Sal Buscema

Defenders #23 (May, 1975)

Posted on by Alan Stewart

The fifty-year-old comic book referred to in the title line of this blog post presents the second chapter of a four-part storyline.  And, seeing how we didn’t feature a post about Defenders #22 here in this space last month, regular readers of the blog know what that means: we’ll be covering that issue before moving on to our ostensible main topic, i.e., Defenders #23.  But wait, there’s more!  Because, although the story chronicled in another half-century-old comic, Giant-Size Defenders #4, isn’t technically part of the same arc, its events do preface those of the main Defenders title’s “Sons of the Serpent” saga in some significant ways.  For that reason, we’ll be spending a little quality time with it before proceeding even as far as Defenders #22.  It’s a three-fer today, folks.  Read More

Avengers #134 (April, 1975)

Posted on by Alan Stewart

While it may say “Avengers #134 (April, 1975)” on the title line above — and, yes, that is that very issue’s cover (pencilled by Gil Kane, inked by Joe Sinnott, and probably touched up by John Romita) that’s displayed right above that — we’ll actually be beginning this post by looking at the preceding issue, Avengers #133 (whose cover by Kane, Dave Cockrum, and Frank Giacoia is shown at left).  That’s because the last time we checked in with Earth’s Mightiest Heroes was in November’s post about Giant-Size Avengers #3, which, as you may remember, ended right in the middle of the extended storyline that today is generally known as the “Celestial Madonna Saga”.  And while covering more than one comic in a single blog post is hardly anything new around these parts, your humble blogger feels moved to point out that, even more than with most continued stories of this era, this one happens to be so information-dense, particularly at this juncture, that a brief synopsis could never, ever cut it.  Read More

Defenders #21 (March, 1975)

Posted on by Alan Stewart

Fifty years ago this month, the Gil Kane-Klaus Janson cover of Defenders #21 heralded the beginning of a new storyline.  But as soon as we readers of the time turned to the comic’s opening splash page — not to mention the double-page spread that followed immediately thereafter — it was clear that although the “A”-plot of the recent three-parter that had wound through two issues of Marvel Two-in-One before concluding in Defenders #20 might indeed have reached its end, the series’ new regular writer, Steve Gerber, was in no way ready to drop the plot element that had driven much of the action of that arc — the mystery behind the past life of the superheroine we knew as Valkyrie…  Read More

Giant-Size Avengers #3 (February, 1975)

Posted on by Alan Stewart

Last month we took a look at Avengers #131, which ended with Earth’s Mightiest Heroes being transported against their wills to the realm of Limbo, where they were set to face off against a Legion of the Unliving assembled by their long-time foe, Kang the Conqueror.  This month, we’ll be discussing the “two-part triple-length triumph” which that comic’s final page promised as a follow-up… a story which, following a pattern that had been set the last time that an issue of the quarterly Giant-Size Avengers rolled around, doesn’t actually begin in the book whose Gil Kane-Frank Giacoia cover graces the top of this post; but, rather, in the one whose cover by Ron Wilson and Giacoia is shown at right: the latest (as of fifty years ago) issue of our assembled heroes’ regular monthly title, Avengers #132 (Feb., 1975).  Read More

Defenders #20 (February, 1975)

Posted on by Alan Stewart

Art by Jim Starlin (and maybe John Romita).

Art by John Romita (and maybe Tony Mortellaro).

Fifty years ago, in November, 1974, Steve Gerber began his tenure as the regular writer of Marvel Comics’ Defenders series with the very issue we’re discussing here today.  But, as we’ve covered in a couple of recent posts, Gerber had already been warming up for his new assignment for several months.  In October, he’d scripted the third issue of the “non-team”‘s quarterly vehicle, Giant-Size Defenders, working from a plot by himself, artist Jim Starlin, and incumbent Defenders writer Len Wein.  But even beyond that, readers picking up Defenders #20 in November found that they weren’t just buying the first issue of the group’s monthly title to carry Gerber’s name in the credits; rather, they were coming in on the third chapter of a continued storyline that had begun back in August in the pages of another Gerber book, Marvel Two-in-One, which regularly featured the Fantastic Four’s Thing teamed up with a rotating roster of guest stars — in this case, the two Defenders known respectively as Doctor Strange, who’d co-headlined with Ben Grimm in MTiO #6, and the Valkyrie, who’d done the same in MTiO #7.  Read More

