The Shadow: Blood & Judgment

by Robert Greenberger

I contend that 1986 was DC’s greatest publishing year and one of the projects coming out that magical year was a brutal adaptation of The Shadow from Howard Chaykin, one of the most interesting creators at work during that period.

For those less familiar, the Shadow was a name given to the radio narrator of Detective Story Hour, using stories taken from Street & Smith’s detective pulp magazines. Such was the 1930 show’s success that eager readers asked newsstand operators for the Shadow magazine so S&S went ahead and created one. Walter B. Gibson, a tireless writer, was asked to turn a name into a character, launching a self-titled pulp on April 1, 1931. The series was so successful it went to twice-monthly publication and spawned a radio series followed by comic books, movie serials, and even a comic strip.

Many comic readers first discovered The Shadow when he guest starred in an issue of Batman as a precursor to the wonderful series from writers Denny O’Neil and Michael Uslan and artists Michael Kaluta and Frank Robbins. The O’Neil/Kaluta stories were once collected but that book is sadly long out of print. Anyway, in the mid-1980s, DC once more obtained the comic book rights and handed the character to Editor Andy Helfer, who tapped Chaykin for the role.

Coming off his acclaimed run on American Flagg!, Chaykin wanted to stretch and felt the pulp crime fighter was what he needed.  “The character was extremely violent in its time,” Chaykin told me in the delayed but forthcoming The Art of Howard Chaykin. “That bit of the guy being inside the water cooler came directly from one of the Shadow stories.”

The body in the water cooler scene from The Shadow: Blood & Judgment.

The reference is to the single scene anyone familiar with the four issue miniseries recalls. The Shadow: Blood & Judgment went on to spark a discussion over the rising tide of graphic violence in comics but it also made people pay attention to the character for the first time in years. A fan-favorite, Chaykin’s work on Flagg! led to solid sales on what might otherwise have been a middling release.

“I still don’t see what was so controversial about it. The book had been a commercial failure as a pastiche of the period material. The reason the Shadow was perceived as a 1930s character was because it was canceled in the early fifties. Had Superman or Batman gone through the same process and been revived, they also would have had that same period quality to them. I wanted to bring the material to a contemporary audience that had no interest in period material. And of course I pissed off Harlan Ellison.”

While the character has remained a beloved figure in pop culture, his comic book appearances have been limited. Anthony Tollin has kept the flame alive with his superb series of pulp reprints (which I also highly recommend you order). The collection of this storyline was an early entry in DC’s bookstore program and has been out of print for something like 20 years. Now that Dynamite Entertainment is collecting Chaykin’s works and also has the license to the Shadow, the time had come to bring back this 120-page project.

Dynamite’s press release on the project has a stellar array of today’s talents talk about how influential and downright entertaining the story was with Brian Michael Bendis saying, “This is my all-time favorite Howard Chaykin comic book. This is him at the tip-tip-top of his game and, yeah I’ll say it, the best Shadow story ever published!” Jason Aaron added, “Chaykin at his ballsiest and most dynamic. This is how the Shadow should be done.”

And from what we hear, that’s exactly the model Garth Ennis is following with the new Dynamite ongoing series. In fact, Ennis was part of the quote parade, saying, “Howard Chaykin was one of the few who dared to make mainstream comics different back in the eighties; it was guys like him, Alan Moore and Frank Miller who made sure there’d be no going back. Howard’s work on The Shadow is amongst his very best: razor-sharp character work, sizzling dialogue and an unsurpassed sense of layout and design.”

Preorder

The Shadow: Blood & Judgment SC

Elektra By Greg Rucka Ultimate Collection

by Robert Greenberger

Daredevil was pretty moribund as a feature when Roger McKenzie was writing it, until he was paired with artist Frank Miller, who breathed fresh life into the series. In short order, Miller replaced McKenzie as the writer and ran with the character, exploring the dark underbelly of criminal life in Manhattan. The book hadn’t been this good in ages but it proved to be nothing but a warm-up for what was to come.

In 1981, the arguably best character introduction of the decade occurred when Elektra Natchios arrived to kill hornhead only to realize he was actually her college lover, Matt Murdock. Suddenly she was conflicted and as you know, when you hesitate, you can die. Her interactions with Daredevil led to her unexpected and gruesome death at the hands of Bullseye.

Thankfully, she got better.

Had it been handled by anyone other than her creator, fans would have rejected the hardcover graphic novel Elektra Lives Again, but we were all happy to have her back. Since then, she has been a popular character, appearing here and there, fortunately never quite getting overexposed and maintaining some mystique.

