Countdown to Halloween: Jack Kirby's Monsters! Night One: Close Encounters of the Kirb Kind

BWAHHHHHHH! (In my spooky vampire voice.) It's once again time for that orangy-and-blackiest holiday of them all, Halloween! Which is coming up in only thirty-one short, chilly fall nights, so you'd better stock up on candy to hand out now. I really mean it. Do not run out of Halloween candy! This month, all month, you should be checking my humble little puppet-town cow-blog for titanic tales of those terrifying titans, those Kingtastic Colossuses (Colossi?), those masters of the macabre month: Jack Kirby's Monsters! Every day, a new Kirby Monster from the Atlas Age of Comics! Also, as in previous spine-tinglin' Octobers, I'm once again part of the Countdown to Halloween web ring of Halloweeny horror! Be sure to visit the other 170+ (!) members of Countdown to Halloween for lots of other fun stuff leading up to our scariest day, because I'm pretty sure you'll find witches, goblins, ghouls, vampires, and a Frankenstein or two in there.

Over here, I'm pretty sure we'll run into the Plant Thing from Venus, the Stone Men of Halloween Easter Island, the Molten Man-Thing, not to mention Fin Fang Foom (brother of the illustrious Doctor Victor von Foom), all of 'em in living color by K-I-R-B-Y, King of the Monsters! (Actually, he was an elected official, but we still call him king.)

But first up, one of Jack's first Atlas Monsters: the Flying Saucer! (Not to be confused with the delicious, cold, creamy Carvel treat.)


Cover of Strange Worlds #1 (December 1958), pencils by Jack Kirby, inks by Christopher Rule, colors by Stan Goldberg, letters by Artie Simek
Now just w-w-w-wait one doggone minute, Mister Bull! (you might say in your Jimmy Stewart voice, and a very fine impression it is too.) Just how the Sam Scratch can a flying saucer be a monster? Well, you just wait an' see! See if I don't show you! Yah boo!


Splash page from "I Discovered the Secret of the Flying Saucers!" in Strange Worlds #1 (December 1958), script by Stan Lee (?), pencils by Jack Kirby, inks by Christopher Rule, colors by Stan Goldberg, letters by Artie Simek
Witness the shame of this pre-Reed Richards professor, who has just been turned down for membership in the Legion of Super-Heroes…hilariously! Also, everybody thinks his UFO stories are pretty funny. Even, sitting on the extreme right, The Joker! Well, he thinks everything's funny.


His quest to find out the secret truth behind flying saucers knows no boundaries! It also apparently knows no panel borders! Yow, Mister Kirby, that's dramatic! But did you lose your ruler that day?


Suddenly, swamp gas! No, wait, it's an actual livin' breathin' OO-EFF-OH!


Check out the alliteration in that first panel! (If that ain't Stan Lee, it's an incredible simulation.) Kirby gives the flying saucer just enough detail to make it looks like it actually works, mechanically, and yet not too much to overwhelm the inker. He was already prepping for dealing with Vince Colletta, wasn't he?


The flying saucer beams images of its home world into our hero's head, thus giving humanity a look at alien technology (or, as we like to call it, Kirbytech!) while simultaneously creating progressive rock.


Again, check out the first caption. Oh, that explains the whole thing! This story takes place on the Planet Garth! Currently being seen in the Secret Wars miniseries Battleworld: Wayne and Garth's World! Anyway, the Incredulous Hunk demands to see what the life form inside the flying saucer looks like before it returns home! Can you spot the surprise twist ending barreling around the corner at warp speed towards us?


Surprise! Twist Ending! (Told ya.) The Flying Saucer is the Kirby Monster! It has legs, and eyes, and a tongue made out of a staircase, I guess. Also, dig that swepy-back metallic hairstyle! It's groovy, man, far out of this world!


