Ghost Rider

Avengers #142 (December, 1975)

Posted on by Alan Stewart

Last month we took a look at Avengers #141, which, as regular readers of this blog will remember, ended with three time-travelers — the founding Avenger named Thor, the would-be Avenger known as Moondragon, and their temporary ally, Immortus — touching down in the American West of 1873, just in time to be startled by someone coming up behind them… a someone, or someones, whom our travelers could see, but whose identities remained unknown to us readers…

…at least until the cover of the next issue — the subject of today’s post — where the illustration by Gil Kane and Frank Giacoia (with a likely assist from John Romita) rather gives the game away ahead of the book’s opening splash page…  Read More

Avengers #118 (December, 1973)

Posted on by Alan Stewart

It’s September, and we’ve finally arrived at the climax of Marvel Comics’ pioneering crossover event of the summer of 1973, the Avengers/Defenders War.  Having realized at last that they share a common enemy, the superheroes of the two feuding teams have united to save the world.

So it’s fitting that, for the first time since the storyline began, the cover of this chapter gives us a group shot of multiple members from both teams — although artists Ron Wilson and John Romita have probably chosen wisely in not trying to cram all fourteen heroes, plus supervillains Dormammu and Loki, into a single shot.  Rather, they’ve opted to go with just nine, and it’s interesting to take note of who’s been included.  Unsurprisingly, every character starring in their own series — that’s Thor, Iron Man, Captain America, and Black Panther (in Jungle Action) from the Avengers, plus Sub-Mariner, Hulk, and Doctor Strange (in Marvel Premiere) from the Defenders — makes the cut.  But that still leaves two slots, and they’ve both gone to female characters — the Avengers’ Scarlet Witch and the Defenders’ Valkyrie — which serves to make the cover at least slightly less of a sausage fest.  Better luck next time, Silver Surfer, Vision, Hawkeye, Swordsman, and Mantis (the only shero who didn’t make the cover).

Still, if you’re hankering for a big group shot featuring all the heroes from both teams, no exceptions, then have no worries; Marvel’s got you covered on the book’s opening splash page:  Read More

Marvel Spotlight #12 (October, 1973)

Posted on by Alan Stewart

In several previous blog posts (most extensively in this one), I’ve described the early 1970s horror boom in American comics as part of a larger wave of interest in monsters (especially among young people) that can be traced back to the arrival of the classic old Universal monster movies on television in the late 1950s, and that flourished in the following decade and beyond, ultimately giving us such enduring cultural artifacts as Bobby “Boris” Pickett’s hit 1962 single “Monster Mash”, the Gothic TV soap opera Dark Shadows (which premiered in 1966, but didn’t really didn’t take off until the arrival of the vampire Barnabas Collins in ’67), and, lest we forget, Count Chocula and Franken Berry breakfast cereals, which first crept onto grocery shelves in 1971.  It was a legitimate popular phenomenon, but one that had largely passed American color comics by — at least until the early 1971 revisions to the Comics Code, which allowed for vampires, werewolves, and ghouls to be used “when handled in the classic tradition such as Frankenstein, Dracula, and other high calibre literary works” for the first time since the Code’s adoption in 1954.  Before too many months had passed, spinner racks were filling up with titles like Tomb of Dracula, Werewolf by Night, Frankenstein, and Swamp Thing — and fifty years ago, in the summer of 1973, new ones were continuing to arrive.  Read More

Marvel Spotlight #5 (August, 1972)

Posted on by Alan Stewart

Like many another character to arise out of the production methods of the two major American comic book companies, Marvel Comics’ supernatural superhero Ghost Rider — the one with the flaming skull — had a number of creative minds involved in his beginnings.

Or, alternatively, he was in every significant sense the creation of one sole individual.  It all depends on whom you ask. (Or perhaps that should be “asked”, as more than one of the principals involved is no longer with us.)

That’s true in regards to a number of other comics characters as well, of course — though in most cases, the difference in opinion doesn’t make it all the way to federal court.  But more on that a bit later.  For now, let’s begin with a fact that’s not in dispute — to wit, that the flaming-skull guy who debuted in the 5th issue of Marvel Spotlight half a century ago was not the first comic book hero to bear the name “Ghost Rider”.  Read More

Daredevil #57 (October, 1969)

Posted on by Alan Stewart

The last issue of Daredevil discussed in this blog, #55, ended with the Man Without Fear’s decisive triumph over Starr Saxon, the sinister technologist who’d discovered his secret identity as attorney Matt Murdock back in #51.  While Daredevil’s strategy against Saxon had centered on the rather drastic expedient of staging Matt’s violent demise in an aerial explosion, his ultimate victory actually came about when, while tussling with our hero high over the streets of Manhattan, Saxon slipped and fell to his (apparent) death.  With the man who had known Daredevil’s secret no longer among the living, that specific problem was obviously now solved; but, considering that DD was still left with no civilian identity, and that all of his friends and loved ones still thought he was dead, you’d probably be surprised to find the guy, at the beginning of issue #56, swinging through New York’s concrete canyons singing a happy tune.

On second thought, if you were familiar with late-Sixties Marvel comics — maybe you wouldn’t be.  Read More