One of the early moves president Bill Jemas made when he arrived at Marvel was to green light an Elektra ongoing series, initially written by Brian Michael Bendis, However, with issue #7, acclaimed crime novelist Greg Rucka arrived from DC and wrote the feature through issue #22. Now, for the first time since 2003, those stories are being collected in the aptly named Elektra by Greg Rucka Ultimate Collection, a mammoth softcover that has Elektra #7-22 plus the one-off story from Marvel Knights Double Shot #3.

At the time, more attention was paid to the riveting cover art by Greg Horn, redefining bad girl art for the time, than the content. In reviewing the stories, the comic didn’t turn the assassin into a wuss or a do-gooder. Instead, under Rucka, it explored the ramifications of her actions. Elektra was riding high on adrenaline pumping through her veins, loving the violence.

The first few stories eased Rucka into the world of Elektra, with a multi-parter where a woman named Katamides reaches out to the vigilante, asking her help against the four men who raped her. Once they have been rounded up, though, Elektra stuns the woman by refusing to help her exact sweet revenge.

Elektra, now a violence junkie, is looking to score her next fix when she is been hunted down and captured by the mysterious Mr. Locke. We learn that his girlfriend died, an innocent, during one of Elektra’s previous cases. For that, she must suffer and he abandons her in the Mojave Desert to die. As she struggles to survive the heat and dehydration, we learnt that Locke was just part of a coalition of victims that wanted to be part of her suffering.

Obviously, she survived the ordeal but recognizes the need to retrain herself, adjusting her technique for maximum affect. As she studies under a man called Drake, The Hand come looking for her, wanting her back. The remainder of the 384-page collection is focused on Elektra, the Hand, Drake, and a man who genuinely cares for the woman.

Most of the art from the ongoing series was executed by Carlo Pagulayan, spelled by Joe Bennett, so it has a real world grit to it. While this chapter of her life is usually glossed over, there’s a reason the Marvel Encyclopedia includes it in their list of Key Storylines and now you can find out for yourself.

Purchase

Elektra by Greg Rucka Ultimate Collection

Batman Vol. 1: The Court of Owls

by Robert Greenberger

Batman has faced many deadly threats over the decades, none moreso than the writers who seek to add their own pieces to the mythos. It’s hard to reconcile that the New 52 Batman adventures still acknowledge the previous continuity since Grant Morrison’s conceit is that the previous 70+ years of stories really happened. Also, Grant built up the death of Batman by giving us the preposterous and out-of-leftfield Black Glove as the big bad, the meta villains who have been pulling his strings.

With that in the past, now the new resident scribe, and heir apparent to the mantle of the Bat is Scott Snyder, who made a splash in Detective Comics and now writes Batman. Snyder has been feeling his way through the continuity, doing bizarre nonsense like Jim Gordon Jr. being a contemporary of Dick Grayson but also nicely weaving in the Cobblepots to the history of Gotham City as seen in Gates of Gotham.

When he took over Batman with #1, he began laying the groundwork for the next meta villains to be pulling the strings. Forget the Black Glove, they were posers compared with the Court of Owls.

Snyder’s handiwork will be collected in Batman Volume One: The Court of Owls, a hardcover collection of the first six issues. With some really lovely art by Greg Capullo, this will no doubt be a more satisfying read in one sitting as the threads all come together and make more sense.

Ostensibly, the story is about a series of murders that implicate Dick Grayson but Batman digs deeper and finds the Court. As Snyder explained to Comic Book Resources, owls and bats are natural opponents and oddly, this had been rarely played up over the decades. Snyder is rectifying by picking up the few such instances, beginning with Batman #107.

“I’ve always loved the idea of the owl as an antithetical symbol to the bat and the way that that exists in current Batman mythology, given all the different versions of Owlman and him being a kind of reverse Batman in the anti-matter universe. I love those stories.

“My feeling was that the owl is a symbol that has a lot of potency in Batman already, and I wanted to build a story around the Court of Owls as something that creates a real and tangible threat in the physical Batman world – in the main continuity of the DCU. I wanted to do something that maybe hadn’t been done before that brings all that terror to bear on Batman now so that you do feel, I hope, this creeping sense of dread. You feel a bigger plan at work and that the owl is a symbol of not only a rival to the bat now but also something that’s been laying claim to Gotham for centuries. The owl and the bat almost can’t coexist.”

