The primary subject of today’s blog post is the advent of artist Rich Buckler as the regular artist on Marvel Comics’ Thor (and despite the post’s title, we’ll be spending at least as much time on issue #227 — Buckler’s actual debut on the series — as we will on #228). But as it’s been a while since we last checked in on the God of Thunder (at least in his own book), it’s probably advisable that we take a few moments here at the top to orient ourselves to the current lay of the land in Thor, in terms both of its ongoing storyline and of its creative team.
Cover to Thor #207 (Jan., 1973). Art by Gil Kane and Joe Sinnott.
Let’s start with the creative end of things. As you may recall, the last issue of Thor we looked at, #207, had been written by Gerry Conway and drawn by John Buscema. The last issue published prior to Rich Buckler coming onto the series, on the other hand (that would be #226) was written by, um, Gerry Conway, and drawn by, ah, John Buscema.
Say what else you will about Thor in the early 1970s — it was consistent. At the point he stepped away from the title in 1974, Buscema had been drawing Thor since issue #182, missing only two issues over a 44-month period. (For the record, those issues were #210, which was pencilled by Don Perlin, and #214, for which Buscema was spelled by his younger brother Sal.) As for Conway, he’d been scripting the series since #193; the closest thing he’d had to a break was #200, where he’d only written the two-page framing sequence around the central “Ragnarok” story penned by a returning Stan Lee. Inkers might come and go (and they did), but from the summer of 1971 on through the spring of 1974, you could be pretty sure that when you picked up an issue of Thor, Gerry Conway and John Buscema were going to be your main storytelling team… for better or worse.
Cover to Thor #220 (Feb., 1974). Art by Gil Kane and Dan Adkins (or Mike Esposito).
As for the stories they’d been telling… as we briefly recounted back in October, 2022, the finale of Thor #207 touched off a multi-issue storyline — the Quest for Sif/Karnilla/Balder/Odin/etc. — that found the Thunder God and his companions journeying deep into outer space for a series of encounters with what were (in my opinion) a pretty unmemorable batch of alien menaces, such as Sssthgar the Lord of Lizards and Xorr the God-Jewel. Upon returning to Asgard in triumph in issue #217, Thor proceeded to… almost immediately head back out into space in #218, this time to battle the Black Stars. That adventure concluded with #220, and its wrap-up seems to have prompted Conway to do some reshuffling of the book’s supporting cast. Not only did he write out Rigellian colonizer Tana Nile and crusty old salt Silas Grant — two characters who’d been hanging around to no apparent purpose ever since the conclusion of the Ego-Prime saga in #203 — but he also shelved one of Thor’s closest companions, Balder the Brave, who, after #221, wouldn’t appear again until #244 (by which time Conway had left the book). Meantime, Thor’s three other buddies — Fandral, Hogun, and Volstagg — had also punched their last Marvel time cards for a while, as Thor left them behind in Asgard when he headed back out to space in #218, and Conway abandoned them then and there as well. (The Warriors Three would return shortly before Balder did, in #240.) To be sure, Conway never formally wrote the four Asgardian characters out of the book, giving them an exit scene like the one he provided for Tana and Silas in #221; rather, they (along with Balder’s bad-girl love interest, Karnilla the Norn Queen) simply stopped showing up in his stories.
Cover to Thor #221 (Mar., 1974). Art by John Buscema and John Romita.
So who did that leave for Thor to talk to? Well, Big Daddy Odin wasn’t going anywhere, naturally. And neither was Thor’s lover, the warrior woman Sif, or Sif’s friend and fellow warrior Hildegarde (a Conway creation). That still made for a fairly light bench, however; and so, as of the conclusion of issue #221, we got a new addition to the ongoing character lineup — Hercules, Prince of Power.
The Marvel version of Hercules, as envisioned by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby back in 1965 for the first Thor annual (actually Journey into Mystery Annual #1), hadn’t shown his face in any Marvel comic since Avengers #100 (Jun., 1972), and was plainly available; so why not team him up with his fellow mythological powerhouse for a time? And so, beginning here and continuing on through Thor #239 (not so coincidentally, the first post-Conway issue), the Greco-Roman demigod would be featured as a regular member of the title’s supporting cast.
Cover to Thor #224 (Jun., 1974). Art by John Romita.
Hercules’ stint as the Thunder God’s primary partner in adventuring began, naturally enough, with an Olympian-themed adventure, as the two heroes were predictably (if unconvincingly) manipulated into fighting each other by the actual bad guys, Ares and Pluto. After figuring out they’d been had, Thor and Herc joined together to bring the beatdown to the latter’s no-good kinsmen, along the way rescuing Hildegarde’s sister, Krista, who’d been kidnapped by Pluto and taken to New York City, of all places. Hercules then proceeded to stick around for the return of another one of Thor’s old foes, the Destroyer, in issue #224. Not to be confused with artist-writer Jim Starlin’s recent creation Drax the Destroyer (or, for that matter, the Golden Age Timely/Marvel superhero who preceded both of them), this Destroyer was an invincible suit of Asgardian armor created by Odin to be the Golden Realm’s ultimate defender (as first seen in Journey into Mystery #118 [Jul., 1965]). Needing to be animated by the life force of another being, the Destroyer was possessed this time around by a human scientist named Clement Holmes, who took it on a rampage through NYC before being ultimately stopped by Thor and Herc. Once Holmes’ spirit had returned to its rightful home in his body, our heroes left the now-inert (but surely still dangerous) armor lying on the waterfront dock where it had collapsed, and then went sauntering off into their next adventure… a rather careless action, to my mind, though one we’ll see addressed (sort of) by Conway and company before the end of today’s post.
Cover to Thor #225 (Jul., 1974). Art by John Buscema.
That next adventure got underway in Thor #225, as Thor and Hercules made the acquaintance of a brand-new antagonist, Firelord. Firelord was the latest Herald of Galactus, the Devourer of Worlds, and the third overall to be introduced into Marvel’s continuity — the first having been the Silver Surfer, of course, and the second being Gabriel, the Air-Walker (an android whose body had been destroyed in the course of the one and only storyline he’d appeared in to date, in Fantastic Four #120-122).
Cover to Thor #226 (Aug., 1974). Art by John Romita and (maybe) Frank Giacoia.
Of course, it’s never good news when a Herald of Galactus shows up on Earth, and this time was no different; though, for once, Earth itself wasn’t in peril — at least, not from the Big G. Galactus had actually come to our planet this time seeking not a meal, but help — more specifically, for aid against Ego, the Living Planet, an entity whom Thor had once helped defend himself from Galactus, back in issues #160-161. Since that time, however, Ego had gone insane, and was now a threat to the whole universe… or so said Galactus, anyway. The Son of Odin was perhaps more inclined than most of Earth’s other superheroes would have been to put his trust in the planet-gobbler, due to his having been privileged to learn the latter’s tragedy-laced origin not long after their first encounter, in Thor #168-169; in any event, he consented to accompany Galactus and Firelord into space to check out the situation, and Hercules gamely tagged along. As Thor #226 came to its conclusion, Galactus’ spaceship reached Ego — and it, along with all its passengers was immediately and violently attacked, seemingly proving the truth of Galactus’ words. While Thor and his companions triumphed in the first skirmish, they knew the worst was yest to come.