Perhaps mankind was not yet ready to make that leap into the unknown…to conceive that a being which could travel through space might not look like us at all…but might resemble the very craft which have buzzed above us in the sky, inspiring in hushed whispers tales of unknown alien worlds. All we know is that this flying suacer's existence must remain a secret to man, even in…the Twilight Zone.

---

Special extra-bonus Comics Did It First section! Stan 'n' the Atlas were not averse to re-using a plot from now and again (what, you think only Archie Comics did that?), and here's an earlier version of O. Henryesque ending of a flying saucer turning out to be an alien being from five years before, with a decidedly New England seafood flavor!


Panels from "The Secret of the Flying Saucer!" in Men's Adventures #21 (May 1953), script by Stan Lee, pencils and inks by Fred Kida
And before Captain America and Iron Man barged in rudely and took over the pages of Tales of Suspense for themselves, Steve Ditko — the second pillar in the Grandmaster of Art Pantheon at Marvel — illustrated a very similar story:


Panels from "I Know the Secret of the Flying Saucer!" in Tales of Suspense #11 (September 1960), script by Stan Lee (?), pencils and inks by Steve Ditko, colors by Stan Goldberg, letters by Artie Simek
Enough versions for you yet? Of course not! Here's a strangely familiar twist-ending story drawn by Don "Why won't Marvel give me credit for co-creating Iron Man?" Heck! (Seriously, how did I become the guy who has to remind Marvel about that?)


Panel from "The Impossible Spaceship!" in Strange Tales #101 (October 1962), plot by Stan Lee, script by Larry Lieber, pencils and inks by Don Heck, colors by Stan Goldberg, letters by Terry Szenics
If you don't care for the original cooked-lobster-red (hey, seafood again!) coloration of the Strange Worlds spaceship alien, well, just wait sixteen years until the story is reprinted and recolored in the pages of a 1970s Marvel monster comic! Behold: the blue and grey Batman Color Scheme Flying Saucer Alien!


Panel from reprint of "I Discovered the Secret of the Flying Saucers!" in Where Monsters Dwell #32 (November 1974)
Finally, leave it up to those crazy Brits to not only charge a shilling for a comic with big sixty-eight pages but to recolor the flying saucer! And leave out the blurb on the bottom. Eh, knowing British comics, there was probably a free prize glued there. Maybe a clam!


Cover of Race for the Moon #5 (Thorpe & Porter, 1959)
I'm pretty sure that's the most exhaustive examination you're ever gonna get about a Kirby space alien in which you can comfortably sit inside and zoom around the universe.

365 Days of Star Wars Comics, Day 274: What If? George Lucas Came Up with This Scene One Movie Earlier?

Panels from Star Wars: Infinities: A New Hope #2 (June 2001), script by Chris Warner, pencils by Drew Johnson, inks by Ray Snyder, colors by Dave McCaig, letters by Steve Dutro

The 1987 2015 Marvel Age Calendar for OOOOOHHH October!

October 1987 calendar from the back cover of Marvel Age #58 (January 1988),
script by Mike Carlin, pencils and inks by Ron Zalme, colors by Paul Becton
(Click picture to Ominous-October-size!)

365 Days of Star Wars Comics, Day 273: Some Assembly Required

Two-page spread from Star Wars (Dark Horse 2013 series) #2 (March 2013); script by Brian Wood; pencils and inks by Carlos D'anda; colors by Gabe Eltaeb; letters by Michael Heisler
(Click picture to Mark II-size)

Where the Heck III: What should have been our armor becomes a sharp and angry sword (Still No Credit Where Credit Is Due)