The Court has its avatar, The Talon, and he is a new creation, poised to challenge Batman both physically and mentally. In Snyder’s mind, it’s all personal with the Court being connected in some way with Lew Moxon, the man who ordered Joe Chill to kill the Waynes, and Chill himself. According to the writer, the Court has been interacting with the Wayne family going back generations, dating back over a century to the events depicted in the current incarnation of All Star Western. Not only that, he’s revealing how they have been involved with the Flying Graysons as well, before their untimely deaths.

“So as much as I’m saying ‘No, this isn’t a story that will revamp how his parents were killed in Crime Alley’ there are connections to that time and connections to what made Bruce who he is and Batman who he is and Nightwing who he is and Alfred who he is and the Wayne family and what they stand for. I think it’ll be very earth-shaking to Batfans as well. We would never change things just to be sensational or anything like that, and certain things to me are sacred, but fans can probably guess what those things would be, and they hold them sacred too.”

The 11-issue arc continues to unfold but clearly, this redefines Batman, Bruce Wayne, Gotham City and the rest of the core cast. Snyder has been confident that editor Mike Marts has been coordinating the new threads and connections so all the other bat-titles reflect what has been going on, leading to future crossovers and no doubt new wrinkles.

Purchase

Batman Vol. 1: The Court of Owls HC

X-Factor: Super Unnatural

Much of the focus these last six months have been on the core X-titles as life in Utopia grew fractious leading up to the events of Schism. These in turn led to a new title and new directions as the mutants effectively split along geographic and political lines. What few have noticed is that off to the side, a set of mutants have stayed out of the fray and have been involved in some of the most intriguing storylines of the year. In case you have missed, you can catch up now with X-Factor: Super Unnatural. The collection reprints the jumping on issue #224.1 in addition to #225-228.

Peter David has taken his collection of misfits and done some intriguing soap opera while sending the team out as a part of their private eye agency, X-Factor Investigations. They are not your normal cases and increasingly, David has been moving the series from crime to the supernatural. Never one to be shy about issues that could create interesting drama, David’s work on the series was recognized last year with the GLAAD Media Award for Outstanding Comic Book and those themes have continued to play a role here as well.

We open with team leader Jamie Madrox and the enigmatic Layla Miller visiting the farm where he was raised. Of course, bad things happen there and the rest of the team deals with a demon. Layla, who seems eerily precognitive, has raised more than a few eyebrows among her peers and readers alike.

“I like the concept of X-Factor constantly struggling with the learning curve and having no freaking clue what their opponents are going to do,” David said at Comic Book Resources. “But if I’m doing supernatural threats, I want them more grounded than, say, the usual array of Doctor Strange bad guys. Plus you then have this interesting disparity of superheroes with science-based powers going head to head with these beings or creatures that are utterly arcane. Layla, thanks to her time with Doom and also her foreknowledge, manages to walk both these worlds simultaneously. Which is a long-winded way of saying that the answer to ‘is she truly interested’ or is it because she knows of ‘the challenges of the job at hand’ is yes to both.

These days the team consists of Jamie, Layla, Guido, Rahne, Longshot, Monet St. Croix, Rictor, Shatterstar and Siryn. Shatterstar and Longshot have grown as characters and as friends, with David altering their speech patterns to reflect that natural development. “Yes, the more time they spend in each other’s presence, the more they start having the same cadences and rhythms to their delivery. Which is not to say that Longshot is suddenly going to start being interested in guys; that’s not in the cards. Nor is Shatterstar suddenly going to begin having luck powers. But I’m gradually drawing increasing similarities between the two, and there’s a definite reason for that. I wanted it to be one of those things where, when you look back on it, you go, ‘Ah, of course, it all makes sense now.’”

Additionally, he noted, “One of the things I enjoy about X-Factor is that the sizable cast (although honestly, is the population of X-Factor really larger than the population of Utopia?) is that I have enough different types of characters, personalities and power sets that I can tell any type of story I want to and have it flow naturally from one or some of them. That way the team always has something personal at stake, which I think is vital to keeping the stories interesting.”

There have also been conscious efforts made to tie this outlier title more tightly with the Marvel Universe with appearances by the likes of Doctor Doom and J. Jonah Jameson but the key change to the status quo – Rictor regaining his powers – actually occurred in Avengers: The Children’s Crusade and David finally reflected that in this collection of stories. “I’m always a big believer in things happening that will provide good drama,” David said. “Because now Shatterstar is going to start to wonder whether Rictor became attached to him solely because he felt vulnerable without his powers, and now is Ric suddenly going to lose interest in him. And how will that impact Rahne who, believe me, is going to have her own problems.”

