Superman For the Animals

One of my favorite things to do at comic book shops or at conventions is to spend time going through the sales boxes. You’ve all seen them. Long boxes stuffed with issues of anything and everything marked down to irresistible prices – sometimes as low as $0.25 each! I’ll admit that I occasionally use the issues I find in the cheap seats for crafting (look, decoupaging is an addicting craft and I want to cover all the things with images from comic books). I mostly use the bargain bins as a tool to find new stories and to get to know new characters. For example, I’ve read just enough about Superman to know I want more. Cue the $1 bin.

I’ll rifle through and pick out a stack of titles from different writers and eras. It’s a nice sampling, and if I like what I read I’ll find more. Sometimes I’ll pick out comics based on the cover alone (like picking wine for the label). When I was flipping through a box and spotted a cover featuring Superman holding a cat, I was sold. I expected Superman For the Animals to be a nice, fluffy story along the lines of Superman rescuing a wayward cat from a tree.

I was so wrong, and I might be scarred for life.

Superman For the Animals is essentially a PSA about animal cruelty. It was published in 2000 and made available for free – DC Comics partnered with the Doris Day Animal Foundation for the comic written by Mark Millar and drawn by Tom Grummet and Dick Giordano (some interesting history on how it came to be here).

A young boy named Tommy is new in town and has fallen in with some troublemakers. One kid in particular – the leader Ballser – is a special brand of horrible. He takes pleasure in picking on animals. He bullies the other kids in the group into helping him with his sadistic obsession. Tommy’s torn between making friends and fitting in and doing the right thing. Ballser starts with kicking some pigeons. Then he tortures a goldfish. He takes it to another level and throws a cat over a bridge! A poor, helpless cat.

That’s where Superman swoops in. He arrives and saves the cat from doom. You see, Tommy had written to the superhero and asked for help. When Ballser sees who interfered with his twisted plan, he’s ticked. He calls Superman a “Boy Scout.” Seeing Superman intervene inspired Tommy to speak up – especially once Ballser insulted him in the same way. It made Tommy realize he could be like Superman too. He just had to stand up for what’s right.

The final straw is when Tommy makes a chilling discovery. Ballser actually has a collection of trophy collars. Tons of them. What the heck. I had to stop and get a tissue.

Tommy mans up and talks to a teacher. Ballser gets help, and Tommy and the gang move on and even volunteer at an animal rescue. Tommy realizes he too can be a superhero, and everyone feels warm and fuzzy. Which is desperately needed at that point since you’ve been reading about animal deaths.

Seeing animal cruelty is hard for me to stomach – even in a comic book – but I can’t deny Superman For the Animals sends some worthwhile messages. Superman saves a kitten and by doing so helps make sure a child gets necessary mental help, and shows Tommy how to be a hero as well as showing him how right it is to stand against evil. It illustrates that Superman can save the day in more ways than just taking down villains. There’s also an anti-bully theme that’s good for anyone to read. The story isn’t afraid to take on the hard stuff. If it made a lasting impression on me, I bet it definitely affected children. I hope it prompted some discussions with adults about animals and their feelings and value.

Meet the Mandarin

Some comics punch you in the gut. The Invincible Iron Man Annual #1 – Mandarin: The Story of My Life hit me in the stomach and slapped me across the face.

The story by Matt Fraction (writer) and Carmine Di Giandomenico (artist) tells a chilling tale. For me, it was my first encounter with the Mandarin. Besides thinking his name is horrible and being aware that he’s in the upcoming Iron Man 3 and that he has a bunch of powerful alien rings, I knew nothing. He was just another villain. Now I see that is serious frakking business.

It all begins when the Mandarin kidnaps an award winning director, Jun Shan, to tell the story of his life in a film. What better way to make the world understand you than to show them your beginnings? To ensure Shan agrees to work with him and tell the story correctly, the Mandarin also kidnaps his wife.

Okay, I can deal with that. It’s not cool but not out of the ordinary bad guy stuff. Then it progresses.

The Mandarin embellishes his personal history. He puts himself at places and times that don’t make any sense or directly contradict each other. And if Shan calls him out on the error? Forget about it. He also micromanages Shan to the point of ridiculous. He’s an overzealous producer – no one wants to work with him (I mean, they wouldn’t even if he weren’t evil).