Cover to Thor #227 (Sep., 1974). Art by John Romita (and possibly also Rich Buckler).
And with that, we come at last to Thor #227, and the passing of the series’ artistic torch from John Buscema to Rich Buckler.
My younger self was pretty sure he knew what to expect from Buckler’s Thor. The artist had been drawing Fantastic Four since issue #242 of that title, which had come out in October of last year, and I was a regular reader of that book. So I was well aware that Buckler had approached that job by specifically and obviously trying to emulate the style of Jack Kirby… and that was fine, as far as I was concerned. After all, Kirby was still “the” Fantastic Four artist, even more than three years after leaving Marvel for DC Comics; and the same was true with Thor. Getting new Thor art that more clearly and intentionally evoked the “good old days” of the King than John Buscema’s stuff (great as it usually was) would ever attempt to do? I could think of worse ideas, for sure.
Like I said, I thought I knew what to expect. And so, I wasn’t prepared for what I got when I opened Thor #227 to its opening splash page…
…and was greeted by a portrait of All-Father Odin that I knew I’d seen before. I even knew where I’d seen it: as a full-page splash panel in Thor #166 (Jul., 1969):
(Inks by Vince Colletta, and text by Stan Lee, for this and all subsequent Kirby-drawn panels, except as noted.)
Thor #166, as it happened, was only the third issue of Thor that I had personally bought new off the stands. It was a book I had thumbed through, if not re-read in full, numerous times; and I knew every image from it very, very well. And I sure hadn’t been expecting to see its fourteenth page lifted more or less wholesale and repurposed as the very first page of “new” interior Thor artwork “by” Rich Buckler. Honestly, if the Thor #227 page had actually been inked by Colletta, rather than Joe Sinnott, I’d have suspected Buckler of simply cutting the Odin figure out of the older book and pasting it onto his own art board.
My discomfiture continued as I turned to page two, which “borrowed” yet another splash panel from the same old Thor issue — the opening splash, in this instance — with Firelord subbing in for the original illustration’s Balder:
And we’re just getting started, I’m afraid. But, for now, let’s get on with our story…
And here we have our next “borrowing”, which comes from Thor #160 (Jan., 1969) — a comic which, almost certainly not the least little bit coincidentally, was the first chapter of the original Galactus vs. Ego storyline:
This one probably wouldn’t have been quite as familiar to my sixteen-year-old self back in the day, as I didn’t buy Thor #160 off the stands, but rather picked it up later as a back issue. However, that wasn’t the case with our next two examples…
This single two-panel tier represents two different instances of artistic appropriation; the first is from Thor #169 (Oct., 1969), which, for the record, was my fifth issue purchased new (inks here by George Klein)…
…and the next is from Thor #161 (Feb., 1969) — my second issue, and one at least as familiar to me in 1974 as #166 was…
(That’s the Recorder following after Thor in the Kirby panel, just in case you’re wondering.)
Here’s another one from Thor #160, with Firelord having taken the place of Tana Nile, this time:
We now return to Thor #227, at least for a bit…
In the next to last panel above, the positioning of Thor’s left hand doesn’t quite match up with its parallel in the following panel from Thor #161…
…still, would anyone care to bet that Rich Buckler didn’t refer to the earlier panel in composing his own drawing?
Or that, before drawing the panel shown directly above, Buckler had taken a close look at the following panel from Thor #166?
OK, so, back to Thor #227…
I’m sure that, in 1974, my younger self was wondering what had become of the Wanderers — that nomadic band of alien refugees from the first world ever destroyed by Galactus — who’d been offered a new home by a seemingly-benevolent Ego at the conclusion of Thor #161. The lack of any sign of them on the Living Planet’s surface didn’t bode well, though one might hope they’d somehow managed to escape the consequences of their host’s madness; alas, as we’d learn seven years later in Fantastic Four #235 (Oct., 1981), he had in fact killed each and every one of them. Bummer.
The above splash is based on a considerably early antecedent than any of the other “homages” we’ve looked at so far, as it goes all the way back to Journey into Mystery #124 (Jan., 1966) — an issue which happens to have guest-starred Hercules:
Still, as old as this image was, the younger me didn’t have to rely on his growing collection of JiM/Thor back issues to be able to recognize it, since the story had been reprinted in Special Marvel Edition #3 (Sep., 1971), bought and read by your humble blogger just three years earlier.
And believe it or not, that’s the last artistic, er, comparison that we’ll be making in our discussion of Thor #227 (though not in the entire post, alas), allowing us to focus just on the story for a while…
Odin rebuffs Sif’s pleadings, though he assures her that if Thor dies, he’ll avenge him by killing Ego. That’s small consolation to Sif, who proceeds to commiserate with her friend Hildegarde; after that, we get a brief scene of Hildegarde borrowing Odin’s Visi-Globe™ to check in on her sister Krista, still recovering from her misadventure with Pluto in a New York hospital, and then it’s back to the action, as Thor at last encounters Ego himself. Or is this giant figure, who’s somehow suddenly appeared (in the Thunder God’s phrase) “like a ghost from out of the air“, the true Ego at all?
“Not so,” declares Thor. “Ego is not defeated — only held at bay.” To achieve true victory, he says, they must find (and presumably incapacitate) Ego’s mind. And to do that, they’ll have to journey to the center of the Living Planet — a task that’s just been made easier by the big hole in the ground left behind by the retreating Ego-giant.
Thor, Hercules and Firelord thus proceed to make their descent, wending their way deeper and deeper, until they come upon a starling sight which, at first, is hidden from the reader. “Zounds!” exclaims Hercules. “Thor — look yonder! In the name of our fathers — what is it?”
And here we’ll leap forward from June, 1974 to July, where, behind its cover by Buckler and Frank Giacoia, Thor #228 picks up right where #227 left off…
The two artists whom we’re told have “stepped in to help Rich out” — Arvell Jones and Keith Pollard — were, like Buckler, alumni of the Detroit, MI comics fan community who were eager to break into the industry as professionals. This appears to be the earliest published credit for each of them; both, of course, would soon go on to successful solo pencilling careers at both Marvel and DC.
As our story continues, Hercules and Firelord continue to battle Ego’s constructs, until the Living Planet suddenly withdraws them back into himself. Once again, Herc is ready to declare victory, though the flaming Herald of Galactus is less certain. Meanwhile, on the other side of the force-barrier…
Wow, Project Worldcore is one impressive-looking structure, isn’t it?
It was pretty impressive back in Thor #135 (Dec., 1966), too… although at that time it was called Wundagore…
(I told you we weren’t quite done with the comparisons, remember?)