Rahne, of course, just gave birth after being impregnated by a god and watched as her lupine offspring ran off into the wild.

The series has strived for a photorealistic look but has been seriously hampered by rotating artists, starting this volume with Valentine de Landro and Pat Davidson. Leonard Kirk, who has worked well with David before, seems to have settled in as the new artist and is more than up to the challenging material the writer throws his way.

Purchase

X-Factor: Super Unnatural

Legends of the Dark Knight: Jim Aparo HC

by Robert Greenberger

In 1968, Dick Giordano left Charlton Comics to join DC Comics as an editor, encouraged to bring along a handful of talent. While Steve Ditko was the most recognizable artist to come over, with his work on The Creeper and Hawk & Dove hogging the spotlight, perhaps the most creative work was being done on a more familiar character. Aquaman, a relatively staid feature, received a shot in the arm as Giordano assigned the series to writer Steve Skeates and artist Jim Aparo. With their Search for Mera story, they helped propel sales and got people talking about the feature for the first time in years.

As a result, Aparo’s artwork became desired and he was suddenly scooped up in the wake of Aquaman’s cancellation to work on features such as The Spectre and Phantom Stranger, but it was editor Murray Boltinoff who recognized the man’s versatility and used him as Nick Cardy’s replacement on The Brave and the Bold.

Aparo’s work, while reminiscent of Neal Adams, had an energy and a grit to it that made it stand out in the crowd. His work was clean and dynamic plus his versatility proved invaluable as the Caped Crusader met up with all manner of hero and villain. In time he was promoted to Batman proper and became closely identified with the character for the 1970s-1990s. Much of his work has gone unreprinted except for selected Showcase Presents volumes including The Spectre, The Phantom Stranger, and The Brave and the Bold. Finally, DC is collecting those B&B tales in full color beginning with Legends of the Dark Knight: Jim Aparo Volume One. This book will collect B&B #98, 100-102 and 104-122 letting you see him handle Batman along with Robin, Green Arrow, Black Canary, the Teen Titans, Deadman, Wonder Woman, The Demon, The Joker, Aquaman, and The Atom. If you haven’t seen these before, you are in for a treat.

If nothing else, Bob Haney’s scripts are packed with intrigue and adventure, atmospheric and explosive, spotlighting Aparo’s storytelling strengths.

Keeper of the Aquaman Shrine, Rob Kelly, told me, “Jim Aparo’s work brought a sense of urgency and almost an film noir-ish feeling of danger to Aquaman, which was a perfect complement to the more high-stakes, character-driven scripts of Steve Skeates.

“Aparo had important, memorable runs on Aquaman in both the ‘60s and the ‘70s (in Aquaman and Adventure Comics, respectively), cementing his reputation to many Aqua-Fans as THE Aquaman artist, a tremendous accomplishment considering the Sea King has had many so fine artists illustrating his adventures.

“He was one of Charlton’s top talents, and when he moved on to DC he became of their top talents. Whether it be the jungle adventures of The Phantom, the groovy comedy of Tiffany Sinn, C.I.A. Agent, the fantasy world of Aquaman, or the gritty urban world of Batman, Aparo could handle any feature and make it distinctive.”

Batman & the Joker by Aparo.

Meantime, Jim Beard, an expert on the artist’s legacy, noted, “Back when I was cutting my comic book teeth, there were two artists who defined ‘my’ Batman: Irv Novick and Jim Aparo. What an amazing thing, to make your indelible mark on a character who’s been handled by a multitude of creators over several decades. Aparo’s Caped Crusader stands out in stark contrast to other such interpretations in my mind, the kind of visual style you hunt for after the original is gone and to which no one else quite measures up.

“The key Aparo book for me will always be, of course, The Brave and the Bold. That was the title where you looked forward to every single issue to see what Jim’s grace and style would do for each of Batman’s co-stars; his was a clean line and clarity of vision that simply could not do any character any harm whatsoever. For such a quiet guy, his dynamism and detail leapt off the page. Boy, do I miss him in this modern industry.

“Any book, any project at all, that seeks to encapsulate Jim Aparo’s work in a single spot for all to see and wonder at how he did it is a good thing indeed.”

Trust us three; this is one book you don’t want to miss, back when the DC Universe was colorful with solid writing and terrific artwork.

