The Comics Rack

THE JACK KIRBY READER VOL. 1

   Many years ago, publisher Greg Theakston began a series called The Complete Jack Kirby. The goal of the series was to reprint all of Kirby's comic work in chronological fashion along with biographical information and full credits. The series hit a snag right after the second volume, when Marvel refused to allow any of Kirby's early material to be reprinted. DC declined in a similar fashion, so Theakston jumped to the post-war years when Kirby, in conjunction with Joe Simon, produced material that they co-owned, in an attempt to continue the series. Two more volumes were released, before poor sales, due in part, I'm sure to the long delays between volumes, killed the project.
   Fortunately, Theakston doesn't give up and has started a new series called The Jack Kirby Reader. Vol. 1, the current volume, features 160 pages of reprints, mainly from the late 40s. Much of this material, I'm sure, would have appeared in the previous series had it continued, but that doesn't diminish the quality of the stories, nor their importance. Under a cover showing Stuntman in action, the book contains 13 stories of varying lengths along with some previously unreprinted comic strip work from 1937 featuring Socko the Sea Dog, 4 one-page vignettes on famous Americans produced in 1947 and an unpublished sequence from newspaper strip proposal.
   Of all the material offered here, it is hard to pick any one favorite. I've always enjoyed the Boy Explorers and the two stories reprinted here are good fun. Another episode of Link Thorne the Flying Fool also appears here and makes me wish that Kirby and Simon (most everything in this volume is from the days when Simon and Kirby were a team) had done a full length book (or twelve) featuring the character. The newspaper strip proposal, "On the Green with Peter Parr", is interesting and it's about golf (!) for corn's sake, but under Kirby's guidance turns into a very human drama in which golf is only a part.
   If pressed, however, I would have to say it is the stories reprinted here from Justice Traps the Guilty, Headline Comics and Young Romance that I most enjoy. These stories are all from the late 40s, when Simon and Kirby were producing stories with depth and maturity the like of which had not been seen up to that time and, sadly, have never been seen since. If you imagine your favorite drama, be it movie or television, and then transfer it to a comic book, you can kind of get a feel for what Simon and Kirby were producing. The stories were basically illustrated dramas about real people written from a more mature perspective that had nothing to do with super-heroes. Although the stories were about criminals, and fallen women and folks who lived out in the Ozarks, they all had the thread of being about the human condition at their heart. The stories catch you from the beginning and don't let you go until the end because they are about people and are realistic portrayals of people with whom we can identify.
   I only found two drawbacks with the book. The first is in the reprinting of a parody of 20,000 Leagues under the Sea, which originally saw the light of day in From Here to Insanity in 1955. Simon and Kirby were never good at comedy and this story is no exception. The art is good, but the entire concept is weak and absolutely reeks of Mad Magazine. The second drawback is the background material: simply put, there is none and the bibliographic material is also very slim, giving us only the story titles, dates, where the story appeared and inking credits. There are no writing credits at all. I find that I miss Theakston's overview of Kirby's career and how these stories fit into the chronology of Kirby's life.
   These minor points aside, this is a volume I would recommend to you without reservation. It may be hard to find, although your local comic store should be able to come up with the book if you ask them nicely and cross your fingers. While some may find the $25.00 price tag a bit steep, you will get at least that much enjoyment out of the stories you will find between the covers.
   The Jack Kirby Reader Vol. 1 is published by Pure Imagination and has an SRP of $25.00.