To ensure Shan continues to cooperate, the villain makes Shan’s wife a puppet forced to do heavens knows what and threatens both their lives. He’s textbook nutty but coupled with a malicious streak that knows no bounds.

Everyone should be scared of him.

Like most antagonists, he only thinks of himself. He wants his legacy to be remembered favorably. He wants to look powerful, fierce, strong – he doesn’t want history to talk about the fragility of his mind. And since it seems like he gets what he wants, he doesn’t have any reason to believe people won’t do or think what he tells them to believe. After all when Shan makes and shows a truer story of the Mandarin’s life, he… well, he loses his temper.

After you know what the rings are capable of, you know that him getting angry is not a desirable outcome. He wields a ghastly amount of power. My newbie self very much appreciated that a panel was included to show off what each ring was capable of doing:

We get to know the powers, sure, but overall this story is about the character. It has to be tempting to insert cookie cutter villains into comics. Goodness knows, they exist across stories and publishers. What you can write and draw to make one really stand apart from the rest? How do you make someone more than just mean? This story shows you. You absolutely see the evil, but you see different facets of the Mandarin’s personality. He has grandiose plans, he’s delusional, he’s cunning yet at the same time too arrogant to think people would try to pull one over on him, he’s petty, ambitious, selfish, a perfectionist, and the list continues. I’ve learned enough to know the Mandarin is a force to be reckoned with; he’s one of the worst.

I can’t say I enjoyed this story, but I do respect it. It was hard to look at the images and read about how horrendous the Mandarin can be. His level of unbalanced reminds me of the Joker, as does his cruelty. That all said, it sucked me into the pages. Every panel contributed to the story. Every moment added depth and personality. Even though I wouldn’t read this comic again, just like The Killing Joke, it made an impression.

This Tony Stark Guy Is Kinda Cool

It’s easy to dislike Tony Stark. He’s rich, brash, and arrogant. He’s an alcoholic and a womanizer. That’s all superficial though. If you dig below the surface, he becomes a more interesting and likable guy. He’s incredibly smart and even if his methods are sometimes questionable, you can see he has good intentions at heart. Those aren’t always enough, but the fact that he does want to improve the world makes up for a lot.

My only experiences with Iron Man to this point have been the recent Marvel films (seriously, how perfect was the first one?!) and in various Avengers comics from the 60s-80s. I think getting to know him through Matt Fraction and Salvador Larroca’s Invincible Iron Man was an ideal introduction. The first volume – “The Five Nightmares” – showed multiple facets of the character. This iteration of Stark seemed similar to Robert Downey Jr.’s portrayal of the character too and that didn’t hurt.

I got to see Tony being clever, smarmy, petulant, compassionate, and triumphant. I also saw him experience perceived failure when he couldn’t stop Ezekiel Stane. And he was afraid, let’s not forget that because I haven’t often seen super heroes admitting their nightmares. This time it was the title of the story.

Stark has plenty to worry about. Other jokers with evil intentions have versions of his suit. It’s dangerous technology when it’s in the wrong hands. Deadly, in fact. Pepper Potts is nearly killed by Stane’s actions. Stane is younger, seemingly smarter, and lethal. He doesn’t care about the lives of innocents and is so focused on avenging his father that he becomes a monster.

Even with all that on his mind, Tony is able to multitask like a boss. In between tracking Stane and his terrorists, he’s holding meetings. He takes out bad guys while giving a presentation. He performs his duties as a Director of S.H.I.E.L.D. and still tackles the world’s problems. He never stops, and his mind never stops – to the point that he doesn’t sleep.

It’s impressive.

And Fraction is clever about how he shows Tony’s smarts. Illustrating a hero’s power seems easier. You can draw the armor and show how a repulsor works and demonstrate actions with the art and sound effects. Getting the reader to see inside the workings of a character’s head is probably a different matter, and it’s important when you’re writing and drawing heroes like Stark, Reed Richards, and Bruce Banner. And I think Stark is a tad unconventional in comparison to those two guys, too.

