Home of the Fighting Spiders

It's back to school days, and if you're heading off to college for the very first time, well, you're on the road to a grand, exciting adventure, where you'll learn the basic skills and talents that will serve you well for the rest of your life, make friendships whose bonds will never be broken, create memories and experiences of fun and frolic, and have beautiful campus romances that open your eyes to the wonder of love. Also: alcohol poisoning.

If you've been accepted here to prestigious Empire State University in Greenwich Village, Manhattan, you've chosen one of the finest of New York's many colleges, including NYU, Columbia, Dr. Stephen Strange's College of Magic and Mystificationing, The Norman Osborn Institute for Advanced Evil, and DeVry. ESU's talented staff includes several national and international award-winners in their fields, including entomologist Professor Buck Mitty, Dr. Miles Warren of the ESU Applied Cloning Department and his assistant Dr. Miles Warren, physical fitness and self-offense instructor Dr. Frank Castle, and a hobbit:


Panels from Marvel Comics Presents #127 (1993), script by Joey Cavalieri, pencils by Dave Hoover, inks by Jeff Albrecht, colors by Mike Thomas, letters by Mike Higgins

There's no slacking off here at Empire State University, so be sure to budget your time accordingly, especially during your orientation! Be certain to fill in and submit all necessary forms, familiarize yourself with the time and location of your courses, pick up all textbooks at the bookstore who will assure you most sincerely that not only do give you the lowest possible prices, but that there is absolutely no place else where you can find these expensive texts and receive them quickly and professionally. Remember to believe everything the school bookstore tells you: remember, if you don't buy your $108 chemistry textbook there, where will you pick it up? (Also, they have sweatshirts.) Finally, remember to meet with your old high-school bully who is attending the same college, and work out a timetable for the next four years of getting wedgies. Scheduling them now will save you time later!


Panel from Amazing Spider-Man #31 (December 1965), script by Stan Lee, pencils and inks by Steve Ditko, letters by Artie Simek

But don't forget to make time to meet new and exciting friends with unusual and unlikely hair, like a 45-year-old freshman with cornrows and Dick Tracy's Moon Maid!



Remember, that cute little co-ed passing you by might turn out to be the love of your life! Go ahead, give her a "tumble!"



Speaking of which, in college you'll learn the most important life lesson ever: never, never do this:


Panels from Amazing Spider-Man #68 (January 1969), co-plot and script by Stan Lee, co-plot and layouts by John Romita Sr., finishes and inks by Jim Mooney, letters by Sam Rosen

But don't worry if you don't connect immediately. Sooner or later, she'll likely tumble 4 ya.


Panel from Amazing Spider-Man #121 (June 1973), script by Gerry Conway, pencils by Gil Kane, inks by John Romita Sr. and Tony Mortellaro, colors by David Hunt, letters by Artie Simek

Yes, campus life is more, much more, than attending boring old classes and researching term papers. Take time to hang out on the ESU quad with your pals 'n' gals. It's not merely suggested, it's mandatory! Remember, ESUer, grazing in the grass is a gas! Yeah, baby, can you dig it? (Offer of grazing in the grass is available only to students of the classes of 1966-1970).


Panels from Amazing Spider-Man #162 (November 1976), script by Len Wein, breakdowns by Ross Andru, finishes by Mike Esposito, colors by Glynis Wein, letters by John Costanza

Of course, there are other activities available to the socially-conscious young student. Become a member of one of ESU's many organizations for change and do or die, baby!


Panels from Amazing Spider-Man #68

But, don't neglect your schoolwork and your instructors...especially your Professor of Turning Body Mass Into Muscle!


Panels from Amazing Spider-Man #68

For the female freshmanwoman, remember that there's much more to college than gossip, drinking, sororities, clumsy sex and boys...

Two-page spread from Emma Frost #13 (September 2004), script by Karl Bollers; pencils by Adriana Melo; inks by Sean Parsons, Andrew Pepoy, and Eric Cannon; colors by Transparency Digital; letters by Cory Petit
Click image to Harry Pierce-size

...there's also studying, prepping for your eventual later career of stripping at a private hedonistic club based on an old episode of The Avengers until you work your way up the corporate ladder to become the S&M queen in co-charge of psychically subjugating your goodie-goodie arch-enemy and then later initiating an mental adulterous love affair with her husband and long-time love before you move into his bedroom the day after her death and seize half-leadership of an entire race of humanity only occasionally pausing to work for for that race's deadliest nemesis and periodically sleeping with an amphibian, all while dressed in skintight minimum leather corset and high heels. Or, nursing.


Panels from Emma Frost #13

So let's wrap up your orientation to Empire State University by providing you with a copy of the campus map, including all six buildings and our famous Peter van Zante Memorial Fountain. Please, do not pitch pennies in it!


