The Adventures of Doc Savage

In 1985, NPR ran a Doc Savage serial in the style of old-time radio. The series adapted two of the original novels by Lester Dent Fear Cay and The Thousand-Headed Man, in 13 episodes. The latter adaptation was done by Will Murray, who has also penned original Doc Savage novels.

The series was released on CD by Radio Archives, but it also appears to be available on a couple of places on the internet, including here.

Wednesday Comics: DC, October 1983 (week 2)

I'm reading DC Comics' output from January 1980 (cover date) to Crisis! Today, I've looking at the comics released the week of July 14, 1983. 

This week sees the publication of Green Arrow/Green Lantern #1, the first issue of a limited series reprinting the seminal run by Adams and O'Neil from 1970. As it's all reprints, I won't review every issue, but I felt like the first issue deserved mention as this would likely be the place a lot of Gen Xers first read these stories.

Flash #326: Bates and Infantino/Martin move things along with the Flash gets booked and arraigned for manslaughter. Flash feels like his life as Barry Allen is over, and in an uncharacteristic display of frustration he trashes Barry's apartment. Meanwhile, the hospital goes psychiatric ward after Fiona claims Barry visited her and that just can't be! This issue really displays the difference between these really law-aligned Silver Age DC heroes and Marvel's more outlaw ones. I can't imagine many Marvel characters turning themselves in this situation (except maybe Captain America), or there really being a context where they would feel safe to do so.

Batman #364:  Jason is back with the circus, but he's also playing amateur detective trying to find the Chimera, a thief whose crime spree seems to have trailed the circus' travels (and whose appearance seems inspired by Rondo Hatton's). Batman's also there, watching out for Jason, but Bruce in disguise and the Chimera in disguise confuses Jason's investigation. The Chimera gets the drop on Batman and leaves him at the mercy of lions, while Jason confronts the thief and finds out the villain has been impersonating his friend Waldo the Clown. Newton/Alcala's art works notably well this issue.

Omega Men #7: Silfer and Smith (through the first Citadelian) lay out the secret origin of Vegan civilization and X'Hal, and it's distasteful in the centrality of rape to the story. Beyond that it has a fantasy/parable kind of feel that isn't bad. It reminds me a bit of Starlin's science fantasy works like Metamorphosis Odyssey. Like Tigorr, I don't completely buy the conceit that the First Citadelian, as the serpent in the Okaaran garden isn't the cause of their aggression but merely the revealer of it. And it seems pretty simplistic to blame the Citadels tyrannical rule on the Vegan people merely being flawed. Tod Smith takes over this issue from Giffen as regular artist.

G.I. Combat #258: The first Haunted Tank story continues the weird time travel/fantasy detour, with Jeb turning out to be some sort of "chosen one' for Zeena's people via a prophecy given then by their oracle (who seems suspiciously like the ghost of J.E.B Stuart). He's got to marry Zeena after defeating a rival suitor in axe to axe combat. I assume they'll get back to World War II eventually. The second Haunted Tank tale hammers home the common reframe of this book regarding valuing your equipment. Craig rides a burning tank into a skirmish over an oasis. Easy Company has a cameo.

In the Mercenaries story, the trio is in Negombo, Sri Lanka, and hired by a mysterious guy name Han to secure a shipment of guns for the government against theft by Leftist terrorists. Turns out the rebels are the good guys and the mysterious bald dude who has a poisonous snake wrapped around his arm is the baddie! 

Kashdan/Catan serve up one of those "from the equipment's POV" about combat boots in Korea, and the issue is rounded out with one of Kanigher's dueling POV stories set on Omaha Beach on D-Day.

Warlord Annual #2: I wrote about this annual in detail here. This issue introduces Krystovar, a Warlord sidekick who I thought was unfortunately under-used.