You can really see it in this scene:

The thought of Stark buying a sugary soda to add to his company’s holdings makes absolutely no sense at first, but when he explains his plan for Okle Cola’s vending machines I wanted to clap. Creative, out of the box – pick a cliché – that’s Stark. His approach makes him a successful business man and hero. He comes at problems a different way – in ways that wouldn’t even cross the minds of most people.

Kudos to Tony for being a genius and to Fraction for showing readers into Tony’s brain.

Larroca’s art is a touch too photorealistic for my taste but at the same time, I think it made Invincible Iron Man hit me harder. The comic pages practically felt like images from a news report so the story felt more real. Like the fictional world was my world and we were all in danger – I was nervous!

Overall, this story endeared me to the hero Iron Man but especially to the man underneath the suit. I felt like I got to experience his character and get to know him in a way I haven’t in other stories. I can’t wait to read more about Tony Stark.

Allow me to leave you with this hilariousness courtesy of Maria Hill:

Thirteen Years Ago

One of my favorite stories in Starman isn’t about Jack Knight. It’s about his father and some of his old friends – Jay Garrick Flash, Alan Scott Green Lantern, Rex Tyler Hourman, and Charles McNider Doctor Mid-Nite. Starman #11: “13 Years Ago: Five Friends” has the ring of older folks telling stories about walking to school seven miles in the snow and cold uphill both ways.

We all have those relatives or family friends. These guys don’t seem bitter though; they’re just not up with the times.

In this installment of “Times Past,” the fearless heroes are up against Rag Doll and his cult. Rag Doll has seen better days, too. The villain in his in sixties. Once spry and deft, he’s now plagued by aches and pains. Arthritis is bad enough but imagine going through similar pain when you’ve got the gift/curse of being triple-jointed. His ligaments are so stretched that tubs of Icy Hot couldn’t make it better. On top of that, his mind starts to fray around the edges.

His crazy ranting (because those two words go together more often than not) draws a following. Rag Doll has a way with words. He builds a cult, and the members bend to his will. And what he wants more than anything is revenge.

Opal City became his playground – not the fun kind with jungle gyms. The kind with death and blood. His gang commits senseless and random acts of crime that stain the streets with red. The citizens of the glimmering city looked hopefully to their hero, to Starman.

Starman couldn’t face the devastation alone. He swallowed his pride and called in his tried and true friends from the Justice Society of America. They worked together as they always had and though watching them take down Rag Doll was satisfying, it’s satisfying because of the way these guys interact with each other.

James Robinson’s story makes you care. I haven’t read most of these heroes’ stories, but I could feel and see their histories. They carry their pasts on their shoulders. The art by Matthew Dow Smith communicates it too; the heavy style with a darker pallet fits. None of the heroes are necessarily in their prime, but it doesn’t matter. They’ve done the job for years. They’ve faced tons of villains. They’ve got it covered. They walk with swagger and confidence.

I especially enjoyed the way they discuss old times fondly. Villains used to be different. They were silly instead of dangerous. Alan Scott makes a fantastic comment about Batman and his mentally unstable rogue’s gallery. Starman #11 was published in 1995. The world has changed and like Scott says, villains don’t wear removable masks anymore. It’s brilliant commentary. The heroes from a lighter time in this darker, gritty setting works is unexpected but it works on every level. Just like the once silly Rag Doll becoming a fearsome bad guy works.

Starman and friends toe the line between the brighter world of old and the new heavier world right to the ambiguous ending. Even when Rag Doll is defeated, he threatens the heroes and their families. He reminds them how his followers will continue even after he’s gone. What happens next is fuzzy, but it ends with a dead villain. It appears as if our heroes of a different age were willing to do what heroes like Batman and Superman aren’t. Maybe it’s because they haven’t faced the decision as many times and maybe it’s just because they’re older and cranky.

There Is a City

“There is a city.

A glorious and singular place. Old and yet pristine. Ornate and yet streamlined. A metropolis of now and then and never was…

And so Opal City stands glorious and singular.”

I was hooked on James Robinson’s Starman from the first page. How could I not be with an introduction like this?

Click to enlarge.

Those words hit me and I read them over a few times before moving forward. This page told me instantly that the city was just as important as our hero. I will give that to DC Comics – they have prime locations. Their cities are inherently cooler and more stylized because of the fictional aspect. Creators can take liberties with extremes; the locations can be grimy slums, sparkling beacons, and everything in between the two. I knew Gotham City, Metropolis, and now I’d get to know Opal City.