Well, Armor Wars, the five-issue Secret Wars miniseries is done and dusted (and bagged and boarded and marked down for the quarter issue bin at your local comic book store). Yep, quite a few of of the 49 Secret Wars miniseries are starting to wrap up, leaving us looking longfully at the finish line a few miles ahead and hoping everybody remembers that to get Johnny Storm down from hanging on the firmament where he's been stuck since Doom hung him up there like some Doomsmas tree ornament made out of flamy unstable molecules. As for Armor Wars, it's as good a time as any to tally up and point out that Marvel went and unbroken 0-5 on giving Don Heck and Larry Lieber proper credit for co-co-creating Iron Man. As you may remember (go ahead! remember!) I pointed out here that Marvel gave incorrect creator credits in the first two issues here, and that they deleted the creator credits entirely in the following two following issues here. For the record, here's the page of Armor Wars #5 where they managed to squeeze in practically everybody's name short of Robert Downey Jr. and Irving Forbush:


Credits page of Armor Wars #5 (November 2015)
Let me just show you what ya shoulda added there, Marvel:

Iron Man created by Stan Lee, Don Heck,
Larry Lieber, and Jack Kirby

Well, let's see if it gets fixed in the inevitable trade paperback (I'll be checking!) or on the credits page for October 7th's Invisible Iron Man volume 7, #1. Or is that volume 8? Doesn't matter. I'll be checking. (shaking my hoof warningly at Marvel)

As for Armor Wars itself, it died pretty much as it lived: big and explodey. It's far from one of my favorite Secret Wars tie-ins at all, and issue #5 didn't redeem it, being pretty much a couple dozen pages of exposition shouted over a big-ass fight sequence. F'r example:


Panels from Armor Wars #5 (November 2015), script by James Robinson, pencils and inks by Marcio Takara,colors by Esther Sanz, letters by Travels Lanham
Followed by more explosions and explanations...


And then even more destruction and deconstruction...


Before everybody gets back on stage for the big-summing up, hosted, as far as I can tell, by the Earth-Battleworld's dimensional counterpart of Natasha Irons:


…and a coda mock-flooded with the promise for adventures and excitement to come in that crazy little world of Armor Wars City, until of course Marvel-Earth gets put back together next month, like a hastily-assembled jigsaw puzzle, just to get it off the table so you've got room for dinner.


Armor Wars, everyone! Armor Wars. Armor Wars, won't you?

(BTW:)

Iron Man created by Stan Lee, Don Heck,
Larry Lieber, and Jack Kirby

365 Days of Star Wars Comics, Day 272: Mondays, too

Panels from "Incident at Horn Station" in Star Wars Tales #2 (December 1999), script by Dan Jolley, pencils and inks by Sean Phillips, colors by Matt Hollingsworth, letters by Sean Konot

Comics' Stupidest Titles: ...And Starring Joan Crawfish

If you read 'em long enough, you'll find more than a fair share of tone-deaf, dumb-ass comic book story titles, and no, I wouldn't even dare count the class Stan Lee-isms like "And Lo — There Shall Come an Ending!" (Part 3 of Five). No, let's reserve this feature for the worst of the worst, the cheesiest, the corniest, the stupidest titles in comics. Titles like this watersogged "classic:"


Splash page from "There Are No Wire Hangers Underwater!" in Iron Man Annual (1976 series) #10 (September 1989), script by Fabian Nicieza, pencils by Don Perlin, inks by Don Ald, colors by T. Fine, letters by Rick Parker
It's only 1989, which means that I can't use my What can we say? It was the nineties tag. You can pretty much agree that the nineties began in the eighties, however, what with the introduction of chrominum covers, Venom, Batman: The Killing Joke, and the New Teen Titans' Danny Chase. Also: the beginning of single-story mega-crossover events in comics annuals, which will eventually lead to Eclipso: The Darkness Within, The Terminus Factor, JLApe, and perhaps the world's worst summer event since the invention of that ice cream van song: Bloodlines. But it all started here in 1989's Atlantis Attacks, in which former President Jimmy Carter, media mogul Ted Turner, and redneck comic Jeff Foxworthy waged war against the entire Marvel Universe…oh, excuse me, I've made another one of my silly mistakes. That's Atlanta Attacks.