New Teen Titans #35: This story really irritated me because Wolfman and Perez use a trope I really don't like. Sarah Simms' ex goes crazy, kidnaps her, shoots a guy, then holds some other people at gunpoint. Cyborg finally realizes he's been a jerk by dodging her calls and he, Changeling, and Raven go to the rescue, only because the plot demands it, a single troubled guy with a gun manages to hold them off, initially defeating cyborg with a graze and beating Changeling in a fight. The plot needs time for the guy to do his crazy, so the Titans get nerfed. It's not an uncommon thing in comics, but I feel like this usage is particularly bad.

Saga of the Swamp Thing #17: I have never before read the waning issues of Pasko's run. With Bissette and Totleben on art, and Abbie and Matt Cable reintroduced, it's beginning to look like Moore's run which follows. Swamp Thing and friends just happen to run into Abbie and learn of her marriage to the now-alcoholic Matt Cable. They're occasionally attacked by grotesque monsters in full Bissette style, which seem to appear and disappear, suggesting perhaps they are products of an unwell mind--like one in the grips of delirium. Harry Kay, having wandered off, gets stuck in a bear trap and is retrieved by the occupant of a strange insect-ship-- Anton Arcane. The Sunderland conspiracy story is still limping along, but it sort of feels like something vestigial.

Superman #388: Lois returns to confront Perry and Lana for stealing her story and is finally convinced her anger is misplaced, but not before getting in a fight with Lana that involves Lana shoving her face into a punch bowl! Meanwhile, Superman helps out a young fan with telepathic powers who is captured by (yet another never to be seen again) group of extradimensional aliens looking for a place to send their undesirables. Though the synopsis may not convey it, I think it's a better than average issue in the typical Bates/Swan mold.

The Pulp Team

As with several genres adapted to rpgs, pulp gaming presents a little bit of a problem going from the inspirational fiction to the gaming table in that pulp fiction/movies/comics tend to be about solo heroes or a primary hero and sidekicks but rpgs tend to be about a group of equals. It's perhaps reasonable to play Indy plus Short Round and Sallah or even Doc Savage plus his Fabulous Five for one story arc, but it might not be as desirable for a long campaign.

On the other hand, a group composed of Indiana Jones, Jake Cutter (from Tales of the Gold Monkey), and Sam Spade may be fine for some, but seems to be less satisfying to me for a long-term campaign, because the characters don't see cohesive. 

The solution seems to me to build a group wherein the characters are roughly equal, but each has their own specialty, and they have the same theme/subgenre. Sort of like if the Fabulous Five didn't have a Doc Savage to outshine them. There are really more examples of this in comics rather than the pulps (though that may just be my knowledge of the pulps is less). Check out the Challengers of the Unknown:

Having the same subgenre is important for keeping power levels similar. Having the same sort of theme is important for helping support their reason for staying together as a group. Of course, both of these can be stretched a bit. 

Sometimes teams are brought together or forced to stay together by an outside force. DC Comics' The Secret Six and Suicide Squad (either the Silver Age nonsupers version or the later supers versions) are examples of this, but so is the more eccentrically charactered League of Extraordinary Gentlemen. For that matter, the Avengers, particularly in the Ultimate Universe and the CMU start out like this too.

A Cold Reception on Level 4

Our 5e Land of Azurth game continued last weekend with the party still searching the lower levels of the mind of Gob looking for pieces of a magical suit of armor. Having explored the 3rd level, they had moved on to level 4, but avoided a room that appeared to be the site of a battle shrouded in some magical mist.  Their avoidance had been rewarded by the lucky discovery of an armor piece in a kobold gut-wagon.

Now, though there was nothing to do but brave the battle. They chose to skirt the edges of the room, having several near-misses with combatants--and some not misses, as a stray lightning bolt injured two of them. A group of the avian Fantsies, clearing the fallen, informed them that this was the site of an eternal battle between good and evil. They kept creeping around, and Waylon "recoveed" a Ring of Flight from the body of a slain ogre that almost literally fell into their path.

