Series Saturday: The Führer and the Tramp

This is a blog series about … well, series. I love stories that continue across volumes, in whatever form: linked short stories, novels, novellas, television, movies, comics.

cover art by Dexter Wee

The Führer and the Tramp, published by Comics Experience and Source Point Press, 2020

Writers: Sean McArdle and Jon Judy

Pencils and Inks: Dexter Wee

Letters and Colors: Sean McArdle

Editor: Andy Schmidt

Synopsis: Charlie Chaplin – comic, filmmaker, and raconteur – didn’t become the world’s biggest star by courting controversy, but when he comes face-to-face with the horrors of Hitler, he feels compelled to get off the sidelines and get involved. And then Charlie is approached by FDR himself with a special assignment. His mission, if he chooses to accept it: create a propaganda film to drum up public support for joining the war in Europe.

And so Charlie goes from movie maker to provocateur, traveling the world and dodging danger to complete his film. With the help of undercover agent Hedy Lamarr, her handler Errol Flynn, and British patriot Alfred Hitchcock, Chaplin faces down American fascists, Nazi spies, and his own massive self-doubt to complete his masterpiece.

But just because the film is done doesn’t mean the mission is, and little tramp and great dictator go toe-to-toe, Charlie and Adolph, one-on-one, mano a mano in a rip-roaring climax that fully delivers on the promise of the premise.

My Thoughts: I ordered this series through my local comic shop partially because the concept sounded fun, but mostly on the strength of Dexter Wee’s art. I got to know Dexter’s work on the webcomic Cura Te Ipsum, in which Dexter and writer Neal Bailey “Tuckerized” me in a few scenes. I’ve always found Dex’s work to be fluid, expressive, and full of action. So I was not surprised at how well he captured Chaplin’s antic physicality, Lamarr’s intelligent sexiness, Hitchcock’s imperious posture, and Flynn’s swashbuckling stature. He also manages to lampoon Hitler and the Nazi rank-and-file without being cartoony, not always an easy line to walk when one is trying to tell a funny story that doesn’t deflate the seriousness of the threat the Third Reich posed. Wee moves effortlessly from panoramic establishing shots to multi-panel action sequences to intimate close-ups. The things he closes in on aren’t always faces – another way he drives home each character’s personality (for instance, the focus on Chaplin’s legs on the first page of the first issue, as Charlie is confronted by a Nazi soldier who mistakes him for a German Jew lacking a star and papers conveys Chaplin’s aggravation at not being recognized, anger at the way Jews are being treated, and nervousness at possibly being arrested – all accomplished without a single facial expression in evidence). And his visual representations of very real people, from Chaplin to FDR to some surprise cameos in book five that are too fun to spoil here, are spot on. I’m pretty sure most folks would recognize each historical person even without dialogue or captions.

Wee’s art brought me to the book, but Sean McArdle and Jon Judy’s story and dialogue kept me invested through all five issues. They balance the comedy, drama, and action elements perfectly throughout, never allowing the comedic or fanciful sequences to subvert the very real seriousness of the Nazi threat. Of course, the series is intended to be, first and foremost, comedy. That comedy swings between physical slapstick (Chaplin naked and spilling iodine in FDR’s lap) and Noel Coward-esque banter (especially between Flynn and Lamarr), with some more subtle humor sprinkled throughout. The dialogue, whether comedic or serious, captures the vocal ticks and mannerisms unique to each character, matching how well Wee’s art captures their physical likenesses without sliding into cliché or pastiche. All three creators really did their homework, is what I’m saying. The pace is also near perfect: I can’t imagine this story feeling as complete if it had run fewer than five issues, but I can certainly imagine how bloated it would have felt at six or more.

Being a story that purports to tell “the truth behind the true events,” there’s a lot of stuff the creators admit isn’t historically accurate (it’s unknown whether Chaplin actually ever met FDR, for instance) and bits that trade off of urban legend (this is not the first time its been suggested that Lamarr and/or Flynn were employed by the US government as spies/operatives). The fun is in imagining that this all could have happened and been highly classified all this time. McArdle, Judy and Wee roll with that sense of fun throughout … and even hint that maybe this wasn’t the only time Charlie Chaplin got suckered into a high-stakes adventure alongside Lamarr and Flynn. I can only hope there’s another miniseries in the near future from this creative team.

I believe the individual print issues of The Führer and the Tramp are sold out from the publisher, so your local comic shop may have a hard time getting them for you. But there’s always the secondary market and the ebooks, until the trade paperback collection comes out in 2021.

Series Saturday: Universal's Frankenstein movies

This is a series about … well, series. I do so love stories that continue across volumes, in whatever form: linked short stories, novels, novellas, television, movies. I’ve already got a list of series I’ve recently read, re-read, watched, or re-watched that I plan to blog about. I might even, down the line, open myself up to letting other people suggest titles I should read/watch and then comment on.

I’ve been a fan of the original Universal Studios Monsters franchise for as long as I can remember, but it’s been quite a while since I’ve done any kind of intentional rewatch of most of them. This year I thought, being in the midst of a pandemic and all, that maybe I’d have time to revisit most of the rest, via the Legacy Collection DVDs I’ve had for ages. For various reasons, I only got through the Frankenstein movies.

There are eight movies in the original Universal Frankenstein series (or seven, if you’re one of those folks who discounts Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein):

·         Frankenstein (1931)

·         The Bride of Frankenstein (1935)

·         Son of Frankenstein (1939)

·         Ghost of Frankenstein (1942)

·         Frankenstein Meets the Wolf Man (1943)

·         House of Frankenstein (1944)

·         House of Dracula (1945)

·         Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein (1948)

The Universal Monsters “universe” was perhaps the earliest cinematic universe in terms of characters overlapping, but the attention to continuity wasn’t like it is today with the Marvel Cinematic Universe and such fare. The Frankenstein movies as a whole hold together better than some of the other sub-franchises in the UMU (I’m looking at you, sequels to Dracula!). Still, there are lots of discrepancies: in Frankenstein, Henry Frankenstein’s tower lab is some distance from Manor Frankenstein and the town it is a part of; in Bride, the tower is a lot closer, and in Son, the tower is right next door to what is now Castle Frankenstein, which overlooks the village. The interior sets of the Manor change quite a bit between Frankenstein and Bride, as well. Sometimes the same character is played by different actors across the franchise, and sometimes the same actors show up as multiple characters. I doubt many audience members at the time cared, as long as they got a good story, but I don’t think it would fly today.

For the most part, we do get solid stories with compelling characters. Although not very similar to the novel on which it is based, Frankenstein gives us Colin Clive’s brilliant performance as the obsessed and conflicted Henry Frankenstein and Boris Karloff’s poignant confused and lost Monster, supported by the always-eerie Dwight Frye as the hunchbacked assistant Fritz and the understated Edward Van Sloan as Doctor Waldman. The only weak point in the main cast, to me, is Mae Clarke as Elizabeth; her performance is a bit too “stagey” as compared to the rest of the cast (and perhaps is the reason the role was recast for Bride?). As unlike the source material as it may be, it’s still a tightly-told and well-acted tale directed by James Whale with great mood and tension throughout.

Karloff and Clive return as the Monster and his creator in The Bride of Frankenstein under Whale’s continued direction, with Elsa Lancaster as both Mary Shelley and the Bride. Valerie Hobson replaces Mae Clarke as Elizabeth. I love this movie almost as much as the original and Son, but man is the tone just all over the place. Whale can’t seem to decide if he’s making a pathos-filled character piece or a slapstick comedy. Una O’Connor’s Minnie (maid to Elizabeth? Housekeeper? I’m still unsure after multiple viewings exactly what her job is) takes up way more screen-time than comic relief should in a film like this, and O’Connor’s shrill over-the-top delivery makes almost every scene she’s in hard to watch. The scene where Doctor Pretorius (Ernest Thesiger) produces his Homunculi also feels out of place, between the bawdy comedy between the Homunculi and the fact that Homunculi are never seen or mentioned again. Karloff is at his best as the Monster here, learning to talk and feel, and Clive matches him turn-for-turn as Henry grows desperate to just be done with creating life and return to his wife. If not for the Una O’Connor scenes and the Homunculi bit, Bride would be pretty perfect and perhaps even better than the original.