Anyway, "There Are No Wire Hangers Underwater!" continues the saga of true blue Atlantean Andromeda, former member of the Defenders and future member of the underwater heroic team named (groan) "Deep Six." I was fairly sure that she was a member of the Avengers during the hazy, please-try-to-forget-them latter years of Avengers Volume 1, circa Deathcry and Teen Tony Stark, but I was wrong. That's how memorable Andromeda is: she wasn't in the worst years of the Avengers.

But she is returning home to Atlantis pretty much concurrent with it attacking, since beloved bare-torsoed fishy king Namor is believed to be dead, floating face down on the surface of the ocean. Not so: Namor would be non-dead for many more years until finally meeting his fate in that epic battle against the Gorton's Fisherman in 2012's limited series Namor No More. Also not realistic: that weirdass, appearently waterproof version of the Times of London, which in real life doesn't look anything like it's portrayed in this panel. For one thing, there's no crispy and delivious fish 'n' chips wrapped inside it.


Andromeda, wearing the world's least aero- water-dynamic boots, is determined to find out the villain behind the plot of Atlantis Attacks! But since she can't find Tom DeFalco, she's going to confront her own Daddie Dearest, the fearsome Attuma! Or as she calls him: the clam behind the madness. I dunno, I woulda gone with "the clam before the storm." But I'm shellfish that way.


The (stupid!) title of the story is a reference to the 1981 cult classic movie Mommie Dearest, and I'm pretty sure including Joan Crawford in this not-entirely-Iron Man story would have improved it immensely.


Instead, we get Andromeda's dad and Namor nemesis Attuma. I haven't read the rest of this story, serialized across several issues of Atlantis Attacks, but I'm just betting one of the sequels is titled "Attuma with a View."


Thus follows the most anti-climatic battle in the history of Iron Man Annual #10: Andromeda confronts Attuma, Attuma threatens Andromeda, Attuma gets all creepy, Andromeda runs swims away. Also, he insults Andromeda's mom (Andmomeda?) Lady Gelva by calling her a sea cow. I dunno, for some reason I myself don't see that as a insult, personally.


TO BE CONTINUED! In X-Factor #4.


X-Factor Annual #4 is pretty cool because it has artwork by Walt Simonson and John Byrne, an appearance by Jake and Elwood Blues…


Panels from "Inferno Aftermath" in X-Factor Annual #4 (September 1989), script by Mark Gruenwald, pencils by Jim Fern, inks by Joe Rubinstein, colors by Greg Wright, letters by Joe Rosen
...but best yet, it doesn't actually contain a continuation of the Andromeda story. Thus not giving us exactly what we don't want! Hooray for comics!

365 Days of Star Wars Comics, Day 271: Office Supplies of the Star Wars Universe

Panel from quite possibly one of the worst Star Wars comics stories ever, Star Wars (1977 Marvel series) #48 (June 1981), script by Larry Hama, breakdowns by Carmine Infantino, finishes by Carlos Garzon, colors by Glynis Wein, letters by Rick Parker

365 Days of Star Wars Comics, Day 270: Belly Shirts of the Star Wars Universe, Day 8: And now a little something for the ladies

Panel from Star Wars (1977 Marvel series) #95 (May 1985), script by Jo Duffy, pencils by Cynthia Martin, inks by Steve Leialoha, colors by Glynis Oliver, letters by Rick Parker

365 Days of Star Wars Comics, Day 269: Belly Shirts of the Star Wars Universe, Day 7: Now, the Star-Belly Sneetches had bellies with stars, but the Plain-Belly Sneetches had none upon thars.