Purchase

Legends of the Dark Knight: Jim Aparo HC

I... Vampire SC

by Robert Greenberger

Around the time of the infamous DC Explosion, many of the anthology series were receiving recurring characters, among them Bob Rozakis’ Mister E, a revival of Dr. Thirteen, and the arrival of Andrew Bennett. The latter character was the first series created for comics by a young, eager new writer named J.M. DeMatteis. The I…Vampire series ran in House of Mystery for a while before vanishing while the character made very infrequent appearances in the DC Universe ever since. It’s therefore interesting to see him revived as part of the New 52 while it’s a treat to have the original material collected in the new I…Vampire trade collection.

Recently, DeMatteis recounted for me how this all got started. “Len Wein — editor of House of Mystery (a great guy and my first real mentor in the business) — wanted an ongoing series for the title. (At the same time I sold him Creature Commandos as a regular feature in Weird War Tales.) He had a title in mind, I…Vampire, and asked me to create a series around it. I went home, cooked up Andrew Bennett and company, Len approved it, and we were off.”

In sixteenth century England, Lord Andrew Bennett had been turned into a vampire. Desiring eternal life with his lover, Mary Seward, he caused her to become a vampire. She became the soulless monster most vampires are, and renamed herself Mary, Queen of Blood. The Cult of the Blood Red Moon were her disciples, vampires she turned and commanded, sending them around the world. Bennett, feeling guilt over his actions, partnered with humans in a quest to end her threat and keep humanity safe.

He was paired with veteran horror artist Tom Sutton, whose roots go back to the Warren black and white magazines plus tons of Charlton Comics (and drew many issues of Star Trek for me). For the new writer, Wein’s choice was “a perfect choice. He did a fantastic job. Tom’s style was very unique, moody, textured and emotional. I couldn’t have asked for anything more.”

Going from writing a handful of anthology stories to suddenly creating two series was a heady experience, but also meant increased expectations from him as a professional. Fortunately, he had an experienced editor in Wein.

“I only worked with Len and, as I recall, he gave me all the room I wanted to tell the stories the way I wanted — but he was always there to gently nudge me back onto the path when I stumbled,” DeMatteis said. “I had so much respect for Len that I took all his input to heart. That said he wasn’t the kind of editor who jumped all over your script. He knew when to step in and when to leave you alone. If you were on the right track, he’d let you go.”

In 1980, while still writing these titles, DeMatteis was given an offer from Marvel he couldn’t refuse so he jumped from vampires to barbarians, taking over Conan among other titles. He admits that thirty years later, he’s not sure what direction he was taking his characters next. “The heart and soul of the series, of course, was Andrew’s quest to both stop and redeem Mary; and I know I wanted the Zen monk vampires to become an important part of the series. Beyond that, your guess is as good as mine!

“Of course I brought Bennett and the monks back almost ten years later in a big arc in my Doctor Fate series. But that story was a new one, nothing that I’d planned for the original run.”

The series was concluded by the other newcomers, the writing team of Dan Mishkin and Gary Cohn, whose work is also included in the trade which reprints stories from House of Mystery #290, 291, 293, 295, 297, 299, 302 and 304-319 and The Brave and the Bold #195.

Still, this is DeMatteis’ baby and he looks back on it with a critical eye, noting, “I…Vampire was created very early in my career. Considering that fact, and how much I had to learn as a writer (I don’t think I really found my own voice until Moonshadow, a good five years later), I think the stories hold up very well… and the concept has clearly held up.

“What worked for me was the idea of a vampire who wasn’t corrupted by the curse; one who was driven not by bloodlust, but by love. I’d like to think that’s still the core of the series and what’s drawing people to it. (And for the record, I think Josh Fialkov is doing a fantastic job on the new incarnation.)”

Purchase

I… Vampire SC

Daredevil by Mark Waid Vol. 1

by Robert Greenberger

Daredevil is perhaps Marvel’s best crime fighter because, throughout his colorful career, he has taken on gangsters and mobsters more than he has fought aliens, monsters, and all-powerful villains. His street-level action coupled, usually, with his banter at first made him appear to readers as a second-rate Spider-Man. Slowly, though, once Gene Colan settled in as artist, he and Stan Lee evolved the book into something unique with a tone all its own. Their run set the stage for several other memorable eras, the best known of course being the two periods when Frank Miller controlled hornhead’s destiny.

Recently, though, Daredevil has gone through some very difficult and hard times thanks first to Ed Brubaker then Andy Diggle. Diggle’s Shadowland run, took things too far off into dark corners and stopped being about the lawyer turned crimefighter and about everything else. As his run ended, it was clearly time for something different.