Son of Frankenstein, directed by Rowland V. Lee, was Karloff’s last turn as the Monster. Karloff does more acting here with his eyes than most actors do with their whole bodies, but he feels wasted. The Monster’s ability to talk is inexplicably gone. He’s not given much to do other than rampaging. Basil Rathbone takes over the lead spot as Henry’s son Wolf and does a great job as a man conflicted between forging his own path and following in his father’s footsteps. Bela Lugosi is brilliant, and almost unrecognizable, as the hunchback Ygor, stealing every scene he’s in.  Lionel Atwill makes his first appearance in the franchise as the one-armed Col. Krogh (in a scene that gets sent-up expertly by Mel Brooks in Young Frankenstein). There are still some awkward humorous moments, mostly involving Wolf and Elsa (Josephine Hutchinson)’s toddler son Peter (Donnie Dunagan), but they’re not as prevalent or as distracting as the Minnie scenes in Bride. Had the franchise ended as a trilogy, it might rank as one of the best horror trilogies ever.

Ghost of Frankenstein moves the action from the town of Frankenstein to the town of Vasaria (where it will remain for pretty much the rest of the franchise). Lugosi returns as Ygor, Lon Chaney Jr. takes over as the Monster (not much more than a weapon of destruction, although in the early scenes there’s an attempt at emotion as the Monster once again bonds with a little girl and the crowd reacts out of fear for her safety), Sir Cedric Hardwicke plays both Ludwig Frankenstein (younger son of Henry) and Henry’s ghost, Evelyn Ankers appears as Ludwig’s daughter Elsa (not to be confused with Wolf’s wife), and Lionel Atwill plays his second character in the franchise, the not-so-nice Doctor Boehmer. It’s a solid movie, building tension as the various non-Monster leads jockey for whose brain they’re going to transplant into the Monster. There’s even a bit of a return to the Monster as he was in Bride, able to speak towards the end of the movie. But it almost feels like director Erle C. Kenton and the writers are trying too hard to be surprising and sneaky. I still love it, just not as much as the previous three.

Frankenstein Meets the Wolf Man puts Lon Chaney Jr. back where he’s best (in hair and fangs), and puts Bela Lugosi in the Monster’s make-up. A sensible move given Ygor’s brain ends up in the Monster at the end of Ghost, except that behind-the-scenes machinations removed any scene where the Monster actually speaks, so Lugosi is as wasted as Karloff felt in Son (perhaps even more so). Elsa Frankenstein is now played by Ilona Massey (with an accent the previous Elsa didn’t have), and dialogue lets us know this is Ludwig’s daughter and not Wolf’s wife. She’s the first Frankenstein featured in the franchise who isn’t a scientist and really has nothing to do with the Monster. Lionel Atwill is back as his third character in the franchise, the Mayor of Vasaria. This is far more of a Wolf Man movie than it is a Frankenstein. Sans dialogue, the Monster is a weapon of mass destruction to be unleashed and defeated.

House of Frankenstein and House of Dracula are “everything and the kitchen sink” approaches to combining several of the Universal Monsters. To this day, I’m not sure why the Mummy and the Invisible Man weren’t invited to the parties. Both movies are pretty disjointed, especially in integrating Dracula into the rest of the action. Concentrating on just the Frankenstein elements: In House of Frankenstein, Glenn Strange takes over as The Monster; Lionel Atwill plays yet another character, Inspector Arnz; there’s a new hunchback played by J. Carrol Naish; and Boris Karloff returns to the franchise as a very different mad scientist, Doctor Neimann. Karloff is brilliant and Naish is excellent, but the Monster himself just lumbers and kills and is “killed.” In House of Dracula, Strange continues as the Monster; Lionel Atwill plays character #5 in the franchise, Police Inspector Holtz; the hunchbacked assistant is a woman (Jane Adams); and the mad scientist is now Doctor Edelmann, played by Onslow Stevens (the closest the Universal Monsters franchise ever really gets to incorporated a version of Doctor Jekyll and Mister Hyde, at least until the Abbott and Costello movies). House of Dracula is again far more of a Wolf Man (and perhaps a Jekyll/Hyde or even Dracula) movie than it is a Frankenstein movie. The Monster is mostly there for mayhem, but at least the Wolf Man gets a happy ending.

There are a lot of people who don’t consider Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein as a valid part of the Frankenstein (or larger Universal Monsters) franchise. I am most emphatically not one of them. While I’m not sure where it should fit in the overall sequence (since I like to think that Larry Talbot gets to keep his Happy Ending from House of Dracula), I think it treats the monsters who appear (Bela Lugosi back as Dracula, Glenn Strange as the Monster, Lon Chaney Jr. as the Wolf Man, Lenore Aubert as the requisite “mad scientist,” and a cameo by Vincent Price as The Invisible Man) with great respect. They’re played as the serious monsters they are, not for laughs. The comedy that comes from Abbott and Costello’s reactions to the Monsters fits much better than that provided by Minnie in Bride or Peter Frankenstein in Son. And Glenn Strange actually gets to speak as the Monster! The only thing that would have made this movie more perfect would have been if Lionel Atwill had still been alive to play one more random police officer or mad scientist. Unfortunately, he’d passed away in 1946. Still, it’s a fitting end-cap to the franchise.

Except…

For my own part, I also include Mel Brooks’ Young Frankenstein as a coda or grace note to the franchise. I included it in this rewatch, even though it’s not in the Legacy DVDs because it was released by a different studio. Brooks and Wilder’s love for the original movies is so evident in every frame of their film. They poke fun at the original movies’ inconsistencies and quirks, while still keeping the tone and using some of the original set pieces. There’s even a theory (espoused by my good friend Chuck Loridans among others) that “Froederick” Frankenstein is actually … Peter Frederick Frankenstein, Wolf’s son! (Who would have be a bit amnesiac to not remember meeting the original Monster and a one-armed policeman as a boy, but the blond hair, the expressive eyes, the sense of wonder… it fits!)

Page To Screen: Evening Primrose

Page to Screen is a series of blog posts where I read a book or story and then watch a movie based on said book or story. It will be intermittent, I’m sure, like most of my “regular” features. The first, unofficial Page to Screen entry was my review of The Bitter Tea of General Yen and the classic movie adapted from it.

Okay, so this one is technically a little backwards from the intent, because I first saw the television musical version of Evening Primrose at the Museum of Television Arts in New York City back in the late 90s. I had not seen it since then. When I discovered that the episode was on DVD and that the short story it was based on was available in print, I decided it was time to read the original story and rewatch the movie. WARNING: HERE THERE BE SPOILERS, FOR BOTH THE STORY AND THE TELEVISION EPISODE. I can’t talk about the differences between the two without spoiling stuff.

STORY REVIEW

“Evening Primrose” by John Collier is a brief twelve pages, an “accidentally found manuscript” type of story. The story purports to have been found scribbled in a pad of Highlife Bond paper bought by a customer at Bracey’s Giant Emporium. What the purchaser of the notepad (a Miss Sadie Brodribb) thinks of the tale she’s accidentally purchased, we never learn. As is the nature of people, she probably thought it was some kind of practical joke by the store employees (akin to finding a “help, I’m being held prisoner in a fortune cookie factory” note in your fortune cookie). The story itself is the first person account of Mr. Charles Snell, a poet who decides the real world is no longer for him and that he’ll live in Bracey’s. He’ll hide during the day, and eat/drink/write poetry at night, deftly avoiding the store’s night watchman. He quickly discovers he’s not alone in living in the store, that this is a thing people do in stores large and small all across the city – people who for one reason or another have eschewed normal society. The community in Bracey’s has a hierarchy, at the top of which sits the regal Mrs. Vanderpant, and at the bottom of which sits a teen serving girl named Ella. Charles is warned that people who betray the community are sentenced to removal by the Dark Men, who turn the offendees into mannequins. Charles falls in love with the servant girl, who is in love with the night watchman (who remains oblivious to the community living around him). Charles decides to respect Ella’s love for another man and to help them meet and escape. Only in his emotional despair over Ella not loving him, he spills the beans to a community member he trusts. The story ends with Ella trussed up for the Dark Men and Charles determined to find the night watchman and rescue her. Charles’ final lines indicate his plan to leave his notes where a customer might find them, in case his plan to rescue Ella results in himself and the watchman also being killed. 