Returning to our narrative… “Egros” and Chimu enter the Wundagore Worldcore structure, currently maintained only by a skeleton crew — those charged “to complete the suspending process for the rest” of their world’s populace.
Just a couple more comparisons to go, I promise. This one’s from the “Tales of Asgard” backup that originally ran in Thor #129 (Jun., 1966) (another issue whose lead story featured Hercules, by the way…)
…and now, once again, we return to our narrative…
Egros and Chimu remain on the surface after everyone else has gone, to make the final adjustments to the system… and so, they’re the only witnesses when catastrophe suddenly strikes:
Gerry Conway appears to have had something of a predilection for coming up with origin stories for Stan Lee-Jack Kirby villains that their creators never bothered to craft one for, themselves — perhaps because they simply never got around to it, but also perhaps because they just didn’t think it was necessary. Conway had done this fairly recently with Annihilus in Fantastic Four #140 (Nov., 1973); there, the five pages devoted to the green insectoid’s backstory contributed virtually nothing either to our general understanding of the character, nor did it have any meaningful impact on the outcome of the book’s main storyline; and so might well be considered to be pointless. In our current instance, Ego’s origin is integrated somewhat better into the main, present-day plotline, as it offers an explanation — i.e., the former Egros’ “guilt” over the fate of his race — for the fragile mental state which, triggered by the actions of Tana Nile back during the Ego-Prime story arc, has at last deteriorated into madness. On the other hand, it seems to me that the Ego-Prime incident could have worked just fine as an in-story reason for Ego’s insanity, all on its own. And though the revelations about Ego’s past arguably add a new level of pathos to the character, that enhancement is diminished — at least for this reader — by the fact that, in the end, it’s just not all that interesting. That’s in large part because it follows the same basic outline as the origin that Lee and Kirby gave Galactus in Thor #168-169. An ordinary guy gets caught in a cataclysm that devastates his world, but transforms him into a cosmic entity? Been there, read that.*
Here’s one more from Thor #161…
…and now, on to our climax:
“…Ego’s sojourn might well be an eternal one.” Or, it might last just seven years — which is how long it would take until the Living Planet’s next appearance, in Fantastic Four #234 (Sep., 1981). Oh, well.
Gee, we haven’t even learned Firelord’s origin yet, and he’s already been set free by Galactus. (Nobody tell the Silver Surfer, OK?)**
Remember that bit about Thor and Hercules leaving the Destroyer’s empty shell lying around on the New York waterfront in issue #226? See, it all turned out alright on the end.
We’ve almost reached the end of the story, but I can’t resist sharing one last example of Rich Buckler’s artistic “inspiration” for his work on this and the previous issue… especially since it’s the only one I’ve got that doesn’t come from an older issue of Thor. Rather, it originates with Fantastic Four #49 (Apr., 1966) — the middle chapter of the famed “Galactus Trilogy” (inks by Joe Sinnott):
Hey, if you’re going to lift an old Jack Kirby image of Galactus from somewhere, why not go with one of his earliest and best known appearances?
And so, our story — and Rich Buckler’s initial, two-part outing drawing Thor — comes to an end. In marked contrast to his other major Jack Kirby-following assignment, Fantastic Four — which he ultimately would draw for 20 issues (plus two “Giant-Size” installments) before taking a 12-year break from the feature — Buckler would serve only a short stint as the Son of Odin’s illustrator, leaving the book after only two more issues (he’d be succeeded by a returning John Buscema, who’d remain in place through the rest of Gerry Conway’s run, which would in turn end with #238 [Aug., 1975]). And I have to tell you that I think that was probably a good thing. Because while my younger self may have felt somewhat ambivalent about what Buckler was doing on Thor — if I’m to be honest, there was at least a small part of me that kind of enjoyed being able to identify the original images behind his “new” art — there was probably an upper limit as to how many Kirby swipes even I could have dealt with, back in ’74.
Ah, yes, the “S” word. You’ve probably noticed that I’ve avoided using it up to this point in our discussion. That’s been by intent, as it’s a plainly pejorative term, and one that’s probably used a little too indiscriminately by modern fans. There are, after all, legitimate homages that one comics artist might choose to pay to another — instances where one image’s echo of another is the whole point. And, too, artists can hardly help be influenced by masters in the field, especially when they’re just starting out. And artists may even appear to copy from themselves, sometimes, since there’s only so many ways you can pose a certain character when drawing them from a certain angle. And so on, and so on.
But.
But, there’s a line somewhere — and even if I’m not sure exactly where it is, I am sure that Rich Buckler crossed it in regards to Jack Kirby’s artwork during the time he was drawing Thor. (I’m almost as certain he did so during his semi-concurrent run on Fantastic Four as well, although I will leave that to others to document. Plus, sometime later, there’s the matter of Buckler’s work on Archie Comics’ Red Circle line in the early ’80s, which prompted The Comics Journal to publish an article headlined, “Plagiarism: Rich Buckler Signs His Name to Jack Kirby’s Work”, which in turn prompted Buckler to file suit against the magazine — a lawsuit that, for the record, was dropped soon thereafter.) The number of appropriations made over a mere two issues, as well as the sheer obviousness of them — well, the audacity pretty much takes your breath away. At least, it does mine.
Part of what makes the whole enterprise seem so, well, brazen, is how relatively few issues of Thor the examples I’ve shared come from (and I should note here that I have not done an exhaustive page-by-page, panel-by-panel search, so I’m not saying that I’ve caught all the swipes, by any means). Indeed, the lion’s share come from a single consecutive ten-issue run — i.e., #160-169 — a run which just so happens to be bookended by Thor’s first and second encounters with Galactus (the first of which also features Ego, of course). That’s out of more than eighty Kirby-pencilled issues of Journey into Mystery/Thor, most of which would seemingly have served just as well as sources of inspiration — that is, if an artist weren’t actively looking for the most relevant and convenient extant material to swipe from for a new storyline involving previously-seen characters and settings.
The other thing that really stands out for me as particularly egregious is that “Project Worldcore” splash. It serves no real story purpose — seriously, what do we really need to know about what this facility’s exterior looks like, when we’re never going to see it again after the next few pages? The page is there only for visual spectacle — and if that spectacle has been lifted wholesale from another artist’s work, what’s the point of it?
In one of his final interviews before his death in 2017, Buckler was asked about what interviewer Michael Aushenker described as “the visual homage you paid to Jack Kirby”. The following is excepted from his response (which you can find in full in Comic Book Creator #20 [Summer, 2019]):
I did that on some of the Marvel books I drew because I wanted to. Drawing in that style was also fun and at the same time it was my way of acknowledging the influence and saying thanks. There was nothing else behind it. My sole reason for doing it was my love of the characters and my admiration for Jack Kirby as a creator!… It wasn’t like anybody at Marvel wanted me to draw this way or that way, or that anybody told me to do it. I always drew whatever I pleased in whatever way I wanted anyway.
