The Summer 2021 Box of Comics

If there's one great thing about ebooks and electric comics is that you can carry potentially your entire library on vacation. 

But that wasn't always the case back in the days before Kindles and iPads. No, back then, you'd have to be judicious with what you wanted to read while on vacation because you'd have to carry everything. In my adulthood, I would spend almost as much time deciding on what books and magazine to bring on a vacation as I did on my entire vacation's wardrobe. I know I'm not alone here. I mean, as much as I enjoyed the 800-page, hard cover history book was I reading, there was no way it found it's way into my backpack for reading on a plane. 

Before adulthood, however, there was another factor that determined what we might bring on a vacation: our parents. I remember my youth in the 70s when we'd go on vacation, my parents would not let me take EVERY comic I owned. Even as an only child, it was just not feasible to bring them all. A friend of mine were talking this week and he mentioned his mom told him he could only bring ten comics on their annual trips. He always prioritized the 100-page giants and the like so he could maximize his reading experience. I did something similar. 

Most of the time, those issues would have a then-current story backed with multiple reprints ranging from the 1940s to the 1960s. In an era where back issues were few and far between, these issues rocked. Well, unless is some crappy story feature Prince Valiant or some Viking nonsense. Didn’t like it then. Still don’t. 

Summer 2021

One of my summer projects is to catalog all my comics. I’m almost done. A nice side effect was seeing all these old issues. Some of them have distinct memories associated with them. Others—many others—do not. In fact, I started culling many issues. “Why the heck did I buy that one?” I asked myself more than once.

Seeing all these issues made me want to read them again. Sure, I could keep all my long boxes in the front room all summer, but I think we know how that would go over with the rest of the family. So I made my own Summer 2021 comic box. I’ll probably go back and pull a few other issues, but mainly, the titles I want to read are in this box.

Those thicks ones are those awesome black-and-white reprints where you get 500 pages of comics in a single volume, the modern equivalent to those old 100-page giants.

I’ve been reading through the Master of Kung Fu collection for a little while, but I’ve sped up knowing the movie is on its way. The others are just hankering I’ve been having: 70s-era Marvel books I never read back in the day.

Marvel also published eight magazine-sized Doc Savage issues, all black-and-white. I have them all, but I’ve only read the first one.

This is one where I remember buying it but have zero memory of it. I like the 70s and 80s when comics artists and writers would just try anything, like apparently making a quarterback into a super hero. Sure.

I have a ton of Superman tiles, second only to Batman. But this Time and Time Again series is something that looks interesting.

Then there are titles like this. Have to read it for the historical value.

I discovered a few X-Files comics which are in the box, but that also led to re-discover this entry where the Dark Knight is abducted. 

This issue of Detective is one of the earliest I ever had. Can’t remember the story, but I will this summer. You can see the frayed edges of a well-loved book.

I’ve got a few novels lined up to read, but I think the Summer of 2021 will be comic heavy.

So, did your parents limit the number of novels and comics for your trips? Did you get to buy some on the road? And what specific comics can you remember reading during the summers?

The Road to The Empire Strikes Back: Episode IV: Marvel Comics

Here's a link to my YouTube channel where I discuss the issues of Marvel Comics' Star Wars title in the months immediately preceding the release of The Empire Strikes Back.

Year of an Indie Writer: Week 20

It's all in the details.

Proofing the Hardcopy of Aztec Sword

Always, always order a hard copy of your books printed by Amazon.

When you create a paperback via Amazon (or IngramSpark), you are provided with a template. On the template are the bleed areas and the bar code space. It is incumbent on you to design your cover with those lines and boundaries in mind.

Amazon also has a great online viewer where you can proof your book electronically. It's good, because it has all the borders marked. But sometimes, you just need the paper.

Because of mistakes like this.

That's all on me. I got this text as close to the bar code as possible in my design program. Clearly, I got it too close. The spine's text also was misaligned, so I've got more than one thing to fix.

The interior is good. Vellum is a good program that takes care of all the little details so you don't have to. It also makes ebooks, so this is a key piece of software for any independent writer.

Oh, and Amazon now puts this banner across the whole cover.

The End of The Big Bang Theory

Strangely, I didn't watch this show out of the gate. I don't hardly watch anything live at 7pm CST. But when it finally landed on my radar, the family and I bought the DVDs and caught up. Ironically, we didn't watch live, but we watched both episodes on Thursday.