It’s a tightly-told story, and Collier builds the mystery of the community and threat of the Dark Men smoothly throughout the story – but the ending feels just a bit too abrupt. Charles declares his love, gets rebuffed, accidentally betrays Ella, and sets his plan to rescue her all within the final two pages of the story. I wish Collier had built the suspense of what would happen to Ella and Charles just a little bit more before the end. Regardless, I enjoyed the concept, the mood, the reveal of Charles’ character, the development of the Bracey’s community (and their relationship to communities in other stores) and eerie threat of the Dark Men.

“MOVIE” REVIEW

The television episode “Evening Primrose” first aired on November 16, 1966 as a part of the ABC Stage 67 anthology series. I would have been a whole three months old. I have no clue whether my parents watched it. Given their love of television and my father’s love of musicals, I’m going to guess they did. It starred the perfectly cast Anthony Perkins as misanthropic poet Charles Snell and Charmaine Carr as innocent, uneducated Ella Harkness, with Dorothy Stickney as more dotty-than-regal Mrs. Monday (a renamed Mrs. Vanderpant).

It’s a musical, with music and lyrics by Stephen Sondheim and book by James Goldman and directed by Paul Bogart. The creators and cast do a wonderful job translating the mood of the story to the screen – all the “free but still sort of trapped” sensibility, the rigidness of the Paul Stern (renamed from Bracey’s) store community, the threat of the Dark Men is there in the staging, dialogue, lyrics and instrumental music – and hey fix the pacing issue I had with the story, giving the romantic relationship more time to develop and giving space to the real threat of the Dark Men at the end. The songs start out character-centric and then become plot-propelling. Charles’ song “If You Can Find Me I’m Here” is one of the best misanthropic “you don’t like my art, screw you” songs ever written, while Ella’s “I Remember Sky” is a wistfully beautiful piece. The duet “When” moves their relationship along and incorporates their fears of being found out, while the duet “Take Me to the World” is the point at which the plot turns towards the big denouement.  

There are a couple of significant changes to the story, as often happens in page-to-screen adaptations. Ella is now an adult (to remove the ickiness of a poet in his late twenties falling in love with a sixteen-year-old, I assume) and her mistreatment at the hands of the older community members is made more explicit (including that they have never taught her to read, write, or do math, and force her to live in the store basement). Instead of unrequited love, Ella falls as much in love with Charles as he does with her. And in what I think is a very sensible change that heightens the drama of the last act, the couple is found out not through Charles intentionally revealing his feelings to his ‘trusted friend’ Roscoe, but because Charles accidentally turns on the store’s speaker system while they are singing “Take Me To The World” and unknowingly lets the entire store community know what they are planning (the night watchman hears too, thus revealing that there are people living in the store even if he can’t manage to find them, which puts him in danger without having to work in the awkward love triangle).

The final act is a wonderful game of cat-and-mouse through the store as Mrs. Monday and Roscoe try to delay Charles and Ella long enough for the Dark Men to catch them. The fate of the characters implied by the structure of Collier’s story is made explicit in the final scenes of the episode. I always thought it was a delightfully dark ending, and I’m glad Goldman and Sondheim didn’t decide to change it for television.

Interesting trivia: while the television episode originally aired in color, the only print remaining is in black and white. And I actually think that adds to the mood and thus effectiveness of the production. I’m kind of glad the color print isn’t available (the DVD has some test footage of Anthony Perkins in Stern Brothers and it just feels too bright for the story being told).

FINAL COMPARISON

While I liked Collier’s story well enough and I want to read more of his short stories, I think I prefer the musical in this instance.

The Collier story can be found in his collection Fancies and Goodnights. The Sondheim-Goldman musical is available on DVD and Prime Video.

SERIES SATURDAY: Stargirl TV series

This is a series about … well, series. I do so love stories that continue across volumes, in whatever form: linked short stories, novels, novellas, television, movies. I’ve already got a list of series I’ve recently read, re-read, watched, or re-watched that I plan to blog about. I might even, down the line, open myself up to letting other people suggest titles I should read/watch and then comment on.

I think that Stargirl has become my favorite of the current live-action super-hero television offerings. (This being said, as I’ve also noted on social media, in light of not having seen any of Doom Patrol, Titans, Swamp Thing or Umbrella Academy, and having fallen way behind on Black Lightning, Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., and Gotham.) So I’m here to talk about why in more depth than my Facebook post.  IN CASE IT NEEDS TO BE SAID – FROM THIS POINT ON, EXPECT SPOILERS! BOW OUT NOW IF YOU HAVEN’T WATCHED THE ENTIRE SEASON AND CARE ABOUT BEING SURPRISED!

I only became familiar with the Courtney Whitmore Stargirl character after her solo comics series had ended and she’d become a full member of the Justice Society of America. In fact, I still haven’t read her solo series, although I’ve picked up the trade paperback collections and mean to get around to them real soon. So my impressions of the show are based on what I know of the character from her appearances in various JSA runs, and on the show itself.

I’m a firm believer in not expecting live-action versions of comic books to hew too closely to the material on which they’re based. It’s less disappointing when they make wholesale changes if you just go in expecting there to be egregious differences. But Stargirl … Stargirl seems intent on capturing the feel, if not the word-for-word storyline, of the comics. I don’t know how closely anything in season one maps onto the original Stargirl comics (other than Courtney’s step-dad being former sidekick Stripesy and building a giant robot) but they certainly seem to be embracing the legacy aspect of JSA comics going back to the 70s (when Robin, Power Girl, and a time-tossed Star-Spangled Kid joined the team). Okay, so this is not the Beth Chapel, Rick Tyler, Henry King Junior or Yolanda Montez I met back in the late 80s (most obviously, the show’s versions aren’t adults) … but they capture the spirit of each of those characters really well: Henry fighting his father’s evil influence, Rick trying to live up to his father’s legacy but still be his own man, Yolanda trying to decide if she even wants to do this superhero thing at all. Beth is the only one I feel doesn’t have much of the original comics version in her portrayal, but this version of the character is endearing and works as the brainier side of a very brawn-heavy team. I also wasn’t sure how I’d feel about the pilot episode’s biggest departure from the comics: killing off most of the JSA. I have to say I think they gave it all the poignancy it deserved, given that show is not about those characters, but rather the legacy they leave behind.

The show is also embracing the giddiness of super-hero fight scenes that many of the current CW shows eschew for more “realistic” (grittier, darker-filmed) fight choreography. It’s not unusual, in a Stargirl fight scene, to see a character get kicked in the chest and fly across the room. It’s also not unusual to actually be able to see who is hitting who and how hard, and what happens to them after they get hit. With the exception of the opening battle of the pilot, in which the Injustice Society kills most of the JSA, even the night-time and subterranean scenes are well-lit enough to see whose doing what. (Arrow’s fight choreography was mostly spectacular – but how often could you actually see the details of what was going on?) I loved pretty much every fight scene from the pilot on, but the fights in the finale had me cheering for just how well-done they were.