Panel from Star Wars: Republic #77 (June 2005), script by John Ostrander, pencils by Jan Duursema, inks by Dan Parsons, colors by Brad Anderson, letters by Michael David Thomas

365 Days of Star Wars Comics, Day 268: Belly Shirts of the Star Wars Universe, Day 6: Wow, Darth Maul got hot

Cover of Star Wars: Legacy (2006 series) #1 (June 2006), art by Adam Hughes

365 Days of Star Wars Comics, Day 267: Belly Shirts of the Star Wars Universe, Day 5: Star Wars: Episode Fur

Panels from Star Wars: Republic #66 (June 2004), script by John Ostrander, pencils by Jan Duursema, inks by Dan Parsons, colors by Brad Anderson, letters by Michael David Thomas

Hit Me WIth Your Best Shot

Panels from [Uncanny] X-Men (1963 series) #132 (April 1980), co-plot and script by Chris Claremont, co-plot and pencils by John Byrne, inks by Terry Austin, colors by Glynis Wein, letters by Tom Orzechowski



Panels from Astonishing X-Men (2004 series) #15 (August 2006), script by Joss Whedon, pencils and inks by John Cassaday, colors by Laura Martin, letters by Chris Eliopoulos



Panels from Uncanny X-Force (2013 series) #10 (February 2014), script by Sam Humphries, pencils by Phil Briones, inks by Dalibor Talajic, colors by David Curiel, letters by Cory Petit



Panels from Groot #4 (November 2015); script by Jeff Loveness; pencils, inks, and colors by Brian Kesinger, letters by Jeff Eckleberry

365 Days of Star Wars Comics, Day 266: Belly Shirts of the Star Wars Universe, Day 4: Technically this entry includes that guy too

Cover of Star Wars: Invasion #4 (October 2009), art by Jo Chen

365 Days of Star Wars Comics, Day 265: Belly Shirts of the Star Wars Universe, Day 3: She just blue herself

Personally, I blame fanon-turned-canon Jedi Aayla Secura for this whole "belly shirt in the Star Wars Universe" trope. Also for this "Blue Man Group in the Star Wars Universe" trope.


Panels from Star Wars: Republic #76 (May 2005), script by John Ostrander, pencils by Jan Duursema, inks by Dan Parsons, colors by Brad Anderson, letters by Michael David Thomas

Separated at Birth

Panel from The Avengers (1963 series) #273 (November 1986), script by Roger Stern, breakdowns by John Buscema, finishes by Tom Palmer, colors by Paul Becton, letters by Jim Novak

365 Days of Star Wars Comics, Day 264: Belly Shirts of the Star Wars Universe, Day 2: I'm pretty sure this scene is covered in Joseph Campbell, too

Panels from Star Wars: Legacy (2006 series) #38 (July 2009), co-plot and script by John Ostrander, co-plot and pencils by Jan Duursema, inks by Dan Parsons, colors by Brad Anderson, letters by Michael Heisler

365 Days of Star Wars Comics, Day 263: Belly Shirts of the Star Wars Universe, Day 1: "I will not condone a course of action that will lead us to showing off my belly button."

This week, all week: let's celebrate the technological advances of a universe that has created every single possible science-fictiony thing from sentient robots to laser swords, a universe which has invented a replacement for wheels on tanks as well as rifles that don't shoot straight and armor that doesn't protect you, and yet, doesn't seem to have invented complete shirts for its women. Yes, it's the Star Wars Universe, a fictional reality that has an entire entry for "belly button" in its specialized Wikipedia. Crop off your tops and get ready for Belly Shirts of the Star Wars Universe!

First up: pretty much the trope-namer, Queen Senator Padmé Elizabeth Amidala! Some are born with belly shirts; Amidala has belly shirts thrust upon her. Well, not so much thrust. Clawed.





Panels from Star Wars Episode II: Attack of the Clones #3-4 (May 2002), script by Henry Gilroy, pencils by Jan Duursema, inks by Ray Kryssing, colors by Digital Chameleon, letters by Steve Dutro
Still, we can be thankful that none of Padmé's impressionable children picked up on this habit of...


Panels from Star Wars: Return of the Jedi #2 (November 1983), script by Archie Goodwin, pencils and inks by Al Williamson and Carlos Garzon, colors by Christie Scheele and Bob Sharen, letters by Ed King
NOW CUT THAT OUT LEIA