What we readers got was a 180 degree turn, courtesy of Mark Waid and Marcos Martin, who deservedly got a new #1 to mark a brand new era. “I thought it was crazy talk,” Waid told me recently. “For a decade or better, Daredevil had been about the grimmest, darkest superhero comic out there, and while I’m certainly capable of stretching (see Empire, Irredeemable and Potter’s Field), ‘grim’ and ‘dark’ are not adjectives normally used to describe my superhero work. But the more I thought about it, and the more editors Tom Brevoort and Steve Wacker said they wanted to bring Daredevil a little more back into the Marvel Universe, I rolled the dice and accepted the assignment.”

The book was fun to read again without ignoring what came before. Instead, Waid did his homework and we’re seeing new uses of Matt Murdock’s heightened senses, a pretty tough trick after nearly 50 years of publication. Additionally, he’s been partnered with artists who have immediately put their imprint on the character. “Both Marcos and Paolo Rivera are brilliant storytellers, to the point where I can write an entire page about Matt drinking tea or Daredevil standing on a building and they can make it spellbinding and dynamic,” Waid said. “With both gentlemen, I’ve let go the reins quite a bit as a scripter and encourage them to make the stories theirs, too–it is, after all, a collaborative medium. And they make me look so good.”

Like me, Waid has a fondness for the book’s two best eras, noting, “Ann Nocenti, Bendis, Brubaker, and others I forget off the top of my head have definitely put their stamp on the character, but I was always fondest of Colan’s era and Miller’s era because they weren’t as relentlessly dark.”

Those first six issues are being collected in a hardcover, Daredevil by Mark Waid Volume 1, and if you missed out, now’s a great opportunity to dive back in. If you were to sit down and reread this as a whole, what would you learn?

“About Daredevil? Where his head is at right now and how someone can go through such awful, awful things and still put on a red suit and fight crime at night. About the real world? Also yes. You’ll learn about how syndicates use something called “flags of convenience” to create criminal pirate empires. You’ll learn memory techniques for the blind. And you’ll learn how lawyer Matt Murdock makes a living now that he’s been outed as Daredevil to the public and can’t enter a courtroom without the opposition using that against him to turn the entire trial into a circus.”

While people have a fondness for both the character and the creators, one never knows if the combination will work but the writer tells me the response has been “phenomenal. As you know, I’ve been writing comics since shortly after the invention of the printing press, and I can honestly say that I have never, ever gotten as much universally positive feedback on my work. It’s thrilling.”

Purchase

Daredevil By Mark Waid Vol. 1

Resurrection Man

One of the DC’s New 52’s revived characters owes his origins, believe it or not, to the Great Lakes Avengers. In the mid-1990s the writing duo of Dan Abnett and Andy Lanning were wrapping up their run on Force Works, a spinoff of the just-canceled West Coast Avengers. At the time, they were mulling over story ideas and Lanning was musing that the GLA member Mr. Immortal had the ability to die and come back, which they found boring. Lanning scribbled a note to himself that it would be cool if each time the hero returned, he possessed a different power.

Well, no idea ever goes unused and in time, the pair was writing for DC Comics and they took that notion and spun it into a brand new character, the Resurrection Man. The protagonist, Mitch Shelley, was well-received by DC’s triumvirate of Group Editors and was given his own series, pairing the writers with artist Jackson Guice. While popular with some fans, it did not sell well enough to last beyond 28 issues, although the character appeared elsewhere until his final death, in the DC One Million event, at the hands of that other immortal, Vandal Savage.

The series was one of the first solo projects from Eddie Berganza, who has now risen to the role of DCU Executive Editor, and reunites with the writers on the new book. Abnett told Comic Book Resources, “One of the things Eddie always said at the time is that he felt that Resurrection Man was, as it were, ahead of its time. It was a comic that got a lot of good critical review but was never a huge hit back then, and he always felt it was because it was a post-human character operating in ways different than were common at the time. So maybe this is a more appropriate way of doing it because he’s not a conventional, as you put it, tights-wearing, spandex superhero. People are slightly more used to that now. In fact, it’s a matter of an audience sort of catching up with the idea of having a superhero in that way and allowing us to re-present the character and try to find fun, new things to do with him.”

Lanning added, “I think in that initial incarnation we were really going out of our way to write the comic as if it were a TV series. I think the comic buying public is now so used to great runs of TV series, boxed sets of great sci-fi, crime, and adventure TV stuff, that there’s a different sensibility out there about the acceptance of that style of storytelling. It was something we were definitely trying at the time. For the most part, like I said, it was very successful critically but I don’t think it caught across the mainstream because at that time it was the height of the iron-jawed heroes with cybernetic arms standing with their legs five miles apart in comics!”