The costumes are also really faithful to the comics, and look almost nothing like what you’d find on any of the other Berlanti-led super-hero shows to date. Gone are the realistic heavy leather outfits of Arrow, Flash, etc.; in are cloaks and cowls and form-fitting spandex and outfits that shouldn’t work in real life but do anyway because COMIC BOOKS. It gives the show a more traditional comic-book look, which I think is part of what frees them to be a little over-the-top in the fight choreography. The only outfits I didn’t really like were those in the snapshot of Pat’s former team, the Seven Soldiers of Victory. They looked a little too much like Halloween costumes. Especially Shining Knight’s, which looked like something you’d pick up at a Ren Faire (but maybe I’m being picky on that because he’s one of my favorite super-heroes?).

The details in the costumes are matched by little set details throughout the season. I particularly loved the movies playing at the theater in Blue Valley: the Unknown Soldier, The Haunted Tank, GI Robot (get the feeling that the people of Blue Valley love their war movies?), and Prez. And I’m sure I missed some other easter eggs, because I can’t imagine Geoff Johns and James Robinson not throwing in more and more obscure stuff as production went along.

The acting on the show is top-notch. Brec Bassinger pulls off the neat trick of letting Courtney be pretty unlikeable at the start (she may be justified in being upset about the move to Blue Valley, but we don’t have to like the way she treats Pat or Mike) and even partway through the season (her grandstanding in the training session with “her” JSA) and still getting us to feel for her. Her best episode was the one in which she finds out her father isn’t who she thought he was and all of her insecurities and heartbreak tumble out. The actors playing the rest of the JSA are excellent as well; while some of what they’re given to play is standard “high school angst,” they don’t overplay it like a lot of high school-set shows do. Of the adult characters, I think Neil Jackson steals the show as Jordan Mahkent/Icicle – his character certainly shows the most depth and nuance (especially as compared to the very one-note “sadistic lunkhead” portrayals of Sportsmaster and Tigress), with Christopher James Baker’s Henry King/Brainwave a close second. And I have to give props to Nelson Lee, who spends the whole season acting under a hood through which we’re barely able to see even his eyes and yet sells every scene perfectly. Amy Smart is terrific as Courtney’s mother, and although I’m not a huge Luke Wilson fan I think he gets Pat Dugan’s mix of sincerity and insecurity just right.

I think the tightness of the season – 13 episodes – helped the actors as well. There was no room for one-off episodes exploring side-quests or a “day in the life at Blue Valley High.” Every scene needed to further the narrative or enhance character, and for the most part they did. Even the scenes of Mike Dugan’s school science fair were necessary – we had to care about the kid if we were going to worry about his safety in the finale. The only scenes I felt didn’t contribute to the overall arc were the scenes in the two-part finale focused on Isaac Bowin (The Fiddler’s son); if they’re not a set-up for the character having a bigger role in season two, then they really were extraneous.

The final episode was one of the most satisfying season finales I’ve seen in a long time, super-hero show or otherwise. The writing staff wrapped up all the major plots for the season while still giving us plenty of hooks into season two. And most of the finale was action, action, action. Which made the quieter Christmas scenes at the end more powerful.

But let’s talk about season two before we go.

With DC Universe and the decision to move most of the original live-action and animated content to HBO Max, there’s a lot of trepidation therefore that Stargirl moving to the CW instead will cause it to fall victim to the things that people dislike about the Arrowverse shows: increased romantic soap—opera elements and too many “filler” episodes, and a move to filming in Vancouver instead of Georgia. I’m hoping that Greg Berlanti will stick to the formula that made season one of Stargirl successful: 13 episodes (15, at most) and a focus on one major problem for the heroes to overcome (and that filming will remain in Georgia as Black Lightning has).

The concern I have is that the season finale set up a ton of possible main storylines for season two. We got set-ups for The Shade (one of my favorite DC characters ever), Eclipso, the search for the Seven Soldiers, the return of Sylvester Pemberton, the whereabouts/survival of the remaining ISA members who aren’t clearly dead, and perhaps even some who were … and left somewhat unspoken was what will happen when the ISA’s kids find out their parents are dead or incarcerated (we didn’t see Artemis Crock or Cameron Mahkent in any meaningful capacity in the season finale, but we did see Isaac Bowin take a tuba to a bully’s head) and who is responsible for those deaths/incarcerations. That’s a lot to juggle in a short 13-15 episode season. I’m afraid that the writers are going to try to go bigger in season two, which will not necessarily be better, and I’m hoping that this prolonged pandemic-induced hiatus will give Johns and company time to decide what story they want to tell in season two and what can wait until a probably season three or longer.

But even with that concern firmly in place, I’m excited and hopeful for a second season of Stargirl. It’s nice to see a brightly-lit, hopeful, less-angst-driven superhero show on television right now.

SERIES SATURDAY: Young Heroes In Love

This is a series about … well, series. I do so love stories that continue across volumes, in whatever form: linked short stories, novels, novellas, television, movies. I’ve already got a list of series I’ve recently read, re-read, watched, or re-watched that I plan to blog about. I might even, down the line, open myself up to letting other people suggest titles I should read/watch and then comment on.

To say that Young Heroes in Love was one of DC Comics’ more eclectic offerings of the late 1990s would not be an understatement. It ran 18 issues, from 1996 to 1998, and I remember enjoy its quirky take on a group of early-20s heroes just trying to make their mark in the greater super-hero world while also navigating their own hormones. I liked it enough that it’s one of those short-lived near-forgotten series that has had a permanent home in my comics collection, surviving multiple downsizings and moves.

And yet, I can’t recall having reread it since it was first published. So I was overdue but a little nervous to actually do it. Any time I consider revisiting something I haven’t read or watched in a decade or more, there’s always that question: will it hold up to my memory?

Happy to say that Young Heroes in Love pretty much does. It’s not perfect, but it’s still good – and when it’s really good, it’s really really good.

Writer Dan Raspler and artist Dev Madan co-created the team and concept, and you can tell from the first issue that they’re just having total fun with the idea of, as Wikipedia puts it, a super-hero garage band. These folks know they want to be super-heroes, and that the best way to make a name for themselves is to work together – but they’re really not very good at that last part yet. Given time, maybe they would be – but Raspler never got to explore that far since the series only ran 17 issues (plus a weird DC 1 Million crossover issue).  When the team encounters more famous heroes, like Superman (during his “electric powers” phase) in issue #3, they fall all over themselves fan-boy and –girling while also trying to impress. They even offer the Man of Steel (Electric? Whatever) membership! Most of the run is one endearing attempt after another to “make it big.” They go up against several giant monsters as well as a serial kidnapper and a villain team with a “rat” theme (Raspler’s hysterical take on the long history of villain teams built around a common theme, most famously represented by Marvel Comics’ Serpent Society). They have their biggest case fighting Batman’s enemy The Scarecrow, but they don’t make a big splash in the news. They do make a big impression on fans in Japan and end up the subject of a manga magazine – mirroring the success lots of young bands have overseas long before they become popular here at home.

Dev Madan’s art in the early issues sets a matching serio-comic tone, slightly cartoonish but not over-exaggerated. It took a little getting accustomed to (in my memory, the art was a bit more realistic). The characters all have distinct looks that stay consistent throughout the issues Madan illustrates (although the same can’t be said for the issues drawn by other artists), and he’s really good at giving the characters a variety of body types. Frostbite’s angular build contrasts Off-Ramp’s scruffy dad-bod (a term that I don’t think had been invented yet in 1996, but which totally fits the character). Bonfire is petite, Monstergirl is more full-figured. The diversity in body types of most of the team becomes extra apparent whenever Hard Drive (the telepathic/telekinetic leader) shares panels with Thunderhead (the team tank): both are broad-shouldered, muscular blonds (although Hard Drive’s blond hair is close-cut and Thunderhead’s is a typical shaggy rocker-do). I have to think making the Brain and the Brawn look so much alike was a conscious decision on Raspler and Madan’s part.