Buckler went on to describe how, having been asked by several fans if he thought that Kirby minded what he was doing, he decided one day to call him up and ask him:
I didn’t get Jack on the telephone this time as it turned out. He was busy at the drawing table and he couldn’t come to the phone, but I spoke to Roz, Jack’s wife. I asked her pointedly if Jack saw my work on Fantastic Four and some of the other Marvel books where I was doing my Jack Kirby style riffs. I wanted to know: what did he think about it? “Was he offended, or did it upset him?” I asked. Roz told me, “No! On the contrary, he loved it. He took it as a compliment!” That settled the matter for me, right then and
there.
Well, assuming that that’s an accurate representation of what happened, I’m glad that Jack Kirby wasn’t distressed by Rich Buckler’s “tribute” (Buckler’s word) to his work. God knows the man had enough other problems to contend with in his professional life. But, with all due respect to the King, I feel obliged to point out that he wasn’t the one shelling out his coin for warmed-over Jack Kirby artwork served up under the name of Rich Buckler, back in the ’70s and ’80s.
I feel much the same way about an argument mounted by Gerry Conway in his 2012 introduction to Marvel Masterworks — The Fantastic Four, Vol. 14. There, the writer came to his frequent collaborator’s defense on the score of “his attempt to replicate Kirby’s style and story-telling” by writing, in part: “To my way of thinking, criticizing an artist who’s clearly attempting to consciously replicate another artist’s style for doing so is like criticizing a cover band for being a cover band.” To which your humble blogger might respectfully respond: that may be true, but on the other hand, no one would expect to pay anywhere near as much for a ticket to see Almost Elton John as they would one for a show by the actual Elton John. Yet I, as well as everyone else back in the day (and today, too, for that matter, if one wishes to buy reprints, or digital editions) — had to pay as much for Buckler’s Kirby knock-offs as we did for Kirby’s own original work. Frankly, I think we deserved (and still deserve) better value for our money.
We’re almost done here, but in the interest of fairness, I want to acknowledge that Rich Buckler wasn’t the first (or, for that matter, the last) artist to copy old Thor artwork by Jack Kirby in the service of creating “new” Thor artwork. In fact, he wasn’t even the first artist to do so for the sequence of stories we’re discussing today… or even the first such to swipe from Thor #161, for cryin’ out loud.
In the last issue of Thor prior to Buckler’s advent, #226, John Buscema offers us this image as part of the flashback where Galactus fills in Thor and Hercules about his most recent encounter with Ego (inks by Mike Esposito)…
…which has unquestionably been based on this earlier panel from Thor #161, depicting a prior dust-up between the two…
So, yeah… Big John B. did it too. Swiped, I mean. Perhaps every prolific artist does, at some point, though that’s pure speculation on my part. I don’t believe that Buscema did it in such quantities that any knowledgeable fan would ever blithely characterize him as a “swipe artist” (as some do with Rich Buckler), but the fact that he did it at all points to the murkiness of this particular issue, and the difficulty of determining where the line should be drawn. Still, I remain convinced that there is a line, even if I’m not prepared to declare to you exactly where I think it is.
But now I’ve had my say, and while I won’t promise to never write another word on the subject of swiping, I don’t expect to get into it any further in regards to Rich Buckler, who produced a great amount of quality work where this wasn’t a problem. Such as the “Deathlok” story we’ll be looking at in a couple of months, when I post about Astonishing Tales #27. (And yes, I know about the big nod to Salvador Dali’s Christ of Saint John of the Cross in that one, but that’s different, OK? I think it is, at least. You all can let me know what you think come September.)
*Your humble blogger wasn’t the only reader less than enthusiastic about Conway’s origin for Ego; so was comics artist-writer John Byrne. After proclaiming it “silly” in an interview published in Amazing Heroes #1 (Oct., 1981), Byrne proceeded to retcon it away in Fantastic Four #235 (also Oct., 1981); there, the FF followed in Thor’s footsteps in descending into the Living Planet’s depths to encounter his brain — though, as it turned out, the cranium that the Thunder God had run into was a false one (the real brain, as discovered by the Thing in the full-page splash panel shown at right, was located much deeper beneath Ego’s surface, and was a lot bigger, besides). Several months later, an anonymous editorial response to a fan’s complaint in the FF #240 lettercol offered more details (while simultaneously indulging in some fairly biting, if oblique, criticism of Rich Buckler’s “repurposing” of old Kirby artwork):
Ego doubtless created that false brain because… his bodily defenses decreased as one approached the core, and the true brain was forced to use subterfuge to waylay his attackers. The origin given in THOR was false because all the imagery of that origin came from earlier THOR stories. Ego was using Thor’s own memories, somewhat garbled, to create an origin which might arouse some pity in the Son of Odin, at least long enough for Ego to mount a full scale attack.
So now we know why Worldcore looked so much like Wundagore! (I mean, sure, we already knew why… but now, thanks to the subtle snark of an anonymous Marvel Bullpenner in 1982, we have an in-universe reason.)
(Incidentally, for anyone who might presume that John Byrne was merely attempting to honor the intent of Ego’s creators, Stan Lee and Jack Kirby, in his own handling of the character, that’s not quite the case. Byrne also plainly didn’t care for the kinder, gentler approach to Ego that Lee and Kirby themselves had employed when they brought him back for his second go-around, choosing to retcon the Living Planet’s benevolent generosity to the Wanderers at the end of Thor #161 as “a cruel joke” [see left].)
Byrne’s retcon of Ego’s origin lasted more or less intact until Ultimates² (Aug., 2017), in which writer Al Ewing restored the Conway-Buckler material to canon… at least until the 2019 miniseries Silver Surfer: Black, in which writer Donny Cates added some details to the Living Planet’s history which would seem to contradict the “Egros” narrative. Yeah, it’s a bit of a mess. (For a much deeper dive into all this, check out this page at the Appendix to the Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe.)
**Gerry Conway never got around to providing an origin for his and John Buscema’s co-creation; when the former Herald finally did get one, courtesy of writer James Felder in Uncanny Origins #4 (Dec., 1996), it’s unlikely to have resembled anything Conway might have had in mind in 1974, as it posits Firelord as having formerly been a Nova Centurion of the planet Xandar — a conceptual framework that wouldn’t even exist until writer Marv Wolfman and artist John Romita produced Nova #1, published in 1976.