Sign me up.

Of course, it’s not just about the city. It can be a character but not the only one.

“The city had a champion. A gaudly-dressed “Quixote:” pure and true – but cursed with perpetual melancholy, as “Quixotes” often are. He used a device, this champion – a weapon that could drain power and light from the heavens and with this, he fought the bad and the wrong and kept his city free of fear.”

Well, as happens from time to time (but rarely with permanence), heroes fall. And the current Starman – David Knight – was assassinated not long after Robinson’s story began. His elder brother, Jack Knight, reluctantly took on the mantle that both inherited from their father, Ted. Jack is the quintessential rebellious type who fights his past and his father’s celebrity. But he comes around like those kinds usually do and makes it work in a way that suits him. He takes on the role of a the hero, but he does it with his own style and in his own way.

He doesn’t wear spandex; he sticks to jeans and a t-shirt. He doesn’t always keep track of the cosmic staff – a weapon and the source of his power. You’d think he’d keep it glued to his side, but he doesn’t always get (or doesn’t want to) the seriousness of his duties. In fact, he’s one of the most careless heroes I’ve met. Deep under it all though, there are seeds of potential.

I don’t feel like he ever welcomes the role, but I like that about him. Of the handful of DC Comics I’ve read, this seems like one of the few heroes where the person is just as important as the power he wields.

I prefer it that way. I can find a small part to relate to and latching onto the qualities of Jack (good and bad) makes me enjoy the story more. And I actually prefer Jack Knight to Starman. At the end of the day, Jack wants to be left alone with his collectibles, with history. He thinks it’s the opposite of “just stuff” and his real passion is being around them. It leads to him owning an antique and collectibles store.

I don’t know if he’s an introvert, but I get the impression he treats dealing with humans as a byproduct of living – a necessary requirement to get through the world. I can appreciate that.

But now he’s responsible for keeping the humans of Opal City safe… the ones he’s never particularly embraced. It makes him a different person and witnessing his evolution is one of the shining parts of the the story.

Quasar Gets Around

Wendell Vaughn is your average Joe. He’s got the brains to make it into S.H.I.E.L.D. and get through training – in fact, he excels. There’s just one hitch: he lacks a “killer instinct.” His superiors don’t believe he can make the sometimes deadly decisions one has to make in the course of standard operations. He passes, but he’s relegated to a security position.

He’s bitter but happy enough when he receives his first assignment. He has to guard a project that his estranged father is working on and it involves the testing of the Quantum Bands that once belonged to Marvel Boy. Things go awry, and a team of A.I.M. agents attacks in hopes of stealing the bands for sure-to-be nefarious purposes.

Unlikely as it seems (well, not to the reader), Wendell saves the day by donning the bands despite the great risk to his person. He handily foils A.I.M.’s plans. When the bands are controlled properly they provide impressive power. They don’t consume him precisely for the trait that S.H.I.E.L.D. counted as a mark against him.

The way they bands are wielded reminds me of the way Green Lantern uses his ring. The energy can be formed and manipulated with Wendell’s imagination.

After the display of bravery and force, S.H.I.E.L.D. reconsiders Vaughn. He has the Quantum Bands, and now he’s a formidable asset. Vaughn embraces his new gifts, gets a fancy costume, and calls himself Quasar.

He gets a gig as the head of security for Project PEGASUS but resigns after he is taken over by the serpent crown.

Yeah, that will ruin your day.

Depressed about his failure, he takes a long journey through space to Uranus to discover more about the Quantum Bands. Who created them and why? He eventually gets those answers but more importantly, he encounters the being called Eon who appoints him Protector of the Universe.

He returns to Earth rejuvenated, a new man with a shiny, new outfit. He soon starts a security consulting firm and rents office space in the Baxter Building. Maybe Fantastic Four offers the space at low prices, but I’m surprised Wendell can afford it – especially since he doesn’t have any paying gigs yet. He must have been saving dough for a while. He wastes no time in hiring a secretary either.

Seriously. In what universe would someone wear a bra and a miniskirt to a job interview for a business position and expect to get hired. I guess she did end up with a job though.

Before long, Quasar is in demand!