Okay, technically, Hard Drive isn’t the brains of the outfit – the diminutive Junior is the smartest guy in the room (at least until the team meets a particular pre-teen genius), but he’s often overlooked by his own team because he doesn’t have any other power other than being small – which does enable him to solve a case all by himself at one point, proving his worth to the cops if not to his own team. And Junior isn’t the only tiny member of the team: Zip Girl joins a few issues in, and she’s not only small, she can change sizes (to lead a normal life out of costume) and she can fly. Junior doesn’t mind, because he’s in unrequited love with her.

Which brings us around to the title of the book. They’re not just The Young Heroes – they’re Young Heroes in LOVE. The soap opera aspect of the book is nearly pitch-perfect, from budding crushes and unrequited love to one-night stands (and a subplot where Hard Drive tries to brainwash Bonfire into being in love with Thunderhead because it’s better for the team dynamic than her total sexual attraction to her power-opposite, Frostbite, and in which its very clear Hard Drive is in the wrong. Yes, he gets his come-uppance eventually). It being the late 90s, it’s not surprising that the majority of the relationships (the good and the toxic) are heterosexual. But not quite all of them. I’d forgotten just how (as comics writer Steve Orlando recently put it) “ahead of its time” this book was in, near the very end, giving us a relationship between a comfortably bisexual character (Frostbite) and a newly-out-of-the closet character (Off-Ramp). And it’s clear this was not a “the book’s being cancelled and no-one is likely to use these characters again, so what the hell” last minute decision. In early issues, we see Frostbite’s glances and flirting with Off-Ramp. Off-Ramp himself spends the early issues not showing attraction to anyone else on the team, mooning over a string of unsuccessful relationships with women. But the character blurbs at the start of the issues often included phrases like “who knows what Off-Ramp loves” – clear hints that sooner or later, Off-Ramp would have a romantic connection with someone. (And no – Off-Ramp’s coming out is not instigated by any kind of mind-control on Hard Drive’s part.)

If there’s one thing that might be deemed problematic about the book, it would be that the main cast is very, very, very white. Monstergirl, aka Rita Lopez, is an alien shapeshifter who hatched from an egg and imprinted on the Latino parents who raised her as their own (shades of Superman’s origin!). She’s the only Person of Color in the main cast (Yes, Frostbite is also not white: but he’s a blue-skinned ancient snow elf from northern Canada, so I’m not sure he counts). And there are only a couple of non-white supporting characters (including Junior’s childhood best friend who is now a cop). This is not something I consciously noticed in 1996-98, and I’m not sure it made a conscious impression on most readers at the time. There was no mention of it on the letters page at least. Which is surprising, given this was only a couple of years after the debut of Milestone Comics, an independent imprint published/distributed by DC. I’d like to think that if Raspler and Madan were pitching the book today, the cast would have been a bit more diverse.

I’d also like to think that if there had been more time, some of the fascinating background world-building would have been explored. Monstergirl’s alien uncle shows up eventually to reveal her true nature, but we never really get to learn anything about Frostbite’s people (for instance, are they connected at all to Justice League member Icemaiden’s community?), nor about the intriguing society of Travelers that Off-Ramp is apparently a member of. In fact, for most of the run everyone on the team seems to forget that Frostbite isn’t just another Young American Hero. Just like they seem to forget Monstergirl’s erratic behavior or Bonfire’s deep knowledge of the super-hero world except when mentioning it is needed to drive a plot point.

Soap opera romance, deep ruminations on the nature of celebrity and teamwork, tweaks on classic comic book conventions, young characters who are earnest and endearing but not perfect and whose bad decisions come back to haunt them, interesting world-building that never gets fully developed, and character traits that somehow get completely forgotten from issue to issue: holy shit – Young Heroes in Love was a CW Arrowverse show before there was an Arrowverse!

I doubt that Young Heroes in Love is on DC’s priority list for collection in trade paperback or hardcover (although, considering the recent collections of First Issue Special and Wanted, I could be wrong about that). But the individual issues seem to be available for only a few bucks each through places like Midtown Comics.

NEW FEATURE GRAPHICS!

For a while now, I’ve been considering commissioning new graphic headers for some of the regular/semi-regular features on the blog. Features like the book reviews, interviews and even “Series Saturday” tend to lead off with a photograph or book cover and so don’t really need a unifying header. But Reading Round-Up, Sunday Shorts and the new Top Ten(ish) don’t usually have a header of any kind, and boy were they feeling left out.

Enter Scott Witt: long-time friend/brother, former housemate, great cartoonist and all-around nice guy. Scott created three headers featuring his character Mopey the Platypus. Mopey is a coffee-drinking, moody, sarcastic writer waiting for his big break. Yes, he’s based on me.

Mopey has appeared in most iterations of Scott’s The World of Witt — in comic strip form, as part of several card games and board games. It’s an honor to be Tuckerized into Scott’s world. A world you can check out on his Patreon, and his Instagram.

And now: Mopey the Platypus in: New Graphics!

Pride Month Kick-off Post

Normally, I’d start June off with a HAPPY PRIDE MONTH, EVERYONE! post near the start of the month (but rarely on the 1st because I’m rarely that organized) and then I’d attempt to make some Pride-centric or Pride-adjacent posts throughout the month. This year, I actually started thinking about what I’d post this month slightly in advance (okay, a whole *week*!). I decided what my Top Ten(ish) lists are going to be, which book reviews I absolutely wanted to post, and then hit on the idea of reviving the interviews that launched this blog so long ago. I started reaching out to fellow LGBTQIA+ creative types, and such folks in other walks of life and careers as well, and then sending short interviews, 5-6 questions, out via email.

But as I sit here at almost 2:00 am on June 1, 2020, part of me can’t help but wonder: is posting book reviews and top ten lists and interviews with writers and artists frivolous in light of what’s going on out there right now? 

Pride parades and gatherings were already cancelled (and rightfully so) to help slow the spread of Covid-19. I have friends and relatives of all walks who have been hit hard by the virus: a good friend who had it, finally tested negative, was given the all-clear, and still has days when he can’t summon the energy to walk across the room; a nephew in his early 30s who spent a week in the hospital while they tried different remedies to clear him up and whose husband also tested positive; a cousin who is a police officer in Brooklyn whose precinct almost completely tested positive in the course of a week or so; and too many more to list. I’ve watched so many people lose their jobs during the shutdown and have struggled with survivor’s guilt that I still have a full-time job that has allowed me to transition to working from home (an adjustment from the non-stop traveling the job normally entails, to be sure, but at least I still have a job).

On top of the virus, over the past few months I’ve watched threads in a number of comic book and science fiction groups I’m a member of on Facebook take decidedly anti-LGBTQIA, and especially anti-Trans*, turns (not to mention misogynistic and racist turns as well). The rhetoric has always been there among a section of every fandom, but it seemed in the first two months of Covid-19 to ratchet up considerably. Perhaps because people stuck at home have more time to lash out? I don’t know. But it was noticeable especially in how not-directly-connected-to-Covid-19 it appeared to be.

And then a few days ago George Floyd was murdered in plain sight by a police officer with a history of violence. And this weekend we’ve seen peaceful protests turn violent, with looting and property destruction. Not for the first time in our history, and probably not for the last. And Pride celebrates/memorializes the Stonewall riots, led largely by queer people of color. I do wonder how accepting the world would be of folks like me in 2020 if those riots hadn’t happened in 1969 (three years after I was born, and a good twenty years before I came out).

In light of all of this, does making posts about the things I love seem akin to rearranging deck chairs on Titanic? Am I just sticking my head in the sand to avoid how bad the world is getting?

It’s taken a lot of thinking, and a lot of false starts on this post, but I’m going to say the answer is “no.” As a number of the folks I’ve interviewed will say in posts over the coming month: continuing to share the things we love, the things that make us happy (whether that’s cute animal pictures, bad puns, or top ten favorite red-headed comic book characters), means we’re continuing to be human, continuing to try and put a little light – however dim, however short-lasting – into a world that’s growing darker by the day.

I don’t have all the answers. I can’t fix all of society’s woes. But I can do what I’m good at: which is hopefully make some people smile and provide some distraction.