Another very entertaining review, Alan! When I read the Buckler issues 50 years ago, I hadn’t yet read any of those earlier Kirby stories (Thor or FF) and so was entirely unaware of the swipes (and that’s exactly what they were, IMO). But I did read that article in TCJ and while, to my memory, that article focused mostly on Buckler’s many swipes in the FF, I’m not surprised at all to see that he did the same in Thor. And to be honest, while I collected those issues and enjoyed them well enough, they weren’t the sort I ever felt compelled to ever re-read again, although curiously, after obtaining volume 3 of the Essential Thor, which included Kirby’s truncated origin for Galactus, I felt a curious sense of deja vu, thinking I’d read the same thing previously but couldn’t quite remember where but now realize it was due to having read Conway & Buckler repurposing the same story but as the origin for Ego! Sheesh! And Thomas let them get away with it — at least I’m fairly sure Thomas had to be aware of Buckler’s over the top swiping. It’s one thing when recapping an older story, Buscema or whoever else mostly copy the art from the prior tale, but when an artist copies older art for an entirely new story over and over and over again, IMO that’s simply inexcusable and reeks of artistic laziness rather than paying homage to artistic heroes. Hell, even in Deathlok, Buckler introduced an entirely new character called War-Wolf who looked exactly like Kirby’s original conception of the Man-Beast.
True, many other comics artists resorted to “swiping” — Bob Kane was also notorious for that, and maybe Kirby himself could be accused of “swiping” the Demon from a Hal Foster storyline in Prince Valient, but of the prominent comics artists of the 1970s at least, I’m not aware of anyone else who swiped so often and so obviously as Buckler. I also must say that as a comics fan of decades now, I’ve come to appreciate artists who have their own unique style over those who appear to almost slavishly copy the style of other artists. Yeah, many artists started out with styles very much like Kirby’s or, in later years, Neal Adams, but most, such as Barry Windsor-Smith and Bill Sienkiewicz as two prime exemplars, did develop their own styles. With Simonson, during his first run on Thor, solely as artist, he seemed to be drawing in the style of John Buscema, but when he returned years later as writer and artist, his own unique style, in both writing and drawing, was like a massive breath of fresh air for the series which badly needed it. Simonson clearly felt no need to emulate Kirby or anyone else or re-tell variations of old stories for the upteenth time. Of course, prior to his return, Moench and Sienkiewicz made their own efforts, which weren’t too bad by my estimation, but simply couldn’t compare to Simonson’s new vision for the series.
Gerry Conway, who had inherited Thor, FF and Spider-Man from Stan Lee, starting in 1971 and ending in 1973, often seemed to re-visit storylines from about 10 years before (or that were currently being reprinted in his books.
Conway seemed less adept at telling complex stories than people like Englehart, Gerber and McGregor. (However, he had a real shill at “One and Done” stories for example, Madness Means The Mindworm from Spider-Man # 138 published right after this Thor story,
Buckler’s art was competent but very derivative. But, at the same time that Englehart. Gerber McGregor & Starlin were re-inventing the field (and people like Wolfman were creating very high quality and original work in less inventive ways) Lee & Kirby cast a very long shadow.
It seems Marvel only finally broke this cycle when Shooter became the EIC in late 1978 and younger creators, often writer/artists 9like Byrnes and Simonson) were unleashed that Lee & Kirby became a heritage and an inspiration, rather than a leash.
Was Buckler derivative in 1974? Yes.
But despite what innovative people were doing at Marvel in 1974, Marvel seemed to be looking back then, overall.
A phrase attributed to Stan Lee comes to mind, “The appearance of Change.”
The “cover band” explanation by Conway got me thinking about a more apt comparison, musically, for what Buckler did on The Mighty Thor. When a distinctive member of a well-known band—whether the singer, guitarist, bassist, or drummer—leaves, the band often replaces that person with somebody who will contribute to new albums, but also play the previous musician’s parts in concert.
Buckler was working in this mold. He was creating new stories that fit in with the previous issues, stylistically, so he hit similar notes and even, at times, played exactly the same notes. My guess is that readers who were unaware of Kirby’s earlier work and just discovering Thor were stoked by Buckler’s style. Maybe later they felt let down that the artist was hewing so closely to the Kirby line (sometimes literally), just as listeners who discovered, say, Black Sabbath during the Ronnie James Dio years might have to reevaluate the singer’s work after hearing Ozzy Osborne’s original vocals.
That’s an interesting analogy, chrisschillig. I have to say it falls down for me somewhat, in that Buckler wasn’t replacing one key member in a “band” that otherwise remained more or less the same. No one on the Thor creative team in 1974 had collaborated on the book with Kirby. (Joe Sinnott may have inked one or two issue here or there, but Kirby’s primary inker on the series was Vince Colletta.) So it’s more like Black Sabbath split up completely when Ozzy left, and Ronnie James Dio and several other musicians started a new band that played Sabbath’s old stuff and even called themselves “Black Sabbath”. Somehow I don’t think that would have flown with the OG band’s fans. 🙂
The band analogy may work in regard to concerts, although in my case I rarely went to concerts but collected a lot of albums. I didn’t get that much into Black Sabbath but in the early ’80s worked (at a pizza restaurant in Sunnyvale, CA) with several guys who were very much into heavy metal and paid close attention to changes in their favorite bands, such as Black Sabbath and Rainbow, and Ozzy & Ronnie when they went solo. In some cases, changes in personnel result in the band becoming very different despite keeping the same name, such as Genesis after Peter Gabriel departed and Phil Collins took over lead vocals and most of the songwriting. Then there are those bands like the Beatles that despite not changing members still went through so many stylistic changes within their recording career from 1962 to 1970 that anyone not paying attention would have thought it impossible that the band that released Love Me Do in 1962 also released Tomorrow Never Knows in 1966, or A Day in the Life in 1967. Other bands essentially become their own cover band, as all or nearly all of the key members are replaced but the band name stays the same. But the main thing is, the original albums are available for anyone who wants to get them but the concert experience is usually a bit different, whether with the same singer or not. Still, I think most Black Sabbath fans going to one of their concerts in, say, 1979 or 1980, knew that Ozzy had been kicked out and replaced with Ronnie James Dio and wouldn’t have expected Ronnie to try to sound like Ozzy, even when singing one of their classic oldies like Paranoid.
As to comics, I don’t think most fans mind too much when an artist draws in a style similar to that of a key predecessor on the title, but many would feel cheated once they realize that an artist isn’t simply adopting the style of that predecessor but precisely (or very nearly so) copying the actual work of that predecessor many times over without ever admitting to doing so in the published work itself, in other words, engaging in plagiarism (something Led Zeppelin got into some trouble over too in their electrified covers of old blues songs whose original authors were known but which were credited to the band or Page & Plant). Early in his career, Barry Smith drew in a style heavily influenced by both Kirby & Steranko, but I’m not aware of him ever directly copying either of their works and claiming it as his own. On the other hand, that’s exactly what Buckler did multiple times, even after many years in the profession.
I knew this conversation was coming and it seems to be going pretty much as I expected. Marvel obviously didn’t care if Buckler “swiped” Jack’s work, or they would have One) told him to knock it off, or Two) stopped giving him new work as a result. They did neither, so shame on them. As for whether it’s fair to paint Buckler with the “swiper’s” brush, there’s a huge difference between someone who chooses to emulate someone entirely as an homage, such as (in keeping with our musical analogy) Todd Rundgren which he crafted a perfect cover of the Beach Boys “California Girls,” or Epic, when they turned in their pitch-perfect cover of “Easy” by the Commodores. These are one-and-done tributes that acknowledge the talent that came before. Buckler, however, “paid tribute” so often it became part of Buckler’s perceived “style” at least insofar as it pertained to Thor and the FF, and that, I think is where the line got crossed.