Of course, you can’t keep a good hero dead, and he’s back, with Abnett and Lanning once more guiding Shelley’s exploits. To support the new edition, DC is releasing Resurrection Man Volume One, collecting the first 14 issues in a nice, thick book. Within those pages, you will meet attorney Shelley (yes, his surname is a nod towards Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley) who was subjected to having microscopic tektites injected into his bloodstream, by a mysterious organization called The Lab, making him seemingly immortal. Each time Shelley is killed, the tektites recreate the body, adapting it to combat the previous cause of death. For example, if he was killed in a nuclear blast, minutes later he would be revived with the ability to become a living shadow.

Shelley was at first rendered an amnesiac but over the course of the first year; he regained his lost memories and put together the shattered elements of his life in Viceroy, South Carolina (the home of Soder Cola). As he answered the questions about his life, new problems arrived in the curvaceous form of the Body Doubles. These gorgeous assassins, Bonny Hoffman and Carmen Leno, were sent by The Lab to get Shelley back under their control. (And in time, they became popular enough to guest star everywhere and get their own miniseries). Before long, it became clear that Shelley was actually always an immortal but The Lab altered his physiology, granting him super-abilities. And with super-powers come super-pals so in time Shelley encountered Phantom Stranger, who thought him an ally, and the Forgotten Heroes who mistakenly believed he was their friend the Immortal Man back from his death during the first Crisis. He also fought more familiar threats such as the android Amazo.

Abnett & Lanning were constantly surprising the readers with the various twists and revelations so the book was never less than entertaining to read. They were well matched with Guice, who used a variety of art approaches, including washes, to give the covers and interiors a look that set the title apart from the Image-inspired art of the era. Filling in for Guice were Tom Grindberg, an Adams clone, Joe Phillips, and Mike McKone.

Purchase

Resurrection Man Vol. 1 SC

The Art Of Howard Chaykin

by Robert Greenberger

I can’t recall exactly when I first met Howard Chaykin but that initial impression remains with me. I was a teenager, attending the various New York City comic conventions and was becoming aware that there was this new generation of writers and artists, just a few years older than me, getting work and looking different than the talents that were producing work already. He was stylishly dressed, with thick sideburns and a fast tongue. He was opinionated, loud, and never less than fascinating to hear hold forth on any number of subjects. Clearly, Chaykin was smart because he was rattling off the names of illustrators and writers from earlier decades that I had been entirely unaware of.

He didn’t draw like Curt Swan or Jack Kirby nor did his work look like that of his peers Bernie Wrightson and Mike Kaluta. I couldn’t describe the style because it took a few years for it to grow consistent. By then, though, I was a fan. The work that convinced me once and for all was Cody Starbuck, his creation for Mike Friedrich’s Star*Reach #1. When I wasn’t looking, he went off to help explore and expand the graphic novel format with his work adapting Alfred Bester’s The Stars, My Destination and Empire, written by Samuel R. Delany. Given how long these were taking, Chaykin accepted other, faster paying work such as the adaptation of Star Wars (at the request of George Lucas no less).

As an editor, I could always count on Howard to say yes to my offers of work and he always brought me excellent covers and Who’s Who pages.

When I got a phone call about two years back to write a retrospective of Howard’s life and career, I was eager to get started. Chaykin gives great interviews, and is always forthcoming but I had never read anything about his life from beginning to today, usually just deep questioning about the project du jour. And while he is known for his groundbreaking work on American Flagg! and dared to do extended work involving sex with Black Kiss, Chaykin is far more than that.

A student of the great illustrators from the turn of the last century, Chaykin is also quite knowledgeable about jazz and science fiction and other subjects. He was trained by Gil Kane to be both a craftsman and an adult and brings his passions to the page. Always paying it forward, Chaykin has worked with countless assistants, most of whom have gone on to careers of their own.

American Flagg!

Over the last few years, Dynamic Forces has been bringing Chaykin’s best work back into print, beginning with the seminal Flagg!, Black Kiss and Power & Glory. While not a traditional superhero artist, Chaykin’s work on that latter title and DC’s Mighty Love graphic novel shows he understands the requirements of the genre.

Lately, though, Chaykin seems to have been typecast as an artist for flashbacks set in earlier eras. Largely, that is because he has keenly demonstrated he can evoke the past with his attention to fashion and detail. He has parlayed that into writing and drawing the Avengers 1959 miniseries so has managed to capitalize on the reputation.