So I’m planning to post a lot more often this month than I have been of late. Maybe not every day, but as many days as I can. Not every post will be about something LGBTQIA-related (for instance, tomorrow’s Reading Roundup of what I read in May), but many of them will be. And hopefully, the contents will make readers smile, or think, or both.

Stay safe, my friends.

Top Ten(ish): Stephen King Books

Top Ten(ish) is a new series on the blog, in which I list of ten or so of my favorite things that have something in common: books by the same author or editor or publisher; music by the same band/performer, etc. Feel free to suggest topics (although if I don’t have a deep enough catalogue of experience with the category, I may choose not to post about it). The (ish) allows me to run slightly higher or lower, because exactly 10 is often hard for me to decide. Note: they’re MY favorites, for a variety of reasons not always having to do with quality alone. I’m not saying they are The Best (in fact, I never make that determination, about anything). Your Mileage May Vary (YMMV). Please, don’t yuck my yum and tell me how I’m completely wrong about anything on this list.

Today’s inaugural Top Ten(ish) post: Stephen King Books, in no particular order other than #1:

1.       ‘Salem’s Lot: I sincerely doubt anything will ever knock this novel from the top spot. I’ve read it about as many times as I’ve read Dracula. I love the sweep of the narrative, the sense that the infestation is so much bigger than the rag-tag band that is fighting it. I love the main characters. And every time I read the scene where Danny Glick shows up at Mark Petrie’s second-floor bedroom window I find myself back in 13-year-old Anthony’s panicked mind – when I first read the scene, it was a windy night and something scratched at my window; I looked and saw red eyes for a second. It turned out to be a raccoon on a tree branch, but I don’t think I’ve ever thrown a book across a room so quickly nor screamed quite so loud.

2.       Cycle of the Werewolf: I’m a bit of a sucker for books that are set up to match a calendar of some kind, whether it’s a chapter per day, per week, per month or per year. This one works so well on that level and as a novella, which is my favorite length to read. And of course, in the edition I have, the Bernie Wrightson art just makes the whole thing even better. (Admission: pretty sure I saw the movie Silver Bullet before I read the book on which it’s based. I like both, but when push comes to shove in this case, I think the book is far superior.)

3.       The Dark Half: I’m also a sucker for books where the main character is a writer, especially if that writer gets involved in supernatural or criminal shenanigans (See: ‘Salem’s Lot previously, and also the next entry on the list). Thad Beaumont may be one of my favorite characters of all time, and definitely one of my favorite King characters. I love the pacing and the reveals on this one, and the glimpses into how Thad wrote versus how George Stark wrote. Interestingly, when the book was released it was touted as the first part of King’s “final Castle Rock trilogy,” followed by the story “The Sun Dog” (which I read and liked) and the novel Needful Things, which is among the King books I haven’t read yet.

4.       Misery: Oh, Annie Wilkes, perhaps one of King’s greatest creations. As a play lover, I’ve always been fascinated by how a writer keeps the audience’s interest up when there are only two characters in the entire story, and I think this novel is something of a masterwork in that regard. Yes, there are the chapters with the new Misery novel Paul Sheldon is writing under duress, but otherwise for the most part it’s just Annie and Paul in a house. And every page is riveting. (Even moreso the movie, which may be one of the few times I like the movie slightly more than the book.)

5.       The Dead Zone: My memory’s getting rusty, but I’m pretty sure this was the second King novel I ever read (after ‘Salem’s Lot and before Cujo) and it has always stuck with me: Johnny’s sense of loss and disconnectedness after his five-year coma turning into a sense of mission as he realizes what he can do; the look into the seedier side of politics (very impressionable on a 13- or 14-year old small-town boy); the apocalyptic nature of the whole thing. I am way overdue for a re-read of this one.

6.       Night Shift: I am a short story fanatic (someday maybe I’ll write a post about why). I may not have read every Stephen King novel, but I have read every short story and novella collection and this was the first (and may have been the second King book I read; I know I read it around the same time as The Dead Zone and Cujo but can no longer remember the exact order). I know people love King’s dictionary-size works, but I think he’s a master of the short form. In this particular volume, favorites include “Jerusalem’s Lot,” “Sometimes They Come Back,” “Quitters, Inc.,” “Children of the Corn,” and “One for The Road.”

7.       Different Seasons: I might have to credit this volume for instilling my love of novellas (alongside Robert Silverberg’s To Open the Sky). Three out of the four included in this volume blew me away, showing me how a writer could step outside of their identified-with genre and still be fantastic. There’s barely a hint of horror at all in “Rita Hayworth and the Shawshank Redemption,” and no supernatural element to the horror of either “The Body” or “Apt Pupil” (which contrast two very different childhoods to great effect). And all three captivate me from start to finish. The only novella herein that I rarely re-read is “The Breathing Method.” When I first read it, it felt too much like Peter Straub’s Ghost Story in terms of set-up (I was young, opinionated, and unaware of the tradition of “gentlemen’s club stories.” Sue me.); I really should try to read it with fresh eyes.

8.       Nightmares and Dreamscapes: So yeah, there are a few themes among this list, as you can tell. More great short stories (perhaps I should do a separate post about Top Ten(ish) Stephen King short stories?). Favorites in this particular collection include “The Night Flier,” “Popsy,” “Home Delivery,” “Crouch End,” “The House on Maple Street,” “The Doctor’s Case,” and “Umney’s Last Case.”

9.       Cujo: Either the third or fourth King book I ever read (again, that pesky rusty memory). Another time I saw the movie before the book. In fact I almost didn’t read the book because the movie holds a not-pleasant memory for me: a friend and I went to see it and for various reasons got there late and ended up sitting in the second row. I developed a headache throughout the movie, and when we got to the scene where Cujo circles the car, the constant eye-view motion got to me, and I ran out of the theater to puke up my popcorn (the first of two times that’s ever happened to me). And of course got teased mercilessly. Pretty sure I never went to a movie with that friend again. The book was phenomenal, partly because another thing I love is books where the characters (and sometimes the reader) are unsure as to whether events have a basis in the supernatural or have a mundane explanation.

10.   Lisey’s Story: I had taken a long break from Stephen King novels, for no apparent reason, but December of 2006 brought me back to it, with almost back-to-back reads of The Colorado Kid (the first Hard Case Crime imprint release I read, leading to my love of that line and thus covered in a future post) and Lisey’s Story. I was in a rough place at the time: unexpectedly between jobs, still not quite over the death of my mother almost two years earlier, with heavy depression, questioning my abilities as a teacher and as a writer … and Lisey Landon’s loss and memories resonated with me. And look at that – another book in which a writer and his secrets take center-stage (or close to it), although this time we see that all through the lens of the writer’s wife/widow.

11.   Skeleton Crew: Have I mentioned how much I love short stories, and how much I love Stephen King’s short stories in particular? I’m not sure that’s been made clear enough in the preceding 10 entries. (That’s a joke, son. Poking a little fun at myself. All the best writers and bloggers do it.) In this volume, the stand-outs for me personally are “The Mist,” “Mrs. Todd’s Shortcut,” “The Raft,” “Word Processor of the Gods,” “The Ballad of the Flexible Bullet,” and “The Reach.”

12.   The Stand Complete and Uncut: Look, I don’t hate King’s doorstop-size novels. If I did, there’s no way the uncut version of The Stand would be on this list at all. I just in general struggle with 1,000+ page books: they’re a big investment, and I find they often take a long time to really “get going.” But The Stand is an exception to that trend: it starts with a bang, and then the swell of characters and locations carries you along until the characters come together and shit really starts to happen. Images sit in my mind’s eye years after reading it: Trashcan Man’s irradiated skin; the mystery of Mother Abigail, the skeeviness of Harold Lauder, the connection between Franny and Stu, the sacrifice of Nick Andros, and of course the big final confrontation.

Okay, Constant Readers: your turn! Hit the comments and tell me what your favorite King books are – put please do so without denigrating what other people love.