If it walks like a duck, quacks like a duck and chomps a cigar like a duck, then it’s Rich Buckler and Howard and Donald ought to be suing him too.
By the way, Conway’s work here was nothing to write home about in these issues, either.
Thanks. Alan.
Never liked Buckled and didn’t know until years later he swiped prolifically. Did you know that habit drove a writer to quit DC back when?
https://www.cbr.com/star-hunters-david-michelinie-rich-buckler-swipe-space-sentinels/
I liked Star Hunters.
I thought Micheline & Layton were going to be important to DC and that letting them get away was foolish (I now understand that even if this had not happened they were recent enough hires, they probably would have been let go, like Milgrom and Hama & others.
Oh well, it was the best thing to happen to Iron Man since Gene Colan..
I, for one, was a big fan of Buckler’s FF work (as well as his brief stint on Thor) because I had been an even bigger fan of Jack Kirby’s work on those books. In the years following Jack’s departure I never thought those books looked right, especially FF. And that’s not to fault Buscema, whose work on Avengers and other features I loved. It’s just that I wanted Jack back. And if Buckler could make FF look like I was used to, more the better. I knew he was ‘borrowing’ shamelessly from old Kirby panels, but I praised his swiping rather than deriding it.
I suppose you *could* argue that it was what the market wanted, just as two decades later in the early 1990s when Marvel’s biggest artists left to found Image Comics, in the short-term Marvel hired some new guys who drew almost exactly the same as them. I well remember in my teenage years feeling a mixture of outrage and admiration at the utter audaciousness Marvel demonstrated when, after Rob Liefeld quite X-Force, he was *immediately* replaced by a new guy named Mark Pacella who at the time was a literal Liefeld clone. Perhaps not quite the same as having Buckler doing Kirby pastiches on FF and Thor, but still pretty close in spirit.
Beyond the egregious copying of JK’s work – indefensible, in it’s sheer quantity; like copying your report on Portugal out of the encyclopedia word for word – it looks like Buckler very closely imitated Quasimodo when drawing his Ego-on-two-legs figure. I would guess it was maybe from the Silver Surfer/Quasi story in an FF annual?
looked it up – FF Annual #5
That Silver Surfer story from FF Annual #5 had just been reprinted in GS Defenders #1!
Wow — you do a great job explaining why Buckler has such a reputation as a swipe artist. And yeah, much worse than Conway’s “cover band” argument. I don’t know that I’d spot it reading then or now, though I can often spot recycled story ideas.
Also Buckler’s Ego looks like a stop-motion figure from an old Rankin Bass special, more comedy than cosmic.
I liked Ego welcoming the Wanderers. Byrne talks a good game about how much he respects the greats but …
Given what a genocidal monster Galactus is, this kind of “Hey, he has a good side” story rarely works for me (don’t get me started on the FF saving his life). I’ve been rereading some of the Lee/Buscema Silver Surfer series from the late 1960s and the premise that the Silver Surfer is some saintly pure soul kind of ignores how much blood he has on his hands.
Well, both Francis of Assisi & Ignatius Loyola’s first careers were as professional Soldiers.. Is that better than being the Herald of Galactus? Especially where Norrin Rad took on the role to save his own world. from Galactus?
I agree with Alan, discussing the subject of “swiping” in comic books is such a big old can of worms, because at one point or another nearly every artist has done it. Between unforgiving deadlines and very low page rates, artists have often relied on swipes to get the job done on time. It’s a time-honored tradition in an industry that often does not treat its talent fairly. And I don’t think there’s really any sort of definitive line or solid demarcation, no precise mathematical formula, between fair use and egregious abuse. Rather, it’s more like a sort of grey zone between the two.
Having said that, unfortunately, I think more often than not Rich Buckler really overdid it with the swiping, on Fantastic Four and Thor and elsewhere. The sheer volume makes it difficult to ignore.
I feel like there’s two Rich Bucklers: the talented creator who did Deathlok and Black Panther and who was a really cool convention guest who made time for all his fans, and the guy who was very over-reliant on recycling the work of other artists, to the point where it became almost a running joke, and he ended up aggravating the other people who he was working with by what could certainly be described as plagiarism.
I do find it amusing in a certain sort of way, though, that precisely when Bucker was recycling so much of Jack Kirby’s artwork on this title, Gerry Conway was simultaneously recycling the origin of Galactus for Ego the living planet. Seems like they were of one mind when it came to liberally borrowing from Kirby & Stan Lee works.
In any case, Alan, thanks for the insightful, detailed look at these issues of Thor. I eagerly await your next post about Buckler’s Deathlok serial.
On the example of his you cite, I’d give Buscema the benefit of the doubt as that was a flashback –
unless there are other obvious examples, though he does sorta half joke about swiping Kirby here:
“BUSCEMA: Well, like I keep repeating, I enjoy doing animated stuff. You know, animals, people, and stuff. I just don’t enjoy doing the mechanical crap. You know, Jack Kirby used to draw the most beautiful machines, and you can see the guy enjoyed doing it. He’d come up with a different idea every panel and I’d swipe his because I couldn’t stand drawing these goddam machines. [laughs]!
https://www.twomorrows.com/alterego/articles/13buscema.html
As for Buckler’s depiction of Ego. I am unfortunately reminded of Georges Méliès‘ 1902 Trip to the Moon
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Trip_to_the_Moon#/media/File:Le_Voyage_dans_la_lune.jpg
I didn’t get this particular issue but as this is late stage Thor for me, I just got the general feeling that there was a of lot of regurgitation in more ways than one (as I had no idea of the swipes at the time).
what Ragnarok? Again? Galactus with another herald ? Again? What Odin incapacitated ? Again?
I know later Thor got revived later but I was well gone by then.
“On the example of his you cite, I’d give Buscema the benefit of the doubt as that was a flashback –”
Just a quick point of clarification (which I should have made earlier in regards to one of frednotfaith2’s comments, I now realize) — while the Buscema panel does come in the middle of a flashback, it’s not a flashback to Galactus and Ego’s first battle in Thor #161 (the source of the Kirby panel) — rather, it’s an incident from Big G’s most recent encounter with the Living Planet, which he relates to Thor and Hercules en route to the latter.
Not a “recap”, in other words, since this scene had not been shown before.
Well, Buckler had been a Neal Adams assistant (before and during the Crusty Bunkers and Continuity Associates era), so Buckler used Neal Adams tropes in his art, notably in his 1970s and ’80s DC work (see, e.g., Superman v. Shazam [inked by Dick Giordano, no less] and Danger: Dinosaurs at Large [inked by Joe Rubenstein, no less] and the Black Panther series in Jungle Action (notably Malice by Pale Moonlight).