Captain America #182 (February, 1975)

Posted on by Alan Stewart

The cover of Captain America #182 — drawn by Ron Wilson and Frank Giacoia (with probable touch-ups by John Romita) — offered few, if any, hints of major surprises to be found within its pages.  Here’s Steve Rogers in his new heroic identity of Nomad, continuing his ongoing battle against the Serpent Squad, with a symbolic (and huge) representation of his former (and, of course, much better-known) costumed alter ego looming in the background.  Pretty much what anyone who’d been following this title for the past several months would expect.

But upon turning to the issue’s opening splash page, we readers of November, 1974, learned that changes had indeed come to Captain America…  Read More

Marvel Two-in-One #7 (January, 1975)

Posted on by Alan Stewart

As of October, 1974, Steve Gerber had been the writer on Marvel Two-in-One for a year — ever since the series teaming the Fantastic Four’s Thing with a rotating cast of co-stars had jumped from its previous home in Marvel Feature to its own brand-new title, in fact.  Intriguingly (though perhaps also understandably), with the whole Marvel Universe to play with, Gerber had initially opted to choose Benjamin J. Grimm’s partners in adventuring from environs he already knew well — that is, from other series he was already writing.  So it was that in MTiO #1, the Thing had come face-to-face with his half-namesake, the Man-Thing; next, in issue #2 he’d first fought and then joined forces with the Sub-Mariner; and then, in #3, he’d teamed up with Daredevil — a trio of co-stars who were all also headliners in other Gerber titles.  Read More

Captain America #181 (January, 1975)

Posted on by Alan Stewart

Last month, in our post about Captain America #180, we covered the debut of the former Captain America, Steve Rogers, in his brand-new superheroic identity of the Nomad.  As regular readers will hopefully recall, the Nomad’s initial outing was somewhat less than completely auspicious, as he tripped over his own cape and failed to prevent the kidnapping of the president of Roxxon Oil by the new and improved Serpent Squad.  Of course, that misstep ultimately did nothing to discourage or deter our hero, who immediately ditched the offending costume piece with no regrets, vowing as he did so that the Squad would get what was coming to them the next time they met — completely unaware that the group’s roster was about to be enhanced by the addition of the evil Warlord Krang of Atlantis, who came bearing the ancient, sorcerous Serpent Crown of Lemuria, no less. Read More

Captain America #180 (December, 1974)

Posted on by Alan Stewart

Last month we took a look at Captain America #179, in which Steve Rogers’ former Avengers teammate Hawkeye — after spending most of the issue disguised as the presumably villainous Golden Archer — managed to convince him that just because he no longer wanted to wear the colors and bear the name of his country, that was no reason he couldn’t still live the life of a costumed hero.  Via the final page’s “next issue” blurb, we even got the name of Steve’s new secret identity-to-be: Nomad!

Now, thanks to issue #180’s cover (pencilled by Gil Kane, and inked by Mike Esposito and/or Frank Giacoia), we get our first glimpse of Nomad in costume — albeit in the form of a quasi-symbolic image that allows the artists to provide a shot of Steve in his more familiar red-white-and-blue togs as well.  Read More

Avengers #129 (November, 1974)

Posted on by Alan Stewart

When we last saw the Avengers, it was at the end of Fantastic Four #150 — the second half of a crossover with Avengers #127 in which both of Marvel’s premiere super-teams came together in the Great Refuge of the Inhumans to celebrate the wedding of the one-time FFer Crystal to the inactive Avenger Quicksilver.

The next issue of Avengers, #128, picked up directly from that two-parter’s events, as behind a cover by Gil Kane and John Romita, writer Steve Englehart and artists Sal Buscema and Joe Staton opened with a scene of the Avengers and Fantastic Four arriving together back in New York, via Avengers quintet.  (Just why the two groups were now traveling together, when Avengers #127 had clearly established that they’d made the journey to Attilan separately, was never explained.  Maybe the FF lent their own ship to the newlyweds for their honeymoon?) Read More