After skirting the room they encountered a giant with a whip and a captive woman wearing one of the gauntlets. Classic story: the giant claimed the woman was a monster and had to be imprisoned, while the woman protested her innocence and begged for release. The party didn't for a minute completely buy the woman's story, but they also questioned her imprisonment and treatment. And, at the end of the day, they needed that gauntlet chained up with her! They negotiated with the giant to let them get the gauntlet, but when they tried, the imprisoned demon in a woman's form escaped. Still, mission accomplished!

Next, they encountered a statue of one of the evil Phantfasms with the bird-like wings of a Fantsie instead of arms. They remembered the statue whose wings he been removed on an upper level. They went to retrieve them, the statue breathed cold at them and nearly killed poor Waylon.

Wednesday Comics: A Bigger Comic Book Implosion

In 2018, TwoMorrows released Comic Book Implosion by Keith Dallas and John Wells, which was an oral history of the DC's 1978 plan for an "Explosion" that ended in failure: The DC Implosion. I talked about the book here.

This year, Dallas and Wells are back with an expanded edition, this one with color. I haven't read it yet, but Amazon tells me it has "additional coverage of lost 1970s DC projects like Ninja the Invisible and an adaptation of “The Wiz,” Jim Starlin’s unaltered cover art for Batman Family #21."

I'm eager to check it out.

More Gwelf

Larry MacDougall released another book in his Redwall-esque fantasy series, Gwelf last month. This one is called Gwelf: Into the Hinterlands. In this one, Willburton Fox and his party set out into the North, first the Scrublands, then the dangerous territory controlled by the Ravens and menaced by Rats, Trolls, and the Mange.

MacDougall's art is just as wonderful as the first book, and there is good worldbuilding in the union of the text and pictures.

Wednesday Comics: DC, October 1983 (week 1)

My ongoing mission: read DC Comics' output from January 1980 (cover date) to Crisis! This week, I'm looking at the comics at newsstands on the week of July 7, 1983. 

There was a freebie this week, DC Sampler #1. It has no real story in it, just two-page ads for DC Comics and all comics that are already on the shelves. Two things jumped out at me. It does give away how Supergirl defeats her mini-clone foes, and the Legion of Super-Heroes ad cleverly evokes the titles and logos of old DC non-supers books to taut the various genres at play in the title.

Amethyst: Princess of Gemworld #6: Granch and his brothers go down in defeat and are killed in their assault on Dark Opal while Amethyst says good-bye (at list for a time) to her Earth foster parents and undergoes a training montage. Princess Topaz is still mopey about his upcoming wedding. Not a whole lot of forward motion story-wise, but Colon's art is still great.

Wonder Woman #308: Nice cover by Andru/Giordano, and representative of the issues contents, for once! Sofia Constantinas is getting used to Paradise Island by eavesdropping and witnesses the ceremony in which Wonder Woman's bracelets of submission and magic lasso are restored by Athena and Aphrodite. She keeps snooping and hears the goddesses and the queen mention that Steve Trevor has been brought back twice from the dead. Elsewhere, Black Canary intervenes with a woman chasing an old man, only find that the old man is a Nazi, Karl Schlagel. The woman mystically transfers her consciousness into Black Canary's body. As Canary, she goes to the League satellite, and is captured by Wonder Woman and the Elongated Man, who learn that she is a Roma mystic and Nazi-hunter. Meanwhile, Black Canary, in Zenna's body, is captured by beast-men goons, and Dr. Schlagel prepares to inject her with something.

The Cavalieri and Bair (credited as Hernandez)/Gaicola Huntress backup seems to be mostly setting up a new status quo but it's awkward. There's a crusading reporter who reveals she's really just out to get Huntress because the heroine has the freedom she was taught she couldn't have as a woman. After allowing Huntress the use of his shower, Minelli asks her out--but we find out in a separate scene that he's an undercover agent for Commissioner O'Hara. The story ends with Huntress thwarting what she believes to be a drug deal, which turns out to possibly be a baby exchange.