However. no less a light than Jim Steranko said he considered Rich Buckler’s art on Giant sized FI # 3 as one of the most dynamic Superhero stories ever.
When I was a LT in Germany in the mid-1980s, I thought Buckler had really come into his own on Spider-Man in the Death of Jean DeWolf stories, that I would see in AAFES book stores.
On top of those: “Never draw anything you can copy, never copy anything you can trace, never trace anything you can cut out and paste up” Wally Wood,
I really liked Buckler when he was doing his Adams riffs, less so than when he was doing Kirby. My feeling was that Marvel was happy for Buckler to be imitating Kirby. It is not a co-incidence that when Kirby moved to DC, more Kirby art remained published by Marvel than by DC. Agree with both Ben and John on their comments on swiping. Romita did a lot of Ditko poses when he first drew Spidey ( in the pages of DD) and Adams did a few Kirby poses in his 2 issue Thor stint. However Buckler and also Adkins really went to town with their Marvel art, and it is all such a pity, because they were really good artists in their own right. The recently deceased Keith Giffen I recall was also lambasted decades ago for overly apeing the style of Argentinian artist Munoz ( and before that Giffen of course was a Kirby clone, but one with his own style of Kirby).
No one has mentioned Ron Frenz? If anything, Ron is the best Kirby swipe artist ever. I really took his version of ( Kirby and Buscema’s) Thor!!!
Alan, I continue to love your efforts and the reactions that the blog receives. You are a fantastic researcher….I would never have the patience or observational memory go and find the sources of all the swipes!!
I appreciate the compliment, Spirit… though I gotta say, I’m not at all sure I identified all the swipes in these two issues; in fact, I’m pretty certain I didn’t. 🙂
In my mind, Ron Frenz really takes the best elements of Jack Kirby, Steve Ditko, John Romita, John Buscema and Sal Buscema and distills them into a really attractive, exciting, enjoyable style. In other words, he has several obvious inspirations, and I don’t feel like he’s wholly dependent on just one artist. I get that it’s a fine line, but Frenz’s work really feels more like homages than swipes.
Romita admitted intentionally trying to imitate Ditko on Spider-Man in his first few issues, since he assumed Ditko would probably be back soon because of the sales on the book. (It appears Romita did not know Ditkp personally . . .)
Adams wrote about intentionally doing Thor with a Kirby-take as a tribute (sort of the “Conway “Tribute Band” take).
When Dave Cockrum left the LSH,, Grell;s first issue had more of a Cockrum vibe than his later stuff (or his Aquaman in Adventure or Phantom Stranger work (which was done earlier).
It feels a bit weird to me that a large part of this article (and the comments) discusses Rich Buckler’s swiping, but your previous article (Dr Strange #4) doesn’t even mention the extent to which Frank Brunner was swiping (most often from Neal Adams’ Deadman, but a few other places as well). Brunner’s entire run on Dr Strange ‘borrowed’ extensively from Neal Adams, but nobody seems to want to identify or comment on this.
He seems to get a pass because he is obviously a talented artist, but he seems to align with the Dan Adkins’ school of swiping as the easiest and quickest way to get the job done. It’s not even full-page splashes, it’s little panels that you would think an artist with any talent could create from scratch.
I was busy and didn’t get a chance to comment for the last article, but it seems appropriate here as so much of the conversation is around this issue. Alan, I have put together a document showing some of Brunner’s more obvious swipes, if there’s some way of mailing it to you? Like you, I don’t imagine I’ve caught every example, but there’s a fairly good sampling.
mike, the simplest answer to why I didn’t call out any Neal Adams swipes from Frank Brunner’s work on Doctor Strange #4, or in earlier issues, is that I wasn’t aware of them. If you’ll go back through my previous posts, you’ll see I did note an “homage” Brunner made to an Adams Strange Adventures cover in one of his first Dr. Strange stories, in Marvel Premiere #10. I also called out his swipe of an unpublished P. Craig Russell drawing for his opening splash in Doctor Strange #1, so I don’t think anyone could say I’ve given him a free ride.
A big part of what I do here is to share what I recall of my experiences when I first read these comics, fifty years ago. My memories of discovering Rich Buckler’s appropriations of old Jack Kirby Thor art in Thor #127 and #128 have remained quite vivid after half a century, and that was the main driver behind the post. Most of the swipes I described were either ones I’d recognized immediately in 1974, or ones I stumbled across while verifying the sources of the ones I already knew about. As I’ve already noted, I feel pretty certain that I could have found more — maybe a lot more — if I’d looked harder; but that wasn’t really the point of the post.
All that said, I’d like to know more about the extent of Brunner’s “borrowing” from Adams in his Dr. Strange work, and I imagine other readers would too . I suspect that the best way for you to share what you have is to comment individually on the issues in question (it’s never too late!), but I’ll send you my email address, so you can send me your document, and then we’ll see where we go from there.
Adkins was a long time assistant and colleague of Wally Wood. who probably taught him the philosophy. Several of the most recered Wally Wood art jobs at Tower were drawn (in whole or in part) by Adkins.
It might be different where you are acting (and were hired to be) an “extender” to draw in someone else’s style to producer more output.
Dan Adkins’s issue of the X-Men is clearly drawn in a Wally Wood style, there was no attempt to hide it. I’ve read that Stan Lee’ objection to Woods’s work on the Dr. Doom stories in Astonishing Tales was not his assistants were doing most of the work, but that it was too obvious. .
Hi Alan, my initial experience with Buckler’s art is similar to yours, except involves his Fantastic Four work. During my comics-reading days during the the Silver Age I was mainly an FF fan; I had the current issues as well as back issues and also avidly read the older FF stuff in Marvel Collectors’ Item Classics/Marvel’s Greatest Comics. Then a few years later, other interests took hold and I quit comics cold turkey.
Flash forward several decades to the 2000s, when I became re-interested in Marvel (and DC) superhero comics thanks to the internet and the presence of comic book communities such as forums, blogs, etc. All of a sudden nostalgia hit and I couldn’t get enough of revisiting the old superhero comics of my childhood. This included catching up with things I’d missed, namely 1970s comics. I bought a ton of back issues and gobbled up all the Essentials and Showcases volumes I could find at Barnes and Noble.
Well! I could not believe my eyes when I started reading some 1974 FFs. It all looked so familiar and as I checked my older FFs, I realized just how many of the 1974 panels were based on the old Kirby FF–mostly from the Sinnott era, but there’s plenty of older stuff there too. With my Essentials in hand it was easy to just check, since the FF Silver Age is indelibly imprinted on my mind. I usually knew right away what panels or art was being copied, so it was easy for me to identify from what issue or story arc the art was being copied (or lightboxed) from.