Series Saturday: DC's FIRST ISSUE SPECIAL

This is a series about … well, series. I do so love stories that continue across volumes, in whatever form: linked short stories, novels, novellas, television, movies. I’ve already got a list of series I’ve recently read, re-read, watched, or re-watched that I plan to blog about. I might even, down the line, open myself up to letting other people suggest titles I should read/watch and then comment on.



As much as the size of my comic book collection has fluctuated over the decades, there are certain series that I have just never been able to part with. It is nostalgia and sentimental value that drives these decisions rather than monetary – anyone who has seen my collection knows that I’m all about readability and favorite characters and not about getting the most value. I can’t imagine the day will come that will see me purchasing a “slabbed-and-graded” copy of any comic book. All of this is why there are what some would consider to be real “quirky gems” in my boxes.

And one of those quirky gems is the 1975-1976 DC series called First Issue Special. The idea, as explained by series editor Gerry Conway in the recently-released hardcover reprint volume, came from DC publisher Carmine Infantino: since new first issues sell better than anything else, why not a series that was all first issues, and anything that really caught readership attention would get spun off into an on-going title? I won’t reiterate the logistic issues Conway explains in his hardcover Introduction. I will say that the concept made for one of the most eclectic mixes of characters and creators one is likely to find under a single title.

The idea of “try-out” titles was nothing new by the mid-70s. DC’s Showcase title, defunct by this point but due to be revived in 1977 for a short run, was the book that launched the Silver Age with try-out revivals of The Flash, Green Lantern, and others. The Justice League and the Teen Titans got their try-out in the pages of The Brave & The Bold. Over at Marvel, try-out series included Marvel Premiere (which launched Iron Fist, Warlock, and a Doctor Strange revival, as well as an Alice Cooper issue), Marvel Spotlight ( which gave us Werewolf By Night, Ghost Rider, Son of Satan, and Spider-Woman), and Marvel Feature (which introduced The Defenders, and launched Red Sonja as well as the Thing’s team-up title, Marvel Two-in-One). What set First Issue Special apart was that no character or concept was given more than one issue to prove itself, because featuring a character in more than one issue would contradict the idea that every issue was a “first” issue.

The line-up of creators alone is impressive: three issues written and drawn by Jack Kirby, two written by Joe Simon, work by Marty Pasko, Walt Simonson, Steve Ditko, Mike Grell, Robert Kanigher, Bob Haney, Ramona Fradon and Conway himself. Not all of these folks were necessarily at the top of their games here, but that was probably as much from the rushed production schedule as anything. According to Conway’s introduction, it sounds like concepts were picked as much because they could be executed quickly as because they might be any good.

The characters were a mix of previously-established properties like Doctor Fate, the Creeper, the New Gods, Manhunter, and Metamorpho and new concepts. The newly-introduced concepts ran the gamut from solo super-heroes and teams (Codename: Assassin and The Outsiders) to boy gangs (The Green Team and The Dingbats of Danger Street) to fantasy (Atlas), pulp-adventure (The Warlord), gritty crime drama (Lady Cop) and science fiction (a new version of Starman).

Of the three Kirby issues, his revamp of classic Gold Age character The Manhunter probably holds up the best, a “passing of the mantle” type story that I think gets unjustly overshadowed by the Archie Goodwin-Walt Simonson Manhunter revamp that debuted in Detective Comics around this same time. The Goodwin/Simonson was more spy thriller than super-hero, while this Kirby issue features classic Kirby throwbacks to Golden Age over-the-top-ness (the villain in the first half of the story has a Hall of Talking Heads to taunt the hero!), and there’s really no reason both could not have been successful. The Kirby Manhunter, Mark Shaw, did eventually show up in issues of Justice League written by Steve Englehart. The Kirby issue that intrigued young me the most, though, was the very first First issue Special: Atlas. It always amazed me how Kirby managed to make even “high fantasy” concepts looks science-fictional, and that’s totally true here. Young me loved Greek mythology, and didn’t seem to mind (and still doesn’t) that this version of Atlas is nothing at all like his Titan namesake. Sadly, the character didn’t catch enough interest, although he’d be used later and to lesser effect in Superman stories written by James Robinson.

It’s also of interest that both Jack Kirby and Joe Simon took First Issue Special as a chance to return to their heyday as creators of “boy gang” characters (see The Newsboy Legion, the Boy Commandoes, and Boys’ Ranch). Kirby introduced The Dingbats of Danger Street (which apparently had been given the go-ahead as an on-going but then was yanked from the schedule with only the first of three completed issues seeing print here) while Joe Simon wrote (with art by Jerry Grandenetti) The Green Team. Talk about taking concepts in complete opposite directions! Kirby’s Dingbats are street-level kids fighting costumed supervillains, while Simon’s group are all young millionaires whose biggest concern is a crowd trying to shut down a project they’ve backed (also, awkwardly, the token black kid only becomes a millionaire by accident while the others are born into – and their privilege shows. Even in the 70s, this was obvious to me and made the Green Team my least favorite issue of the run). The Dingbats eventually showed up in some Superman stories and the Green Team in work by Grant Morrison in the 2000s.

Other than Atlas, my two favorite “new concept” issues were The Warlord and Starman. The Warlord was Mike Grell’s take on the classic pulp-adventure “hollow Earth” concept, following in the footsteps of Edgar Rice Burroughs and Jules Verne but putting his own distinct spin on it. Warlord is the one First Issue Special character to successfully spin out into a long-running series, but moreso because it was planned that way from the beginning rather than from immediate reader response. Regardless, I loved everything about the character, the world of Skartaris, and the series that followed. Grell has also always been one of my favorite artists and he’s at the top of his game in this issue. The science-fictional Starman, about a lone alien rebel looking to protect Earth from invasion by his own warrior society, had lots of promise that never got the chance to shine. I’d like to think if the character had had a multi-issue tryout in Showcase a few years later he might have taken off (although then much of what James Robinson eventually did with the character in his own Starman revival decades later might have been vastly different).

At the time of publication, I can’t say that the Lady Cop, Codename: Assassin, or The Outsiders issues made any strong impressions on me. Rereading them now, the first two are pretty solid character introductions with potential. I can see the appeal to some of The Outsiders as an ersatz Doom Patrol, with the main characters even less “passing-for-human” that Robotman and Negative Man, but to me the story seems to be trying too hard.

Of the previously-established characters given berths in First Issue Special, the return to Metamorpho by Bob Haney and Ramona Fradon is probably the most fun, a ridiculous non-stop romp through Washington DC’s landmarks to stop a vengeful ghost. Some of Haney’s dialogue is over-the-top, especially for lovesick goon Java, but Fradon’s art is spot-on. The Creeper story attempts to establish a new norm for the hero. It’s a good enough story, making use of a little-remembered (at the time) Batman villain, but I think it loses something by not having original creator Steve Ditko write as well as draw the story. The “Return of the New Gods” (also the series’ final issue) is pretty much one long fight scene and feels a bit rushed story-wise (trying to do too much to establish that these are the classic Kirby characters but also different) and art-wise (Mike Vosburg’s pencils feel much more dynamic in the Starman story the preceding issue), almost like the creators were pushed to hit a deadline.

The stand-out among these previously-established characters is clearly the Marty Pasko-scripted, Water Simonson-drawn Doctor Fate issue: a great story that builds on Fate’s history and lays the groundwork for later Doctor Fate solo features. I really wish this one had gone to series.

First Issue Special may have varied in quality across its short run, but conceptually it was more hit than miss for this reader, and I’m glad I still own all of the original issues as well as the new hardcover reprint. Now if DC would just get on the ball and give us hardcover or trade paperback collections of the one on-going series that successfully spun out of First Issue Special, Mike Grell’s The Warlord, I’d be really happy.

One-Season Wonders

“What series(es) cancellation(s) broke your heart?”