The Art of Howard Chaykin features not only his life in his own words, but offers up numerous commentaries from those he worked with or used as apprentices ranging from Dean Haspiel to Ken Bruzenak. Brian Michael Bendis and Walter Simonson offer up their own tributes and the book contains the most comprehensive checklist of his career that you could ever want. The book was a pleasure to research and write and I only hope I did Howard proud.

Purchase

The Art of Howard Chaykin HC

Essential Sgt. Fury Vol. 1

by Robert Greenberger

Of all the titles that can be said to kick off the Marvel Age of comics, the one that may have been the most consistently strong right from the beginning was Sgt. Fury and his Howling Commandos. The series chugged right through the ‘60s and ‘70s until it switched to occasional reprints and vanished with a whimper after 167 issues.

At a time when Marvel had retired its genre titles or features in favor of colorfully costumed characters, DC Comics had been more successfully introducing recurring characters in their commercial war titles, led by Sgt. Rock. In late 1962, as Marvel’s Fantastic Four, Hulk, Ant-Man, Thor and Spider-Man were generating increasing sales, writer/editor Stan Lee was feeling like everything they introduced was a sure-fire hit. In what is perhaps the second most oft-told tale from the era, Lee bet publisher Martin Goodman he could make a hit out of a book with the worst title ever. He quickly coined Sgt. Fury and modified the real life Screaming Eagles into the Howling Commandos.

Partnering with Jack Kirby, who unlike Lee saw actual combat, the two kicked off the first new war series in years and using the new alchemy of characterization mixed with slam-bang action, the series immediately found an audience. John Severin, who would join the art team some time later, recalled that he and Kirby had spoken about teaming for a war-based comic strip in the 1950s that never materialized, but it could be that Kirby took those unused concepts and contributed them to the feature. The first 23 issues and Annual #1 are being collected in the new edition of Essential Sgt. Fury Volume 1. The 544-page collection contains the very best of the material and demonstrates early on that the creators were channeling their own World War II experiences nearly 20 years later.

Fury’s squad was made up of a motley bunch that was more integrated and international in flavor many of whom were seen recently in the Captain America movie such as Corporal Timothy Aloysius Cadwallader “Dum Dum” Dugan and Private Gabriel Jones (an African-American solider, who the color separator “corrected” to Caucasian in issue one, prompting Lee to send a note with the color guides to the second issue). The team had several significant firsts such as Isadore “Izzy” Cohen, the first Jewish American comic book protagonist (Ben Grimm’s heritage was revealed decades later) and there was Jonathan “Junior” Juniper, the first significant character to die in battle during the Marvel Age. He was replaced by Pinky Pinkerton, who Stan later suggested was always portrayed as a gay character, although I seriously doubt that.

Taking orders from Captain Samuel “Happy Sam” Sawyer, the Commandos worked throughout the European Theater of war and both Lee and Kirby made certain not to glamorize the actual battles. Dubbed “The War Mag for People Who Hate War Mags”, the series stretched credulity at times but also brought pathos at a time when the rest of the titles were bombastic. The second issue immediately demonstrated the horror of war with a scene set at a concentration camp, its emaciated prisoners, and the horrific gas chamber.

Issue #4 not only killed Juniper, but it introduced Pamela Hawley, the British nurse who was to become the love of Fury’s life. I still recall sitting in summer camp reading a reprint of issue #18 where Hawley died and felt gut-punched. Characters didn’t die like that (at least not then they didn’t; Hawley was the most significant death until Gwen Stacy opened the floodgates a few years later). The large cast allowed Lee to explore their backgrounds to vary the storytelling so in this book you will get to meet Private Robert “Rebel” Ralston’s family and Pinkerton’s background.

As for contributions to the Marvel Universe, issue #3 guest starred Major Reed Richards of the O.S.S. and in issue #13 the Howlers met Captain America and Bucky. When Fury’s major antagonist Baron Von Strucker was introduced, little did anyone realize both men would survive to the modern day and continue their battles as the leaders of S.H.I.E.L.D. and Hydra respectively.

The book was a victim of its own success so Kirby was gone by the eighth issue, replaced by Dick Ayers, who was a veteran storyteller and easily slipped behind the drawing table. Kirby returned for the occasional cover, and the first and last pages to issue #13, but Ayers made the title his own, even plotting a few issues and managed to fit in drawing the first annual as well. Check out issue #15, which was attractively inked by Steve Ditko. When Severin joined him with issue #27, the book took on a distinctive look all its own and was one of the best drawn titles of the decade.

For one of the most satisfying reading experiences from that particular decade, you don’t want to miss this collection.

Purchase

Essential Sgt. Fury Vol. 1 SC