Monday Night Murals: And Lo! There Shall Come...a Mural!!

Long before the the King of Denmark granted Danish merchants monopoly on trade with Iceland, long before the carving of the Jelling Stone, even prior to Björk...heck, waaaaay before the Sampo...



...there were the Norse Gods of Asgard! Mighty Thor, god of thunder! All-Powerful Odin, the All-Father! Mischievous Loki, god of evil! Or maybe just mischief. We're not quite sure. The Warriors Three: Larry, Moe, and Curly! (And occasionally Shemp.) Tammy, Norse goddess of the shopping mall! And, the rest! Here in the mighty halls of Asgard! (gard gard gard gard)

I don't think it's any secret that one of my favorite back-up features in comic books is Stan Lee and Jack Kirby's Tales of Asgard, the short but utterly bombastic back-features to their early stories in Thor #97-145. Some of the tales were reprinted in 1968 in a 68-page king-size comic:



...and reprinted again in 1984 to capitalize on the success of Walt Simonson's Thor (with a spankin'-new Simonson cover):



...but it wasn't until last year that Marvel reprinted all the Tales of Asgard back-ups in a six-issue, newly-recolored series (followed this year with a fancy-schamncy but lovely hardcover). If you're a purist you may balk at the modern colors applied to Stan and Jack's classic (I kinda liked it myself). But how to represent the vast panoply of Lee & Kirby's mythology on a mere six comic book covers? Well, first, call in Olivier Coipel, Mark Morales, and Laura Martin to create the new covers. Here's two of 'em.



Well, those are impressive, but are they covers worthy of the Norse gods? Well, when you connect 'em all into a mega-mural, hoo boy, by Odin, are they ever! You betcha, ya!

Covers of Tales of Asgard #1-6 (July 2009-October 2009), art by Olivier Coipel, Mark Morales, and Laura Martin

Click once, then again, on the picture to Volstagg-size...but wait! Is your monitor worth of the Norse gods? Because this image is truly GOD-SIZED! (So don't click it over a dial-up modem unless you can wait until Ragnarok to see it all!)

I was wondering why the first few issues in the mural are out of order...from left to right, 3, 2, 1,....until it occured to me: of course your want to not only start the series with Thor on the cover, but also put him smack-dab in the middle of the mural as well, so ish #1 has got to be in the middle of the interlocking piece. Poor, Loki...he thought he was the star of this thing! Maybe it's his posture. Sit up, ya lazy galoot!

Anyway, everybody who's anybody in Asgard is in this mural, except maybe Frog Thor and Beta Ray Bill. (And as much as we love 'em, they didn't come around until much later. But maybe they're hanging around in the back behind Hela.) I've used the original Marvel solicitation art rather than the actual comic book covers to let you see the full grandeur of the piece. Wouldnb't you love to have this hanging on your wall? Well, you can, because Marvel's also And if you don't know your Balder from your Brimer, well, there's a handy numbered chart of who's who! (Thor's in there somewhere, believe it or not!)



Want a closer look? Clickety-click on over to Marvel.com and then click on the "ZOOM" button in the upper right hand corner of the image. Did you ID all the Norse gods? Did you forget Candy, Thor's high school crush at Asgard Science and Technical High, cheer captain for the Asgard Vikings and archrival to Sif? I bet you did.

Now, swing your hammer on over to DeviantArt and check out Olivier Coipel's pencils and Mark Morales's inks on the unfinished covers to issue one, two, four and five!

All hail Thor, mighty god of thunder! And so, we bid adieu to fair Asgard...or, in the words of Thor himself from his 1997 hit single "Ride of the Chariots": We go in for the kill / With our iron will / we are the planet riders / in the name of Valhalla!":

365 Days with Hank McCoy, Day 158

Panels from X-Men: First Class v.1 #7 (May 2007), script by Jeff Parker, pencils and inks by Roger Cruz, colors by Val Staples, letters by Nate Piekos

Ten of a Kind: Crouching Spidey, Hidden M.J.

And there you go. Ten covers of a kind that feature...

What? More?

Okay.









So there you are! We've got every single...oh, wait, I forgot the limited edition variants. (Sigh).