He teams up with a dazzling array of characters, and it all feels natural. Everyone lives in New York City, and I like that he runs into the Fantastic Four and Spider-Man without it being a giant multi-issue crossover event. It should be commonplace for them to all cross paths – not the next BIG thing that will span forty issues and costs you tons of money. (Okay, I have feelings about “events”).

The Avengers squabble over which coast gets him, he works with the X-Men, Spidey and Stingray, he fights Venom and the Angler. He’s popular, and he’s committed to helping the city. He struggles between balancing his burgeoning business and being the super hero people need. He’s always on call, and he comes up with the excuse of having a racquetball team to explain his frequent absences to his secretary. I had no idea anyone would buy someone being that obsessed with racquetball.

I think part of the reason he pushes himself to always be there and available is that he feels like he constantly has to prove himself. None of that pressure seems to be coming from external sources, but it seems to me that Wendell keeps thinking back to the time in S.H.I.E.L.D. training when he was good but not quite good enough. He wants to be the best and given what I’ve seen of his powers and personality – he’s doing more than okay.

How Does Kamandi Keep His Hair So Shiny?

The world has been struck by a natural disaster. The earth is left in ruins, and the human population is dwindling. Pockets of people survived in underground bunkers, and Kamandi, The Last Boy on Earth (!) is one of them. Jack Kirby’s story explores a post-apocalyptic world that isn’t exactly like the others.

Though Kamandi learned about the world before the Great Disaster through videos and microfilms, he has no idea what the current state of humanity is. He emerges from the bunker in search of fellow humans after his grandfather dies.

Kamandi is shocked by what he finds. The people he encounters have reverted to savage beings with pre-historic man behavior. They have lost intelligence and behave with aggression and fear. But that’s not enough. Life as we know it has ended, the human race is more or less screwed, but it gets worse. Anthropomorphic animals rule the roost.

Yes, warring factions of tigers, rats, and gorillas are tearing apart the land. They speak, they are bipedal, they don armor, and they see humans as beasts. They hunt us. Humans are pets or slaves, and animals use them for labor or entertainment. All of them are shocked when they encounter Kamandi. He can fight back, speak to them as equals, and use reason – so he must be destroyed or captured.

And he is captured. A lot.

I want to make fun of how often Kamandi ends up trapped by animals, but it’s a numbers game. There are hundreds of creatures ruling the land and very few intelligent humans. Plus, he’s just a naïve teenager. He eventually finds more survivors and teams up with a trio of humans who are genetically engineered (mutants I guess) to survive in this new Earth. They set out to explore and to figure out how to return humanity to sentience.

They encounter plenty of entertaining characters along the way. One of my favorites is Flower, she who possesses magical hair that never moves and always covers up just the right parts:

In his journeys, Kamandi also visits places such as Las Vegas. I love the layout of this panel; it shows the glory of the city and it isn’t a stretch to imagine it in dusty ruins.

Age and wear are visible through the pages. The world has been through a lot, and Kirby packs in enough surprises that you’re never sure about what you’ll see on the next page. His world builds upon itself and always reaches to be bigger and better. You always have something to marvel at – and you’d think you’d get tired of it or stop buying it, but you don’t. You just eagerly move forward.

I enjoy the world at large, but I get hung up on tiny details. For example, where is Kamandi finding enough water to keep himself so clean? Where is his stash of super shampoo? No one surviving in a post-apocalyptic setting should have hair that pretty! He also walks around shirtless and in shredded pants. Did they not take extra clothes to their bunker to save over the years? How has he never learned to craft new duds? Don’t paranoid people who live in bunkers teach themselves everything about survival?

Those tiny things don’t ruin the story – far from it – but they take some of the reality away from me. And I like reality in my fiction.

Star Wars In Comics

Star Wars is everywhere. At least, that’s what it feels like now. It wasn’t always that way.

A long time ago (in the late 70s) in a galaxy not so far away, fans of the game-changing science fiction story didn’t have much to turn to besides the movies. You couldn’t walk to the local video rental store a few months after the movie closed to get your fix either. The first home release of the movies was in 1982 – five years after A New Hope hit theaters! For those of us used to being able to watch movies not very long after they exit the local Cineplex, it’s hard to comprehend. Fans flocked to theaters to see the films again and again to get their fix. Outside that, they dug for any Star Wars material available like tenacious Jawas searching for scraps.