Anyway, several years ago as a project I started to record my findings in a blog. If you are interested in seeing Buckler’s FF inspirations, you may want to take a look at my old blog Panelocity. There’s also Thor and other work in there: https://panelocityhomageswipes.blogspot.com/
What especially fascinated me was that for his FF stories Buckler not only swiped from old FF issues, but also from other 1960s Kirby comics such as Thor, Captain America, and Avengers 1960s comics. The sheer volume is astonishing! Plus the swipes were not always “one to one”, say a Reed swipe resulting in Reed. No, at times it was more subtle than that; the swipes were also used for compositions and how a panel’s action was constructed, or how characters were positioned.
Sharon, I came across your blog when I was doing research for this post, and really enjoyed my visit. 🙂. I’m glad you stopped by and shared the link here.
You also raise a good point about the swipes which aren’t quite one-to-one, as you put it. From my perspective, it seems somewhat less egregious for RB to base a Reed pose on a Cap pose than to turn a splash of Thor flying into another splash of Thor flying — in the former instance, he at least had to draw a different costume, mask, etc. I’m curious to know if other readers see it that way.
I just spent an enjoyable 20 minutes or so at your blog, Sharon. I’m in awe of how many swipes/homages you have been able to identify. I’m lucky if I’ve recognized a handful of swipes in my entire reading career, and here you are with dozens and dozens. I’m bookmarking your site!
Glad you enjoyed it, Chris–and thank you for the kind words.
Life has been keeping me busy so updates are few and far between, but I do have some 1980s Buckler FFs that I’ll get around to posting at some point. Stay tuned…:)
One of the comments from the author on the first Deathlock issue (which contained George Perez;s first published work_ was that George Pérez’s early work as Buckler’s assistant was to research old Kirby pages..
In fairness to Buckler, these appear to be new work that copies classic Kirby compositions. rather than tracing or copies,.
When I was a kid, I spent many a day, attempting to free hand draw Kirby, Ditko , Kane & Anderson images. It is how you learn to draw comics at first if you are not professionally trained..
I was more of a DC reader in this period, so I knew Buckler as “the Neal Adams swipe artist” instead of “the Kirby swipe artist.” The thing is, it actually does take talent to reproduce another artist’s work (assuming you’re not just using a light table). It just seems like talent wasted. Whenever I consider an artist like Buckler or Shelly Moldoff, it always seems like they took a short-sighted view of things: they got steady work, they paid the bills, but ultimately they kind of sold their legacy short. They’re typically not remembered as greats because they didn’t add anything particularly original to the medium. In fairness, who knew these stories would live on so long after their initial publication and still be showing up in collected editions decades later? And posthumous fan adulation is no substitute for food on the table in the here and now. But still.
This was the period I started reading comics and while I was willing to give anything a go, Thor had zero appeal to me. Besides featuring dialog that was ridiculously stilted even by 70s comic book standards, the title never seemed to be going anywhere or doing anything particularly exciting, with Thor and the gang wandering randomly through airless space in a wooden longboat. That one-page Hostess ad where he fought space hillbillies made about as much sense as any of his adventures, and took a lot less of my time to read, so I left it at that. It was only when Simonson showed up that I came to realize how cool a character could be, and only years after that before I worked backwards to discover the joy of the Lee/Kirby run. But this run I considered the thunder god’s time in the wilderness: Thor never got my quarter and I only read my friends’ copies once I’d run out of everything else to read. Even now, looking over your scans in this article, I felt my eyes glazing over and my mind shutting down, except for the game of “spot the swipe.”
But thanks for the review and insights. And for reading it again so I don’t have to. 🙂
There’s an old Eclipse comics Mr.Monster/Airboy crossover where the central character is a comics artist who always took the easy route and swiped whatever there was a market for. Now he’s old and bitter and feels his life has never amounted to anything — which is when things start to get weird (as you might guess from the cast). I really enjoyed it.
I’m going to have to look for that one!
Wow. I did read this issue 50 years ago and while it was not a favorite, I didn’t realize the extent of the swiping on this and the previous issue of Thor…and I had started reading Thor in early 1968 and read the other earlier referenced issues as reprints. Your research was incredible here and I believe I spotted other swipes, possibly from sources such as FF (not Thor) and there was also a full page splash of Galactus that you reproduced where he has a big “G” on his chest (that came from his first appearance in FF, and was quickly removed since after all he is from another galaxy and would not have a “G” on his chest). That was really strange since I don’t think Galactus appeared anywhere else in this Thor story with that big “G”. I found this swiping to be really disappointing because Rich Buckler was actually a good artist, as other have pointed out and his work on Black Panther and Deathlok was genuinely interesting and innovative. I also fondly remember his first few issues of Avengers, 101-104, with the covers of 102 and 104 being particularly good. He also did a lot of good work for DC and could generally be a good cover artist (except when he was swiping the cover of FF 42 for FF 148….sigh). Alan, your comment about Gerry wanting to provide origins for Stan and Jack’s characters is interesting and on target, since Gerry also provided an origin for the Puppet Master in, of all places, Marvel Team-Up 6. As to my feelings regarding Thor 228, I believe you provided a good review and I don’t think I could add anything else (without being negative). It was disappointing to see an origin that was so similar to the Galactus origin from Thor 169 that I had bought and read in 1969…
I did give some thought to why John Buscema missed four issues of Thor at this time, because he actually remained the official Thor artist until early 1977 and actually returned the following year (1978) to work with Roy Thomas and stayed until leaving permanently in 1979. So where did John go? Apparently he was really busy and needed help with Thor… He was working on Savage Sword in June 1974 and he would be drawing a very lengthy story for SSOC 2 (which I believe you will be discussing in a few weeks) but he was also pressed into service on 2 other magazines… He drew Ka-Zar stories for the revived Savage Tales as well as starting to draw the bi-monthly Ka-Zar series. This all occurred in the same summer 1974 time frame that Thor 227-230 came out. Thanks again to the Grand Comics Database! There may have been other work he was doing at this time, possibly for the black and white horror magazine but I’m not sure. Just thought you would find this of interest. Thanks Alan!
Another reason might be Buscemi’s two Avengers fill-ins and penciling AND Inking two issues of Conan, Just before this . . . . The “Dreaded Deadline Doom” often seemed cumulative . . . .
Checked out the Puppet Master origin in MTU 6. I rather like it — it’s tragic enough to make him more interesting while also establishing that yes, he’s a scumbag even so.
Conway also gave Poison Ivy her first origin back in a World’s Finest WW story.
I’m much more of a casual comic book fan than anyone else here and I certainly didn’t notice the swipes at the time I originally read Thor 227-228 even though I remembered very well the Kirby Thor/Galactus saga from 1968-69. I confess that until I read this blog post that I never imagined that artists would steal from each other like that, to say nothing of not raising bloody Hell when they were stolen from (ESPECIALLY someone like Jack Kirby).
There isn’t much more for me to add here (without swiping the comments of others, ha ha) except to postulate that this kind of thing is what happens when the comic companies pay low page rates, don’t allow artists to own/keep their own original work (so there is no incentive to create it) and the comic companies don’t care that it’s happening.