AVENGERS DISASSEMBLED

   Okay, I have to admit that I haven't read The Avengers since around the time that it was decided that Hank Pym was insane and a wife beater (somewhere in the early 200s). Up to that time, The Avengers was pretty close to my favorite book and, at one time, I had a full set that started at issue #40, but when they started to pick on good old Hank, I decided enough was enough. Imagine my surprise, then, when Wilie started to write me about how good The Avengers was and how the new story arc, to be called "Disassembled" would really knock my socks off. Just to get me interested he even sent me some of the issues before the new arc and one of the "Disassembled" issues. Well, I must admit I was pleasantly surprised by Chuck Austen's writing and was so impressed by the single Bendis issue I read that I waited until the entire storyline was collected into one book in order to read the whole story.
   Avengers Disassembled is the trade paperback that tells the whole story and collects Avengers #500-503 along with Avengers Finale. As far as re-boots go, this is one of the best I have seen. In a nutshell, all of the characters who have ever been an Avenger show up for a huge battle in which some major characters die and by the end of the tale the Avengers have been changed: seemingly forever. Sounds like hype, but it is the way the tale unfolds itself. Of course, nothing in comics is set in stone and the deaths and events that occur in the course of the story can be undone by later writers, but standing on its own, this is a compelling tale, mainly due to the unexpectedness of events.
   The major credit for this story must go to writer Brian Michael Bendis. I've never read anything by him before, but I'm starting to look for his work now. Bendis has a great ear for dialogue and the conversations between characters flow quite naturally. Not only that, but he also knows when to let the art carry the story and vice versa. And the plot....yikes! Bendis handles all the characters in a sensible fashion and even allows them to go in directions that have not occurred before: sort of like an Alan Moore reboot; which from me is high praise indeed.
   The art by David Finch is also of high quality. The characters all look different from one another and also show a great range of emotion in their faces and postures. His storytelling does take a bit of getting used to, since he tends to take a cinematic approach to his layouts, interspersing small panels that show reactions with larger panels that show a lot of action. Finch, however, has a wide range and handles both action and emotion very, very well.
   Only a couple of quibbles over the book. Overall, I feel the book is colored way too dark. I realize the need to establish a mood, but even the parts of the story that occur in light, look dark, but this seems to be the modern theory of comic coloring. The Avengers Finale is (was) kind of a throwaway and although Bendis brings his story to a conclusion that sets up the new series, he is not aided by the multiple artists working on the book, many of whom seem to be drawing with a wet cigar butt.
   These problems aside, this is a good, solid story that is well worth your time and would look good up on your bookshelf.
Avengers Disassembled is a trade paperback with an SRP of $15.95.

ESSENTIAL TOMB OF DRACULA VOL. 3

   Essential Tomb of Dracula Vol. 3 is up for review this time around and it contains the final issues of the comic book incarnation of Tomb of Dracula (#50-70), along with selected stories from Tomb of Dracula Magazine #1-4.
   Taken as a whole, this volume is probably the weakest of the ETOD volumes, mainly due to the TOD Magazine stories that are included. These stories appeared in the second magazine incarnation of Dracula and were, to my mind, an afterthought, to the comic series. Granted, they are stories about people (and of the type I would refer to as adult), but they lack the characterization and depth that would raise them above the ordinary. The character of Dracula also suffered during this magazine incarnation and was reduced to a killing machine with little of the nobility, humanity and supporting cast that Wolfman had given him in the regular comic series. (An aside: you must also be aware that Marvel was going for a "Mature Readers" type of publication at this time and that there was partial nudity in the original magazine stories that has been redrawn here to accomadate the faint of heart!). The only story from these later offerings worth looking into, and then only because of its oddity value, is the Steve Ditko drawn Dracula story from issue #3. The story has some nice wash technique, but Ditko's interpretation of Dracula leaves a bit to be desired.
   The material from the TOD comic reads better and continues the storyline that actually started in issue #46 with the wedding of Dracula to a member of a satanic church. The stories that begin this volume continue with the pregnancy of Dracula's wife and the ramifications of the birth of Dracula's son: a child who is not who he appears to be. Along the way, the usual supporting cast continues to hunt Dracula, although their participation in the stories lessens as the series winds down to its conclusion. By the end, Dracula becomes the main focus of the stories and this is where the whole series falls apart, since Dracula by himself is not as interesting as Dracula reflected in the lives of those around him.
   Obviously, there was something in this storyline that was of great interest to Wolfman, although I have no idea of his religious affiliation, if any. The Christian overtones of Dracula's son throughout this sequence cannot be ignored , nor can the use of God and Satan as real characters in the story. Similarly, the short sequence where Dracula becomes human once again also has a number of ramifications, some of them religious. Where this long and meandering story might have gone had the series not been cancelled is anyone's guess, but it is the only time (at least that I am aware) that religious ideas have been used in a comic book series in a real sense and not metaphorically. Since we don't know when Wolfman got the news that the series was to be cancelled, it is hard to guess where changes were made in these sequences to wrap up all the loose ends by issue #70. All in all, however, these stories are good, but not up to the level found in the first two Essential volumes.
   Of course, TOD cannot be discussed without the art of Colan and Palmer and both artists are in very fine form for these final stories. Palmer's inking reflects Colan's pencil lines without overpowering them and his addition of zip-a-tone to the art lends an extra layer of depth to the finished product. Colan also provides wonderfully moody art for the TOD stories (as he did for the entire series) and even to the end of the series his pencilling is outstanding. Art reproduction throughout is quite clean, although some of the covers did not print well at all.
   I must admit that this is not a volume I would recommend on its own. By the time these stories appeared, the cast of characters and situations of the storyline had already been well established. One must really start with ETOD Vol. 1 and read the entire series for the stories to have their full impact, so I can't recommend this volume on its own merits for your bookshelf. On the other hand, if you buy all three volumes, you'll have the COMPLETE SERIES!
   Essential Tomb of Dracula Vol. 3 has an SRP of $16.99 and, along with Vols. 1 & 2 will give you hours of reading pleasure.