Page from Web of Spider-Man Annual #3 (1987), script by Danny Fingeroth, pencils by Don Perlin, inks by Keith Wilson

Oh, and whatever you do, don't miss our famous annual Homecoming Bonfire!


Panel from Fantastic Four #371 (December 1992), co-plot and script by Tom DeFalco, co-plot and pencils by Paul Ryan, inks by Danny Bulanadi, colors by Gina Going, letters by Jack Morelli

365 Days with Hank McCoy, Day 250

Panel from Astonishing X-Men #1 (September 2008), written by Warren Ellis, pencils and inks by Simone Bianchi, colors by Simone Peruzzi, letters by Joe Caramagna

Monday Night Murals: Star Trek: The Mural Picture

Hey, I promised you a Star Trek mural this week, didn't I?



Or, as it says in the product listing on Urban Collector:

Ever wish you were aboard Captain Kirk's Enterprise? Now you can with the Star Trek: Bridge Full Wall Mural! Printed on the revolutionary pre-pasted Surestrip material, this extra large, photoreal wall mural puts you in the center of the action, and the backing won't damage the underlying wall. Measures 9 feet H x 15 feet W.

You know, I don't make nerds = living in your basement jokes on this blog, but if you've got this, have fun living in your basement.

Oh, what the heck, for you...have another Star Trek mural:

Star Trek v.2 #58-60 (March-June 1994), art by Jerome K. Moore and Tom McGraw
Click image to nuclear wessel-size

I loved the two series of Star Trek comics from DC, which started off, like Marvel's Star Wars comics, trying to tread the thin cosmic string fragment of filling in the mythos between the movies, before the next film came out. If I was writing them I would have killed off Kirk and Scotty and McCoy in every other episode, because you know what? They'll be back in the movie sequel. "Keptain! We're being attacked by tribbles with phasers!" "Mister...Chekov! The lives of...four...HUNDRED..." Eh, too easy a target.

Later in the comic series, like the Pocket Book Trek novels, DC opted for continuity implant adventures that happened during the first or second five year mission (non-canonical tho' the second one may be). I remember some of this three-part story, in which Chekov looks back on his varied career, during which he looks sad a lot, electrocutes Kirk, and has to set his giant floating communicator free, because if he does and it doesn't come back, he never really had it at all.

Anyway, despite not quite matching up at the edges, that's a dandy piece of artwork by Jerome Moore to tie together the three-part miniseries within a series. Some of the DC second series covers are among my very favorite pieces of Trek comic art:



Now tell me you wouldn't wanna read those comics based on their covers!

365 Days with Hank McCoy, Day 249

Panel from Patsy Walker: Hellcat #1 (September 2008), written by Kathryn Immonen, pencils and inks by David Lafuente, colors by John Rauch, letters Dave Lanphear and Natalie Lanphear

Ten of a Kind: Foreign types with their hookah pipes sing

(More Ten of a Kind here.)

365 Days with Hank McCoy, Day 248

Panels from SWORD #1 (January 2010), written by Kieron Gillen, pencils by Steven Sanders, inks by Craig Yeung, letters by Dave Lanphear

Same Story, Different Cover: This never happened to the other fellow

L: Strange Tales #142 (March 1966), art by Jack Kirby and Mike Esposito
R: Nick Fury, Agent of S.H.I.E.L.D.* #18 (March 1971), reprinting Strange Tales #142, art by Herb Trimpe and John Severin

(Click picture to helicarrier-size)


*Spiced Ham In Egg Lard Diet

365 Days with Hank McCoy, Day 247

Beast sticker from X-Men Ultimate Sticker Book (March 2006), written by Alastair Dougall, designed by Mark Richards

Saturday Morning Cartoon: The Hole Idea

Looney Tunes: The Hole Idea (1955), directed By Robert McKimson

Separated at Birth: I can't stop staring in those evil eyes

Get the cameras rolling! We can have a Dazzler movie in theaters in 2011 and she can be in The Avengers in 2012!

Earth-616 in the Balance

Remember the time when the man behind the Captain America mask was briefly Al Gore?


Panels from All-Winners Comics #21 (Winter 1946-47), script by Otto Binder, pencils by Al Avison, inks by Charles Nicholas

365 Days with Hank McCoy, Day 246

Panel from X-Men #2 (November 1991), co-plot and script by Chris Claremont, co-polt and pencils by Jim Lee, inks by Scott Williams, colors by Joe Rosas, letters by Tom Orzechowski

Dial "H" for Hydra

Bad guys get all the best stuff. The volcano hideouts, the sharks with laser beams, the fluffy lap cat...everything cool. You know, the jet packs, the robot spiders, the space-ship swallowing ocean liners, the ocean-liner swallowing spaceships, the weather machines, the Palm Pilots, the sexy robots, the virulent plagues, and let us not forget the trained chimps. That goes double for all your criminal organizations, too: SMERSH, SPECTRE, THRUSH, KAOS, GALAXY, CHUMP, THEM, HIVE, AIM, RICO, and especially HYDRA. You know, "cut one limb off and two more grow in its place" HYDRA? That's a fearful power but must be really hard to buy them a sweater for Christmas.

