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From: boyajian@akov68.DEC (Jerry Boyajian)
Newsgroups: net.comics
Subject: Comics Reviews
Message-ID: <2498@decwrl.UUCP>
Date: Thu, 12-Jul-84 10:43:18 EDT
Article-I.D.: decwrl.2498
Posted: Thu Jul 12 10:43:18 1984
Date-Received: Sat, 14-Jul-84 02:18:55 EDT
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FANTASTIC FOUR #271
	Some of you, if you're an oldtimer like me, may remember the old days of
Marvel before the advent of the FF, Spider-Man, Hulk, Thor, etc. The assorted
horror/sf titles, JOURNEY INTO MYSTERY, STRANGE TALES, TALES OF SUSPENSE, TALES
TO ASTONISH, etc. featured wonderfully hoary stories of alien monsters with
names like Tim Boo Bah, Fin Fang Foom, and the like. Usually, these monsters
came from outer space to destroy the Earth, or take it over, or simply eat man-
kind, and some intrepid scientist would find its weakness and destroy it or
drive it away. Well, in this issue of the FF, John Byrne gives a tribute to
those old stories, as Reed Richards recounts his pre-FF encounter with the alien
monster Gormuu. The hommage is perfect, right down to the imitation Jack Kirby/
Dick Ayers style of artwork, including the cover. Younger readers may think it
silly, but to us veterans: what a comic!

MARVEL GRAPHIC NOVEL #11 (Void Indigo)
	This is the prologue, if you will, of Steve Gerber and Val Mayerick's
new series for Epic Comics. I really don't have much to say about it. It isn't
particularly original in concept, nor earth-shaking in execution. If anything,
it's somewhat disappointing as I expected more from the team that gave us Howard
the Duck.

*******>>>>> CAVEAT EMPTOR: While the Epic Comic will carry a "Recommended for
Mature Readers" or somesuch, the Graphic Novel carries no such warning, and it
should. There is a fair amount of nudity (though certainly no more than in HEAVY
METAL or EPIC ILLUSTRATED), and a lot of graphic (very graphic, almost a bit
much for me) violence.

PETER PARKER, THE SPECTACULAR SPIDER-MAN ANNUAL #4
	I don't normally pick up the Spider-Man books, but this looked interest-
ing, so I thought I'd give it a whirl. I was very pleasantly surprised. Bill
Mantlo turned in a very nice, bittersweet love story. The basic plot is that
Aunt May has started getting letters from an old flame, a man she was very much
in love with. The trouble is that this guy was a hood (back then, she was so
blinded by love that she didn't believe he was a hood until it came out in the
open), and has been in prison since then, and only recently has been parolled.
He never stopped loving her, though, and now wants to pick up where they left
off all those years ago. The only problem with this book is that the cover gives
the false "if he can't have her, no one can" impression, and it's not like that
at all.
	One unusual aspect to it is that Spider-Man hardly appears at all in the
book --- it's all May's story, and helps define her character more than anything
else I can remember reading. And even more of a pleasant surprise is that, as
she is drawn here (hell, I can't remember who did the art --- I think it was
Kerry Gammill and Sal Buscema), the young May Reilly was quite a beauty.
	I recommend this comic highly.

ACTION COMICS #560
	Forget the Superman story; it's really blah. What makes this issue worth
picking up is the advent of the back-up series starring the ever-whacko Ambush
Bug. If you're in the mood for a story with fruit flies, "Crazy Eddie" commer-
cials, a Buick being brought to justice, and the amazing Ginsu ("A typewriter
may be the tool of your trade, Kent, but three years later you still can't cook
a chicken on it!"), this is for you.

(Is that enough of a recommendation, Jeff? I can't recall actual issue numbers
--- I'll look them up --- but the Bug has previously appeared in a DC COMICS
PRESENTS with the ("new") Doom Patrol, in another DCCP with the Legion of Sub-
stitute Heroes (one of the funniest comics I'd read in years!) and a recent
issue of SUPERGIRL.)

*****

Before I go, a correction to my previous posting: WARRIOR #19, not #20 came out
the other week.

--- jayembee (Jerry Boyajian, DEC, Maynard, MA)

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