This question was posted on a friend’s Facebook page a few weeks ago. I noticed as I typed my response that while most respondents were naming long-running series they loved (everything from Lost to ER to Family Matters), my instinct was to list all the “one-season wonders” I remember loving and wishing I had been able to see more of. Okay, there were a few more-than-one-season shows that crossed my mind (Seaquest DSV; Hamish Macbeth; Wonder Woman) but the most immediate thoughts were of shows that lasted only one season.

It also occurred to me that most of the shows on this list of “one season wonders I loved” are shows I have not watched in at least a decade and in most cases several decades. Despite having quite a few of them on DVD. So I’m using this post as a challenge: today, I’m going to talk about these shows almost purely through the lens of nostalgia. Down the line, I’d like to do a rewatch and see if my thoughts on any of them have changed.

Note: This list is comprised of shows I actually remember watching and enjoying and wanting more of. So, for instance, shows like The Green Hornet, Honey West, and T.H.E. Cat are not on here because I have no clear memory of watching them.

And so, in no particular order, here are my thoughts on “One Season Wonders I Loved:”

Voyagers (1982): In general, I love time-travel stories (even when they make my head hurt if I think too hard about the concept). And my memories of this show are that the episodes were campy fun. I wanted to be Meeno Peluce’s Jeffrey Jones and couldn’t get admit even to myself that I had a crush on Jon-Erik Hexum’s Phineas Bogg (but I did recognize how similar the character’s name was to Jules Verne’s Phileas Fogg and wondered if there were a familial connection). I was definitely sad when this one ended.

Awake (2012): The concept intrigued me: a cop’s life is turned upside down when a car crash kills one member of his family – but depending on which reality he wakes up in (red or blue), it’s either his wife or his teenage son who is dead. But it’s the cast that sold me: Jason Isaacs. Dylan Minnette. BD Wong. Cherry Jones. Laura Innes. The finale episode works fine as a cliff-hanger and as a series finale, but I wish we could have seen where creator Kyle Killen was going next.

Invasion (2005): If I recall correctly, the 2005-2006 television season debuted three distinct “alien invasion via water” series (the other two were Threshold and Surface, neither of which I’ve ever seen). I latched onto this one: after a hurricane, a Florida town’s inhabitants start to act strangely, and a park ranger has to figure out what’s going on while dealing with his doctor ex-wife, her husband the sheriff, and other family members. It wasn’t a perfectly-acted show, but it did feature Kari Matchett, William Fitchner, Aisha Hinds, and was one of Evan Peters’ earliest series roles. (Fun story: a couple of years later I was on the Warner Brothers Studio Tour. We passed the lagoon where much of Invasion was shot. The guide asked if anyone had watched it. I was the only one who raised my hand. Tour Guide: “And that’s why it was cancelled.”)

Best of the West (1981): Yes, there are two Meeno Peluce shows on this list. Sue me.  I *loved* this sitcom about a Civil War vet who would rather talk than shoot and who moves his family to the West and ends up the town marshal. Joel Higgins as Sam Best, Meeno Peluce as his son, Leonard Frey as the criminal “town boss” and the great Tracey Walter as dim-witted bad-guy sidekick “Frog.”

Earth 2 (1994): A colony ship crash lands on the Earth-like planet they were aiming for, which is supposed to be uninhabited. But signs quickly point to native sentient life and that some humans may have preceded them there. This is one of those shows I feel really would have hit its stride in a second and third season. Debrah Farentino and Clancy Brown (as a good guy!) headed a cast that also had Terry O’Quinn, Roy Dotrice, and Tim Curry (“Hello, poppet!”) as recurring guest-stars.

Planet of the Apes (1974): This show was the subject of one of my first Series Saturday posts. I loved everything to do with Planet of the Apes back in the day: I rewatched the movies and the re-cut movie length versions of the tv series whenever they aired, owned all of the Mego action figures and playsets and a good number of the Marvel magazines (sadly, the action figures and the magazines are long gone). One of several shows I wound up writing fan-fiction about during my high school years (not that I knew it was called fan-fiction at the time).

Tales of the Gold Monkey (1982): Created to capitalize on the Indiana Jones craze, I adored this show for the over-the-top fun and because it co-starred Roddy McDowell, who I loved from the Apes movies and tv show. Another show I wrote fan-fiction about, my stories would have qualified as “Mary Sue / Gary Stu” because I created for myself the role of Jake Cutter’s nephew Baldwin.

Terriers (2010): The subject of a recent Series Saturday post and one of only two shows on this list I didn’t watch when it originally aired but came to later and loved. Brilliant modern-noir, top-notch acting by the cast led by Donal Logue and Michael-Raymond James, and a great soundtrack as well.

Firefly (2002): The other show on this list that I didn’t watch when it originally aired but came to on DVD later. So much promise left on the table. And a roundly great cast led by Nathan Fillion at his most endearing but anchored, in my humble opinion, by the great Ron Glass.

Dark Shadows (1991): I was both anxious and excited for the revival (now we’d call it a “reboot”) of one of my favorite childhood soap operas as a night-time drama. It was uneven, to be sure, but I still loved pretty much every minute of it. I’d been familiar with lead actress Joanna Going from her work on the soap opera Another World, was intrigued by the casting of Ben Cross as Barnabas and the great Jean Simmons as Elizabeth Collins Stoddard. The only upside to the cancellation: Joseph Gordon-Leavitt wound up on Third Rock from the Sun a few years later.

Clue (2011): I have a real soft-spot for this teen action series nominally based on the board game. It ran 5 episodes and the finale left room for a second season that never materialized. It was a fun story despite any real connection to the board game, but part of the reason I have a soft-spot for it admittedly is because one of the stars, Zach Mills, is the son of a friend of mine.

Quark (1977): Another one of those sitcoms that just cracked me up, even if some of the humor went over my eleven-year-old head. It was science fiction, it was funny. That was enough for geeky little me. And it was created by Buck Henry, who co-created Get Smart with Mel Brooks.

Man from Atlantis (1977): In retrospect, a large part of the attraction to this show for baby-gay Anthony was probably shirtless Patrick Duffy, but I didn’t really know that at the time. I loved the science fiction aspects of the show, and the friendship between the amnesiac outsider (Duffy) and the human doctor (Belinda Montgomery).

Salvage 1 (1979): Okay, this one’s in on a technicality. It officially had two seasons. But the second season only aired 2 episodes before cancellation, and all in the same calendar year as season 1. So I’m counting it. I loved it: Andy Griffith as a junk-man with his own spaceship for collecting satellite debris, Joel Higgins as his pilot/sidekick (so yeah, two Joel Higgins shows on the list!). The unrealistic logistics didn’t bother 13-year-old me. Another show I wrote fan-fiction about. I wish this one was on DVD or streaming somewhere.

Battlestar Galactica (1978): In my memory, the original Battlestar Galactica ran more than one season, so I was actually surprised when someone pointed out it in fact hadn’t. My father loved that it starred Lorne Green (from Bonanza). I enjoyed the swagger of Dirk Benedict, the scenery-chewing of John Colicos, and the fact that it also featured Noah Hathaway who I followed to The Never-Ending Story.

When Things Were Rotten (1975): Long before Mel Brooks directed Men in Tights, he co-created this sitcom spoof of the Robin Hood myth. In my memory, its classic slapstick over-the-top comedy was hilarious. Dick Van Patten, Ron Rifkin and Bernie Kopell co-starred.

The Prisoner (1967): I was one year old when the show originally aired, but I remember watching it in reruns years later with my father (I think it aired on the New York City PBS affiliate, but I could be wrong). One of my first spy-series loves (along with Mission: Impossible and The Man From U.N.C.L.E., both of which were not one-season wonders).

Kolchak the Night Stalker (1974): Another show that looms longer in my memory than it actually ran. The prototype for all of the “investigate weird goings-on” shows that came later. Several of the episodes scared the heck of out eight-year-old me – possibly not my father’s finest parenting moment letting me watch it.