THE JACK KIRBY READER Vol. 2

   Pure Imagination has been gearing up their publishing schedule and, at this point, is releasing about one book a month. Fortunately, those of us who are Kirby fans are not being left out in the cold and The Jack Kirby Reader Vol. 2 has been part of this new schedule: giving us another large dose of classic Kirby material with a couple of added bonuses along the way.
   The surprise of this volume is the inclusion of some of Kirby's pulp illustrations from 1940. Done for Marvel Stories while Kirby and Simon were on staff at Timely comics, there are four of these splash pages reprinted here, showing that Jack was as good an illustrator as he was a comic artist. The volume then follows the pattern of Vol. 1 and reprints a number of Kirby stories from 1947-49 when the team of Simon & Kirby was at their peak. Closing out the book are some very short stories from 1952, 1956 and 1957.
   I would be hard pressed to come up with a favorite story in this book. I've always enjoyed the Simon & Kirby crime comics and put them on an equal par with the crime comics produced by Lev Gleason. Yet, while both have depth and, to my mind, are the equivalent of "adult" comics, the Simon & Kirby material always has more action due to Jack's style and so, they edge out Gleason by a narrow margin. The examples here are no exception to my preferences and are quite enjoyable. Romance comics, a genre created by Simon & Kirby, are also represented here by three stories and are an "adult" type of story that we no longer see in comics. Like the crime comic stories, these tales are about people and this is what makes them "adult." And, just for the adventurer in us all, there is another story about Link Thorne from Airboy Comics. The short stories from the 50s are also of interest, as they include a great cross-genre sampling of supernatural, science fiction, western and war. In fact, in thumbing through the book, I find that the only stories I don't like are those concerning Lockjaw the Alligator and Earl the Rich Rabbit. I've long been of the opinion that Simon & Kirby didn't understand how humor worked in comics and these stories do nothing to change my mind.
   I could go on at length about the comics reprinted here, but I've done that so often in the past with Kirby material that I'm beginning to sound like a broken record. As with Vol. 1 of this series, there is not a lot of background material about these stories: just the story titles, publication dates, titles of the magazines the stories appeared in and one annotation indicating that Kirby did his own inking. I would be much more interested in some background on how long Mort Meskin served as Associate Editor for Simon & Kirby (found on a couple of splash pages from the 50s) or in who did the terrible inks on the last story in the book, but, unfortunately, these questions aren't answered here. What you do get, however, is 160 pages of well told comic stories by one of the masters of the art form: Jack Kirby.
   The Jack Kirby Reader Vol. 2 has an SRP of $25 and definitely belongs up on your bookshelf.