And because no Marvel moment is complete without commemorating it in plaster:





And, for those of you who like blinky things, I made this:


Feel free to copy; please don't hotlink


(More Ten of a Kind here.)

365 Days with Hank McCoy, Day 157

Panels from [Uncanny] X-Men #42 (March 1968), script by Roy Thomas, pencils by Don Heck, inks by George Tuska, letters by Sam Rosen

Separated at Birth: You kids better get up or you'll miss the school bus

L: New Mutants #38 (April 1986), art by Art Adams
R: New X-Men v.2 #27 (August 2006), art by Paco Medina and Juan Vlasco

(Click picture to zombie-size)

365 Days with Hank McCoy, Day 156

Panel from Avengers #231 (May 1983), script by Roger Stern, pencils by Al Milgrom, inks by Joe Sinnott, colors by Christie Scheele, letters by Jim Novak

Saturday Morning Cartoon: Robin Hood

Robin Hood (1960), narrated by John Rust, from the "Mel-O-Toons" series produced by New World Productions and syndicated by United Artists. The soundtrack was originally produced for childrens' records from RCA Victor and later animated.

I Don't Like Fridays

Thank goodness it's Friday, huh? Hope you had an excellent June 4. You didn't? Today wasn't that great? You had a bad day? You're taking one down? You sing a sad song just to turn it around? You're coming home and you announce to the world at large, well, that was the worst June 4 in history.

Liar.

Because today we celebrate the negative nine hundred-eighty-fifth anniversary of the worst June 4 of all.



Pages from Legion of Super-Heroes v.4 #38 (Late December 1992) script by Keith Giffen, Tom Bierbaum, and Mary Bierbaum; breakdowns by Keith Giffen; finishes and script assist by Jason Pearson; inks by Karl Story; colors by Tom McCraw


Now, I'm not saying this to top-trump you one one-up you...sure, with your flat tire and your splattered suit and your parking ticket and your expired lunch meat, it wasn't a great day for you. But in the year 2995, they're looking back at your June 4th and saying what a picnic it was.




Yup, the Earth is gonna blow up. Puts your day in perspective, doesn't it? Makes your June 4 look like a date with Katy Perry, huh?* *This simile works best if you are Russell Brand.




Well, well, well. Your day is a walk in the park compared to this. Remember that Monty Python "Four Yorkshiremen" sketch (homaged here by Eddie Izzard, Harry Enfield, Alan Rickman and Vic Reeves)? Yup. That's what the Legion of Super-Heroes thinks about your day.




Still fuming about your crummy June 4? Well, at least you didn't have to be evacuated from the planet you were born on and tossed in a floating space ark with the small percentage of humanity that could be saved, did you? ANo, you did not.




And if you were lucky, you came home, switched on the TV, and watched a little Smallville or Friday Night Lights. You didn't have to see this on your June 4:




Also, I'm pretty much guessing you are not a member of the Legion of Super-Heroes with the oh-so-kawaii spectre of the Grim Reaper looming over you, especially if your name is Ferro Lad.




So, pop open a pint of Ben and Jerry's, sit back, put your feet up, and reflect how, in comparison, you had a pretty darn good June 4th. Maybe your boss yelled at you, maybe you broke a shoelace, maybe your well-planned multi-billion-dollar international jewel heist was foiled by a bumbling French Sûreté detective. I dunno.




My point...and I do have one...is that you never know when the Earth will blow up*, so treat each day as a celebration and a joy. *(June 4, 2995, actually.) Remember to be careful and have fun out there, kids. As one of the great philosophers of the last century once opined:






You know, I've really learned something today. June 4 isn't about flat tires, or fallen soufflés, or whether Shrinking Violet and Light Lass had a thing going on, or whether that guy's name was Mon-El, M'onel, Valor, or Ralph...it's about seizing the carp out of every day and sinking your teeth into life, enjoying every bite, just like Tenzil Kem.




So, Happy June 4. And sweet dreams!

365 Days with Hank McCoy, Day 155

Panel from Ms. Marvel v.1 #16 (April 1978), script by Chris Claremont, pencils by Jim Mooney, inks by Frank Springer, colors by Janice Cohen, letters by Rick Parker

Encyclopedia Bull, Bovine Detective