It's true: if you can get it in the Evil Sky Mall Catalogue, then HYDRA's got one or two. Who do you think it is who really shopped at Evil Brookstone's and Evil Sharper Image? Evil organizations like HYDRA have got to continually keep up with the (evil) Joneses, so it's likely that more than 93% of their ill-gotten gains from gun-running, dirigible heists, and earthquake extortion goes straight back into R&D. And it's worth every penny. Why, without it, they wouldn't have the betatron bomb...


Panel from "Sometimes the Good Guys Lose!" in Strange Tales #138 (November 1965), plot and layouts by Jack Kirby, dialogue by Stan Lee, finishes by John Severin, colors by Stan Goldberg, letters by Sam Rosen
...the overseas fire monitor...


...the tel-a-larm...


..and the only true friend that the Supreme Hydra has ever had.


But none of those things, as amazing, extraordinary, and evil as they are, can hold a flaming stick of dynamite to...

HYDRA'S CRIME DIAL!

Because, when you're overseeing a vast criminal empire, you've got a lot on your mind, so why not apply an animal-based mnemonic to your lieutenants? (Just be sure you're up front in line so you don't get dubbed "The Wombat" or head of "The Cicada Division."

HYDRA's Crime Dial allows the Supreme Hydra to contact every division of his vast nefarious staff, with the possible exception of the "flamingo" secretarial pool. Just spin the wheel, venture to buy a vowel, and reach out to touch a fox or a leopard or a beaver! (What? What? What is everyone laughing about? I don't get it.)


Remember when you were in Cub Scouts and they divided the troops up into animal packs? And you wanted to get picked for the Cougars or the Bears or the Puff Adders? And instead you got stuck in Piglet Squad? Yeah, that's kind of what it's like for the members of "The Mole Squadron" at HYDRA. I picture it as being 30 Rock, but with everybody in green jumpsuits and hoods. Yes, especially Liz Lemon.


Panel from "The Brave Die Hard!!" in Strange Tales #139 (December 1965), plot and layouts by Jack Kirby, dialogue by Stan Lee, finishes by Joe Sinnott, colors by Stan Goldberg, letters by Artie Simek

I suppose HYDRA could have miniaturized this and put it all on a desk with pushbuttons, but hey, if last fiscal year's budget was higher than you expected, you gotta spend the cash on something or you won't get the funding next year. Thus was born the Crime Dial, from which vast troops of tigers can be sent after Nick Fury, brandishing their Sugar Frosted Flakes and telling him how GRRRRRRRREAT! he is.

And so it is why, why they are frequently defeated, HYDRA will never be destroyed for good...because of the Crime Dial. S.H.I.E.L.D.* may have some circular things of their own...



Top: Panel from "Who Strikes at—SHIELD?" in Strange Tales #142 (March 1966), plot and pencils by Jack Kirby, dialogue by Stan Lee, inks by Mike Esposito, colors by Stan Goldberg, letters by Artie Simek
Bottom: Panel from "The Man for the Job!" in Strange Tales #135 (August 1965), plot and pencils by Jack Kirby, dialogue by Stan Lee, inks by Dick Ayers, colors by Stan Goldberg, letters by Artie Simek

But accept no substitutions for the patented HYDRA Crime Wheel, the device so effective it later was seen in Daredevil #121 (albeit not by Daredevil).


Panel from Daredevil #121 (May 1975), co-plot and script by Tony Isabella, co-plot and pencils by Bob Brown, inks by Vince Colletta, colors by Don Warfield, letters by Karen Mantlo

Oh, and let's not forget HYDRA's diabolical Wheel of Food.


from Strange Tales #139
More recently, in the pages of Dark Reign: The List: Secret Warriors: One-Shot, the 2009 Eisner Award-winner for "Most Colons in a comic not drawn by Ernie," HYDRA has modernized their organizational wheel. It's clear that in the years between the Crime Dial and this, somebody's been learning Powerpoint.

"The Zodiac Wheel" from Dark Reign: The List: Secret Warriors #1 (December 2009)
Click image to organizational-bloat-size
But, y'know, that can't be the real HYDRA organizational chart, so I went online to the secret hidden website www.hydra.com and downloaded their real organizational chart, which I present to you here for the very first time. Enjoy, but don't tell 'em Bully sent you!




*Scheduled Haggis Ingestion Eliminates Lethargy and Diphtheria.

365 Days with Hank McCoy, Day 245

Panels from Uncanny X-Men #297 (February 1992), script by Scott Lobdell, pencils by Brandon Peterson, inks by Dan Panosian, colors by Marie Javins, letters by Chris Eliopoulos