For many of these long-running shows, the characters face some big change and move out of the apartment or bar or whatever. But what I loved about the series finale of TBBT was that we now know things will continue just as they have for the past twelve years...we just won't be seeing their lives. Babies will be born, children will grow up in this wonderful make-shift family, and they finally have a working elevator. Come on. That's not a spoiler. You knew going in the thing would finally work.

Anyway, loved the finale. Well done.

Game of Thrones: Leave the Creators Alone

I love being a geek who has seen very little of this series. It just didn't do it for me. My wife enjoys it and, up until this month, always watched the shows via binging when HBO offered a week's worth of free programming. But for Mother's Day, I bought her HBO so she could watch the end live.

And I actually sat in for most of last week's episode. I'll also tune in tomorrow live. I think by Sunday, I'll have watched something like six or seven full episodes. With my wife's running commentary, I get caught up.

As a Star Wars fan who loved The Last Jedi and groused about those fans who signed petitions trying to get Disney to remake Episode VIII, I rolled my eyes this week as GOT fans wanted a do-over of this season.

Really?

I can imagine one day we'll have some famous author write a blockbuster book and they'll be fans demanding the publisher re-write it to their tastes. Sigh.

Always Have an Answer

Last week, at Houston's Comicpalooza, a friend of mine asked me why I haven't written any genre stories that would find a home at a geek convention. It was an honest question and one to which I didn't have a good and ready answer. I fell back on my humorous answer as to how I came up with my western hero, Calvin Carter: Growing up a SF geek kid, I discovered mystery fiction as an adult, so naturally I ended up writing a western.

It prompted me to examine my writing to date and I arrived at an answer: I enjoy writing thrillers, mysteries, and westerns.

But I think I'll be trying my hand at some SF before year's end. It might even be this summer.

Podcast of the Week

Blockbuster. It's fantastic. It is an immersive podcast, completed scripted like a radio show, about how Steven Spielberg and George Lucas, with John Williams, created their massive films of the 1970s. How good is this series? When Lucas and Spielberg face challenges to their productions, you can't help but be worried for them...and we KNOW the answer! Check it out.

Book of the Week

Marvel Comics: The Untold Story by Sean Howe. I bought this on Audible when it was a daily deal, but highly recommended...and I'm not even finished.

Song of the Week

Could it be anything other than the second single from Bruce Springsteen's new album? Just listen to the lush orchestration. And the chimes!

Movie Review: Captain Marvel

If it was opening day for a super-hero movie, then you know I was there.

I saw Marvel's new film, "Captain Marvel" on Friday night. Oddly, the theater with the RPX screening--i.e., bigger screen, bigger chairs, bigger sound, and bigger price--was not full. Not by a long shot.

But the people who were there were die-hard fans. How did I know? When the "Marvel Studios" logo was run and instead of showing all the heroes in all the movies...they showed all the Stan Lee cameos with a simple "Thank you Stan" right after it. I'll admit, I got emotional. But the fans in the theater clapped and cheered. I did, too.

I know next to nothing about any of the various Captain Marvel characters. The only thing I know for sure is the original (?) one, the one named Mar-Vel, died in 1981 or so...and has stayed dead. I always admired that about Marvel Comics.

So, going into this movie, I was a super-hero fan but I was going to be shown something new. And I loved it. The movie starts in space, on a planet called Hala. Brie Larsen is a character named Vers (pronounced Veers). She's part of StarForce, and her mission is to extract one of their own from the vile, green-skinned, shape-shifting Skrulls.

Naturally, things go awry.

She's captured by the lead Skrull, Talos (played wonderfully by Ben Mendelsohn) and her memories are tapped. She escapes and lands in Los Angeles 1995. Now we get a fun fish-out-of-water story with Vers being all earnest in her mission, never telling a lie, teamed up with Samuel L. Jackson's Nick Fury early in his career.

And the results are pretty darn hilarious.

The odd pairing makes for a standard buddy movie where each character has to learn about the other. We get some backstory on Vers--real name Carol Danvers--meet some people in her past, and have lots and lots of things that'll make those of us who lived through the 1990s smile and point and laugh.

As I mentioned, Mendelsohn is under make-up for most of the film, but his acting chops really shine through. There are more than a few moments when you really see his talent no matter the prosthetic. Larsen is an actress I cannot say I've seen in anything else. But she is charming in her own way. She knows what she's doing is right and she's set on completing the mission. When she faces things that counteract what she knows, she has to confront them.

And, most importantly, she's having a blast being a super-hero. So refreshing.

Jackson plays Jackson so you know what you're going to get. Nothing wrong with that.