THE LOU FINE READER Vol. 1

   Having just returned from a comic buying trip, I came across a beautiful volume that I just have to share with you. Entitled The Lou Fine Reader, it is an oversized trade paperback from Pure Imagination in the same format as the Kirby Readers. The volume features 160 pages of Fine's work from the 30s and 40s, cleanly reproduced in B & W and, I must admit that I've seen some of these stories before, but never reproduced as cleanly.
   Fine is considered by many, myself included, to be one of the true greats of the Golden Age of comics and the examples in this book show why. Fine's characters seem to always be in motion, whether punching out a villain or flying through the air. His storytelling has a cinematic style and the point of view of the panels constantly shifts around so the viewer sees the action from different angles while the story moves ahead; a technique later popularized by Neal Adams. Fine was also the first artist to move figures and objects outside the panel borders long in advance of 3-D and this technique is also well represented here, as well.
   Of greatest interest, however, is development of Fine the artist as presented in these stories. One has only to glance at the crudity of the early "The Diary of Dr. Hayward" syndicated pages from 1939 and then look at the Black Condor pages from 1941 to realize how much Fine changed over a very short period of time. He also managed to give each strip a distinctive style, so that Dollman doesn't look like Uncle Sam, who doesn't look like The Ray, The Flame or anyone else: each strip has an individualistic look that only has Fine's artistry in common.
   As an added bonus, publisher Greg Theakston has written a 19 page biography of Fine that is included here along with a bibliography of Fine's work that covers the years 1938-1941.
   NOTE: Long time collectors may have a copy of The Lou Fine Comic Treasury from Pure Imagination that was published in 1991. There are three stories duplicated between the two collections, but the reproduction in the Reader is much cleaner.
   The Lou Fine Reader is definitely a book worth adding to your collection, has an SRP of $25.00 and, by the time you read this, Vol. 2 should also be available.

POWERS: WHO KILLED RETRO GIRL?

   Continuing my current love affair with the work of Brian Michael Bendis (which began with the Avengers Disassembled storyline...see above) I picked up the first collection of the Powers series, Powers: Who Killed Retro Girl?. Once again, I am impressed, which is saying a great deal. Bendis, along with artist Michael Avon Oeming has created an original series that is not only a good mystery story, but also a good super-hero story as well.
   The idea that super-heroes exist has been done many times before, dating all the way back to Superman. Bendis has given this basic idea a twist by making the super-heroes of Powers rather aloof; their existance is accepted, but they are looked upon as near gods by most of humanity. Except for that difference, everything else seems just like we would find it in a noir-ish detective story. Detective Christian Walker finishes a case and is then introduced to his new partner Deena Pilgrim. Their relationship is an ongoing sub-plot of the book. The major plot of the book, however, is the murder of Retro Girl and while Walker and Pilgrim set off to investigate this murder, more mysteries are presented and we get a better look at the world that Bendis and Oeming have created. By the end, the mysteries are solved, the story is completed, yet the characters of Walker and Pilgrim have been so well established that any further appearances from them would be welcomed.
   In the hands of lesser creators, Powers would probably have been a one-shot at best. Bendis, however, writes his characters with a great deal of depth that raises the bar for comic book writing (there is an aged Iron Man in the book that I really enjoyed). He also has a wonderful ear for dialogue that not only makes the words sound right, but he also is able to write characters talking over one another in the fashion that people actually use when speaking in heated situations. The story is also original, particularly in its resolution and Bendis even gives credit to Howard Chaykin in the next to last story page, since much of the layout and style of the story are done in the style Chaykin first did in American Flagg. Oeming's art is also of great interest. His style could best be described as Bruce Timm/ Batman Adventures, since he uses a lot of heavy lines for his characters. Oeming also uses many repeated panels to tell the story, shifting only facial expressions or the direction of a character's eyeballs to reflect the dialogue. This technique owes much to the current state of television than it does movies, but Oeming uses it quite affectively and, although a bit cartoonish, his characters do look like they have actual anatomy, unlike many of the comics being published today. His art also has a dark, noir quality to it and I only question whether the sun ever shines in the nameless (?) city, as the coloring throughout is quite dark.
   I enjoyed Powers a great deal and found that although this particular story arc ended with this volume, I will be looking for more adventures of these characters as time and budget allow. The story is done in one and, I think, can be enjoyed on its own without any of the material that followed (I think there have been about 50 issues of the comic as of this writing). My only quibble about the book is the added material. I want to read the story, preferably on the cheap, and I'm sure that all the extras, such as unused covers, sketchbooks and the script to issue #1, helped raise the price beyond where I am comfortable, especially since the later volumes in the series have a similar price.
   Powers: Who Killed Retro Girl? is an Image trade paperback, well worth your time and money and has an SRP of $21.95 (see what I mean about all those extras?).