Luckily, Marvel comics picked up the license and channeled the characters into a new medium: comic books. They helped fuel the fervor of fans in 1977 by publishing an adaptation of A New Hope. As the issues flew off the shelves, it became apparent that the decision to make Star Wars comics was a smart one. It’s said that the move may have saved the company’s finances from disaster.

Over the next nine years, Marvel released 107 issues. They adapted the next two films in the saga into comics, and they created original stories. Many featured familiar characters like Luke, Leia, and Han, but Marvel also introduced new faces like Shira Brie. The run stopped in 1986.

Then came the dark times. No comics. No novels. Nothing. I can’t imagine what it was like for fans during that period.

It didn’t change until 1991. In addition to Timothy Zahn’s Heir to the Empire being released, Dark Horse Comics published the first of their Star Wars comics: Dark Empire. The comics branch of the expanded universe has been with them ever since (that may change with the recent Disney acquisition of Lucasfilm). Dark Horse has published hundreds of stories in the beloved galaxy and as with any huge setting and large cast of characters, some of the series have been fantastic (like Legacy) while others have been just entertaining or just okay.

What I’ve loved most about reading Star Wars comics is exploring different time periods within the universe. They’ve jumped between timelines going back to 36,000 years BBY (before the battle of Yavin) to 138 years ABY. You get to experience the beginnings of the Jedi order, tales of the Sith, wars, smuggling trips, and events of varying importance over the years. You get to witness the galaxy recover after the Rebel Alliance defeats the Empire, and you even get to meet Luke’s descendents. And you get to visit so many planets and worlds.

It’s kind of awesome.

In fact, a comic that came out last week reinforces how comics can tell superb stories in the Star Wars universe. Star Wars #1 by Brian Wood and Carlos D’Anda goes back to the roots of the saga to tell a story that takes place just after the end of A New Hope. The Death Star has been destroyed, but the Empire knows about Yavin and the Rebel Alliance is desperately searching for a new base of operations.

Wood captures the tone of the original trilogy from the first page, and D’Anda’s art is vivid and reminds me of early Marvel comics in style if not in colors. The dialogue is paced just right, the story moves forward with tremendous energy, the characters come alive, and it’s just one of those comics where you can’t turn the pages fast enough. At least I couldn’t. It’s exciting, and I haven’t felt this level of enthusiasm about a Star Wars comics in a while.

It probably won’t come as a surprise to anyone that one of my favorite parts about this comic is seeing Leia as an X-wing pilot. She is a devoted leader and diplomat and given her gumption, it doesn’t surprise me at all that she would jump into the role of a solider from time to time. I think she has an adventurous streak so it’s probably as much about getting a break from her regular duties as it is about getting boots on the ground. I’m thrilled to see Leia in this light, and I’m looking forward to reading more of this series!

It’s just one of many examples of the wonderful things Dark Horse has done for the universe we love so dearly, and I hope they get to continue doing so.

‘Twas The Fight Before Christmas

One of my favorite things about watching sitcoms when I was younger was checking out the holiday episodes every year. It was entertaining to see how each show would divert from its regular programming to fit in Thanksgiving turkeys or Christmas trees. Sometimes it was fluid and fit in nicely – sitcoms have the advantage of being primarily episodic and therefore throwing a little mistletoe around doesn’t affect any ongoing arcs – and other times it was the definition of contrived. I love that the celebration of holidays occasionally makes its way to comics too. I don’t know that it occurs as part of continuing series often, but it’s well suited for one shots.

And it’s fun to come across them.

At a convention I went to last year, I stopped at one of many booths filled with long boxes and aimlessly browsed until I saw a sectioned sorted by creators and went right to the one labeled Darywn Cooke. I flipped through the issues and was thrilled when I spied Spider-Man’s Tangled Web #21: ‘Twas The Fight Before Christmas by Cooke and Jay Bone.

Spider-Man, Medusa, the Fantastic Four, J. Jonah Jameson, and Santa?! Sign me up.