Stan Lee's cameo is so, so wonderful because, for the first time, he's actually playing himself. That he's reading the script for Kevin Smith's "Mallrats" movie now makes the professional fan/podcaster/writer/director part of the Marvel cinematic universe. I suspect he's beyond thrilled.

Captain Marvel is a fun movie with way more humor than I expected, lots of great super-hero/space battles. It seems the movies of Summer 2019 now start in March.

Spider-Man: Homecoming

I know far less about Spider-Man than I do about Batman, Superman, or most of the DC Comics heroes. I was a DC-first guy growing up and I pretty much stayed that way ever since. But, of all the Marvel heroes, I know Spider-Man the most. Which is to say I’ve barely read a Spider-Man comic since the Ultimate version around 2000, but I read a lot them back in the day, mostly in the reprints of the original Steve Ditko-Stan Lee run. I watched the Tobey Maguire movies—enjoyed them, except the third which I can barely remember—and missed the Andrew Garfield ones altogether. But when Spidey showed up in Captain America: Civil War last year, I was thrilled. They way he interacted with the other heroes, the quips, the isn’t-this-awesomeness of Spider-Man being played as what he started out to be—a high school kid—was fantastic. Even with my limited knowledge of the character, I knew that, at last, we had a live action Spidey that matched the early comics.

Spider-Man: Homecoming is all of that and more. In a real sense, this is a high school movie about Peter Parker who just happens to be Spider-Man. All the teenaged angst, awkwardness, and attitude just puddles over in nearly every scene of this movie. This is a high school film, and I mean that in a good way. I saw the film with my boy and his friend. I laughed at the moments in the film because I remembered them; they laughed at the same moments because they are now living through them.

Tom Holland is now twenty-one, which meant he was 19 or 20 when filming this movie. And he looks five years younger. Pitch perfect casting. He showed, often through facial expressions, the awkwardness of being a fifteen-year-old boy in high school. His best friend, Ned, played by Jacob Batalon, is exactly how most of us would be when we discover our friend is Spider-Man. Man, he SO wants to tell everyone, and often he’s barely restraining the urge to blurt out “Peter Parker is Spider-Man!” Loved him because he is me.

But if you want pitch perfect casting, look no further than Michael Keaton. It’s be 25 years since his last stint as Batman, but he’s always played a great bad guy. Remember Pacific Heights? I loved to hate him in that movie. In this, well, frankly, his character, Adrian Toomes, does things some of us might do. The film opens with a flashback to the aftermath of the first Avengers film with much of New York destroyed. Toomes and his men are contracted to salvage, but the new Department of Damage Control takes over. He’s overextended himself, he’s got a family and employees who rely on him. What is he supposed to do? Well, he never turns in some of the alien technology he already salvaged and he and his team become weapons dealers with Keaton himself being the man who, over the eight years since the flashback, steals more tech from Damage Control.

SPOILERS AHEAD.

In the trailers, Toomes talks about Tony Stark and all of his rich friends and the powerful heroes that make such destruction. Toomes is disgusted that Stark helped create Damage Control, so the very man who makes the destruction also gets paid to clean it up. He’s got a point. Going into the movie, you think Toomes is talking to fellow bad guys, trying to enlist their help to do some thievery. But no! He’s talking to Spider-Man who, at this point, he knows is Peter Parker. Nice twist there.

But perhaps the best sequence of the film is one of the smallest, most intimate scenes: three people in a car. Peter finally gets up the courage to ask his crush, Liz, to homecoming. She says yes. She’s played by Laura Harrier, a young woman of color. The entire film, Toomes is talking about providing for his family. Keaton is no a person of color. So when Peter knocks on Liz’s door to pick her up for the dance, he, and probably the entire audience, never expected to see Toomes opening the door!

Now, my instant reaction was “Vulture found out who Peter likes and is holding her hostage!” But no. Toomes really is her dad. His wife is African-American and thus you have the best twist of the entire movie. Which leads to the best sequence in the film.

Toomes drives Peter and Liz to the dance. Spider-Man has already saved Liz’s life. Peter knows Toomes is Vulture, but Toomes, at the start of the scene, doesn’t know Peter is Spidey. In the course of the drive to school, you see, via Keaton’s nuanced acting, Toomes figure out Peter is Spidey! In a nod to what makes Keaton such a fantastic actor, he arrives at school and asks Liz to step out so “I can have the dad talk with Peter.” Keaton delivers that one line as a comedy beat, complete with a funny face. In that instant, he’s Beetlejuice. In the next, he’s stone cold bad…but with a twist. He tells Peter thanks for saving his daughter’s life, go inside and show her a good time—“but not too good”; he’s still a dad!—and forget all about the Vulture’s arms dealings.