Blackhawk #263: Blackhawk has been assigned to find and stop Domino while for her part, Domino has been ordered to assassinated Blackhawk. The two wind up in Marrakesh where they are captured by a group looking to ransom them both. Meanwhile, the Blackhawks are tracking the war wheel and discover the secret of its appearances and disappearances (its being carted around by zeppelins) and bring all that to a stop. Blackhawk and Domino work together to escape, but then Hendricks shoots and kills Domino after she appears about to turn on Blackhawk. But was she? Blackhawk is haunted by the possibility she might have been ready to reform. I'm surprised they killed off Domino. Maybe Evanier just felt they had done everything with her they could? Spiegle's art really sells that seen though, and in general this issue with the war wheel and its large scale carnage this is a standout in an already great run from him.

Justice League #219: Only a few months after his exit, Conway is back, albeit teaming up with Thomas. I wonder if this turn is due to cancellation of the JLA/Avengers project, which Conway was writing? In any case, this JSA/JLA team-up story seems more of a Thomas idea as it is in service of a retcon regarding the history of Black Canary--though that goal isn't entirely clear from this issue. Johnny Thunder's T-bolt attacks the two Flashes then assaults the annual JLA/ JSA reunion, incapacitating only those heroes born on Earth-One, leaving Black Canary, Red Tornado, and the Justice Society members uninjured. Before they can figure out what's going on, the heroes they have to go off to stop the Crime Champions, who are attacking various locales on Earth-One. Starman and Black Canary, meanwhile, trail the Thunderbolt to his home dimension, where they discover villain behind it all is the criminal Earth-One counterpart of Johnny Thunder--and he's got transparent coffin type thing containing the bodies of Larry Lance and Black Canary!

Arak: Son of Thunder #26: Ron Randall comes on board as artist. Arak and Satyricus arrive in Byzantium to report the death of Kallinikos to Emperess Irene and request the use of a ship to get back to the New World. Those plans have to wait as they're attacked by a lioness that Arak must defeat Tarzan-style, which leads to him getting an offer to be a charioteer for the Green team (not to be confused with the Green Team).

The chariot race is about as Ben Hur amped up for comics as you might imagine, but Arak is victorious after killing some rivals. Before he can ask his boon of Empress Irene, he seems the lioness about to be burned alive in a cage in front of the cheering crowed--then she turns into a beautiful woman!

DC Comics Presents #62: Rozakis/Mishkin and Novick/Hunt serve up a goofily patriotic team-up with the Freedom Fighters, which seems like it would have been more at home in the bicentennial ramp-up of 1976, but I guess is honoring the 4th. There's even a framing sequence where a kid visiting a museum who doesn't care about the U.S.'s history reads this very comic and sees the error of his ways. In the story proper, Uncle Sam and the Freedom Fighters come to Earth-One to stop Neo-Nazis from stealing and destroying the Constitution and Declaration of Independence, which in fact, are some sort of totemic, mystical protectors of America. Superman is busy dealing with the national crises the theft caused and can't help. We do get a couple of references to the Freedom Fighters' 70s series, at least.

Fury of Firestorm #17: Conway and Broderick/Tuska/Rodriguez open on the funeral for Ed Raymond, who we find out isn't dead. There are suggestions of maybe some sort of witness protection type situation, but we aren't given a lot to go on. Anyway, Ronnie and everyone else believes he's dead. While this is going on Hewitt's experiment turns Lorraine Reilly into the nuclear-powered, Firehawk, who has been conditioned to obey Hewitt's commands. He sends her to attack Firestorm. Ronnie, distracted by grief and the feeling he is responsible for his father's death, initially just tries to escape the attack, but once Firehawk burns some civilians, he fights back and quickly defeats her. When she reverts to Lorraine, that gives Ronnie something else to feel guilty about. 

Dissatisfied with Firehawk's performance, Hewitt decides to create another superhuman. This time, he'll be the test subject.