It’s the night before Christmas, and Jameson sends out Peter Parker in a ferocious storm to do some last minute shopping – he needs him to get a crystal unicorn for his wife (fellas, here’s a hint: not many ladies actually want a crystal unicorn). While he’s out and about, Parker comes across some kids who got separated from their group and being a hero and all, he gets them out of the cold and takes them back to the Daily Bugle where the holiday party is still happening.

Jameson’s reaction to the children is priceless… and expected. He doesn’t know what Christmas cheer means.

The good times continue when Wasp and Sue Richards head out to finish their shopping at Macy’s. It just so happens that Flash Thompson is there donning the Spidey suit for the occasion because nothing says the holidays like Santa and Spider-Man making a joint appearance.

However, all isn’t as it should be. The Puppet Master is hiding in the wings and has the faux Spidey and Medusa under his control. He manipulates them into wreaking havoc and stealing from the store, and when Jameson gets wind he can’t wait to take the kids down there to show them the truth about their beloved hero.

Yeah, he can be a real jerk.

Thankfully Peter Parker was also on his way because he still needed to find the unicorn for Jameson’s wife. With the Fantastic Four, Wasp, and the actual Spider-Man all in the same place, the Puppet Master couldn’t keep up his charades for long. The fakeness of the holiday got to him, and he just snapped. It happens to the best of us. Though he was hauled away, the kids were probably quite confused about why Santa and Spidey appeared to be the bad guys.

I adore the lighthearted tone of the story, and the way it almost bounces around. It’s infectious and bound to make the reader smile. I love jokes like this:

Watching superheroes act like everyday people who do human things like putting off shopping until the last possible minute is always a blast.

About that Will Eisner Guy

Confession time: until this month I’d never read a Will Eisner comic.

I know he’s incredibly influential in the medium. I understand that the Eisner Awards are a huge deal, and they wouldn’t be named after him if he wasn’t the same. Reading The Spirit has been on my list of things to read for a while but so is a lot of other stuff and I haven’t got around to it (I know). I was introduced to his work through A Contract with God instead.

Apparently it’s commonly said that this was the first comic to call itself a graphic novel; it was published in 1978. From Eisner’s keynote address at the 2002 Will Eisner Symposium:

“That began what is known as the graphic novel today. Those of you who’ve heard me speak before know this now famous story about how it was called a “graphic novel.” I completed the book, A Contract With God, and I called the president of Bantam Books in New York, who I knew had seen my work with The Spirit. Now, this was a very busy guy who didn’t have much time to speak to you.

So I called him and said, “There’s something I want to show you, something I think is very interesting.”

He said, “Yeah, well, what is it?”

A little man in my head popped up and said, “For Christ’s sake stupid, don’t tell him it’s a comic. He’ll hang up on you.” So, I said, “It’s a graphic novel.”

He said, “Wow! That sounds interesting. Come on up.”

Whether that particular statement is true or not (someone else thought of it first), I bet that the graphic novel was among the first to tell stories that were personal and about real life instead of superheroes. It was a move by Eisner to try to showcase sequential art as a serious medium, as “viable literature.” Even now there’s a stigma that comes with the word comics – usually from close-minded people who write it off as nothing more than longer versions of the strips in newspapers – and the negative attitude was more pronounced back then. It’s like critics didn’t count them, and the people penning the stories weren’t real writers.

Eisner also realized the people who started with comics in the 30s were growing up. They wanted more than another epic superheroic battle, and he realized they’d probably check out a different sort of story. It was a gamble, and it paid off.

Though most of the stories in A Contract with God didn’t fit my personal tastes, I can step away from that and see the grand thing he accomplished. As I started flipping through the pages I realized this was the predecessor to the type of comics I like the most: narrative stories. I include a lot more superhero comics in my diet now, but in the beginning it was primarily stories about people and life. Some were drawn and lettered like a regular comic, some had more words and less art, but many followed the overall style of Eisner’s book.

It was fascinating for me to see the roots of this style of visual storytelling. We’re accustomed to graphic novels and stories like this now (Archaia Entertainment publishes several comics along this line), but in the late 70s? If there were an internet then, I’d love to have seen the initial reactions. A Contract with God received enough of a positive response to warrant publishing two sequels, but the first of those wasn’t out until 1988. Whatever readers and peers thought, I’m glad Eisner was willing to take the risk and do something different.