Now, do you think Peter is gonna do that? Yeah, me neither.

END OF SPOILERS

There are so many good moments in the film that I’ll happily see it again. You should, too. This is a super-hero film that’ll put a smile on your face early on and it’ll rarely leave.

Highly recommended.

Comics Cavalcade

Over the weekend, I went to SpaceCity Con here in Houston. It’s something of a Memorial Day tradition. Typically, the convention is Comicpalooza but that’s been pushed back to Father’s Day weekend. And, yes, before you ask, I’m going there as well.

I’m to the point in my comic book collecting where I gravitate towards the dollar bins. At conventions like these, there were boxes and boxes of comics that are bagged, boarded, and sealed for all time. Those don’t hold my interest anymore. For me, comics are, as they always have been, to read. Because my interests are so varied, I like to sample a lot of different books, even ones that weren’t on my radar back in the day.

The best thing about dollar bins is that, for the most part, they are un-alphabetized, un-bagged, un-boarded, and just shoved in a box. As a result, you literally have to go through book by book looking at the titles, smelling the old paper, pulling out titles that might interest you, and then subdividing said large stack of books into something small and manageable. Now, I’ll leave it up to you whether this spread is manageable or not, but for me, it’ll get me through the first month of summer… or until Comicpalooza!

The Batman titles there on the left are good selection of mid-70s material. The writer for the flagship title is David V. Reed. I haven’t read the Detective books yet. Overall, I was very pleased that I was able to locate a good number of books from 1976 that celebrated the Bicentennial now 40 years gone. That particular title there of Action Comics, when that bad guy is his hitting Superman into 1776, I had seen that cover for a long time and was finally was able to locate it. The Superman title second from the bottom—and the Wonder Woman title—both both look different. They are Pizza Hut collectible editions from the mid-70s. They are reprints from the 50s—which is what I really thought they were—but still fun reading.

Column three has got two sets of titles. There is the Master of Kung Fu which I have heard lots of good things about. Evidently it began as a typical title to capture the early 70s kung fu craze but morphed into a sort of superspy storyline. Shang Chi, the master himself, is the son of Fu Manchu. Back in the 70s, Marvel had the rights to Fu Manchu and used them. Ever since, those rights have lapsed. Thus these titles rarely get reprinted. This particular run, issues 83 to 87, is a single storyline, late in the run, but I figured it would be good chance to read and see what it was like. The Star Hunter stuff was DC’s answer to Star Wars. I have a fondness for cheesy space opera. Back in the day, I bought the debut issue, but never read or located any more. I found these four issues and picked them up. They’re not in order so I will be looking for the others come Father’s Day.

The comics in column three are random. A couple of Bicentennial ones down there on the bottom, each numbered with a special black-and-white number in the upper right-hand corner. When I do peruse the dollar bins, I try to find books that are thicker to give me more content and, most importantly, complete stories. Thus three of those titles in column 4 are all giant size. Ironically, that World’s Finest issue that cost a dollar back in 1979 also cost me a dollar in 2016.

I was lucky to find some Shadow books. The one down there on the front I liked in particular because that was when Denny O’Neil (of Batman fame) took up the title when DC got the rights to write stories about the character. The artist was Frank Robbins who was never one of my favorites — he did the Invaders for Marvel comics and that was my first taste of how cover art and interior art could be different. The modern titles I had never read or never heard of. Ironically these are from 1987 when Denny O’Neil was the editor of the Batman titles. I don’t think he had anything to do with this run, but it is a complete four issue set. The one there on top is a Shadow annual.

The titles on the last column are even more random than the others. A couple of Jonah Hex issue, one Man Wolf (I’m not too familiar with this one, but the creature in question is transformed, I think, by a gemstone from the moon), issue 1 of the Logan’s Run adaptation, and a big annual of Christmas stories from 1997. And, yes, I won’t read that one until December. That Rampaging Hulk title you see is the collection of the black-and-white stories from Marvel magazine back in the mid-70s. Marvel tried their hand at more adult content using the larger magazine format that wasn’t subject to the Comics Code. When the TV show became a hit, Rampaging Hulk was transformed to Hulk! and became color. The Essential titles are all black-and-white reprints typically of color comics, but since this collection were originally in black-and-white anyway — and it only cost five dollars whereas the standard original book cost at least double that amount — how can I pass it up?

That’s my haul from SpaceCity Con 2016. I’ll be reading and reviewing these periodically throughout the summer. Let me know if you have any history with any of these titles as I’d be curious to know if y’all read these books back in the day or even now.