Redartz: Good day, and welcome everyone! For this episode of "Rank and File" we cast our eyes upon the earlier Bronze age, to 1972. Our goal: to select some of the finest examples of comic book storytelling available in that fine, vintage year. I've chosen my favorites, using my admittedly subjective criteria (have I actually read it, and did I like it) along with considerations of historical significance, creativity and just plain coolness. Therefore, let us dally no longer with explanations; on with the show...
1. Avengers 100- "Whatever Gods There Be", by Roy Thomas, Barry Windsor-Smith, Joe Sinnott and Syd Shores. Great classic tale with a plethora of Avengers.
2. Fantastic Four 121- "The Mysterious Mind Blowing Secret of Gabriel", by Stan Lee, John Buscema and Joe Sinnott. One of Stan's last stories, but an interesting way to bring Galactus back...
3. Green Lantern/Green Arrow 89- "And Through Him Save a World", by Dennis O'Neal and Neal Adams. A bit heavy-handed, but a dramatic finish to the O'Neal/Adams run.
4. Marvel Premiere 4- "The Spawn of Sligguth", by Archie Goodwin, Barry Windsor-Smith and Frank Brunner. A tale smacking of horror; a bit different for Dr. STrange, but a good read. And unusual, but nice, artistic pairing of Smith and Brunner.
5. Marvel Team-Up 4- "And Then-The X-Men", by Gerry Conway, Gil Kane and Steve Mitchell. A Solid team-up, solid art, solid stories, just a solid issue.
6. Amazing Spider-Man 113- "They Call the Doctor...Octopus"; by Gerry Conway, John Romita Sr. and Jim Starlin. A great start to the Ock /Hammerhead war. And interesting to see Jim Starlin over Romita, as well.
7. Captain America 155- "The Incredible Origin of the Other Captain America", by Steve Englehart, Sal Buscema and Frank McLaughlin. Englehart's phenomenal run on the book is just starting, and already he tackles a biggie: the '50's' Cap!
8. Conan the Barbarian 20- "The Black Hound of Vengeance", by Roy Thomas, Barry Windsor-Smith and Dan Adkins. A personal favorite among the Thomas/Smith Conan stories. Absolutely great; and what a cover. Incidentally, this must have been a good year for Mr. Windsor-Smith.
9. Kamandi 1- "The Last Boy on Earth", by Jack Kirby and Mike Royer. The King starts off his post-apocalyptic epic in fine form. Dialogue may be a bit clunky, but you can't fault his imagination.
10. Swamp Thing 1- "Dark Genesis", by Len Wein and Bernie Wrightson. A more detailed origin for the swamp monster, courtesy of his two initial creators.
There's my picks; take'em or leave'em. Either way, let us all know why you took them or left them, and pass along your own lists for the Best of '72!
10 comments:
Sorry about the deleted comment. Why doesn't Blogger let us edit our comments? Anyway...I listed my top 5 of 1972 a while back (Swamp Thing #1, Captain Marvel #25, Justice League #103, Chamber of Chills #2, and Conan #24). A couple of your choices would be in my top ten: Captain America and the Falcon #155 and Kamandi #1. To round out my top 10, I'd add Avengers #101 (I LOVE #100, the BWS art and all the Avengers together, but to me, 101's Harlan Ellison plotted "5 Dooms to Save Tomorrow" is a better story, and really, the Rich Buckler/Dan Adkins art better suited to the Assemblers). The rest of my list would include Batman #244, the Denny O'Neil/Neal Adams conclusion to the Ra's al Ghul saga can't be beat and (this is a toughie because there were so many great comics in 1972) I'd add...Adventure Comics #425. A filler, sure, but a noble experiment: short, one-off adventure stories done in a style similar to DC's mystery, romance, and war books, with an assembly of artists to die for: Kaluta, Kane, Toth, Nino, and Frank Redondo. Wowee!
Ha! We recently discussed the work of H.P. Lovecraft and this Marvel Premiere/Dr. Strange story is clearly inspired by Lovecraft - the Sligguth even sounds similar to Shoggoth, one of Lovecraft's "Old Ones". I haven't read this particular Dr. Strange story but, judging from the cover, it seems inspired by Lovecraft's classic 1936 novella "The Shadow Over Innsmouth".
Red, four times today you refer to Barry Smith as Barry "Windsor" Smith. He added the "Windsor" part much later and it is merely a snobbish affectation - Barry Smith is English and here in the UK a "double-barrel" surname means you are a bit posh, better than the average supposedly. I could change my name to Colin Windsor-Jones and pretend I was upper-class!
Please stop calling him Barry Windsor-Smith - when he was drawing Conan, the Avengers etc he was plain old Barry Smith!
By the way, did you hear the news that scientists have discovered dinosaur DNA? The DNA of dinosaurs is so similar to modern birds that, in fact, dinosaurs never went extinct - birds ARE dinosaurs!
Dude! You hit my sweet spot when I was 10-11 years old!!!
I will simply state that I had most of what you show and that the stories “wowed” me!
Is it possible that the Cap America you show started us down the path to Winter Soldier???
I can't argue with your choices, although I haven't read all of them. As for additions, I'm with Groove on Batman 244 ... shirtless swordfight in the desert!
I'd also mention Len Wein's run on JLA (especially 100-102 where they go back to various time periods to find the Seven Soldiers of Victory); early Tomb of Dracula (although the consensus seems to be it didn't hit its stride until #7 when Wolfman and Colan teamed up); and a couple of notable debuts ... Thanos in Iron Man 55 and Valkyrie in Defenders 4. I've read both stories but can't remember much about them, so maybe they weren't all that great.
Groove- You make some solid choices! I've never read that Batman story, but it doubtlessly was epic. And that Adventure issue: wow, that sounds great. I love a good anthology. Got to hunt down a copy of this one...
Colin- Sorry; I just refer to Barry with three names as that's how I usually see it listed these days. But yes, I always 'knew' him as Barry Smith. Perhaps he just prefers signing with his initials; "BWS" has a better sound than "BS". :)
And no, I hadn't heard about the DNA news. Thanks for the tipoff; it's off to the National Geographic website after I finish up here.
Charlie- Glad you enjoyed the list; I thought you might like today's timeframe. Interesting conjecture about "Winter Soldier". Thoughts, anyone?
Mike W- good call on Wein's JLA. That story arc you mentioned was on my short list too...
Oh MAN-- I believe I have 8 of the issues you've pictured-- geeze, that was a good year, wasn't it?
My Kamandi #1 could only be referred to as a "Reader's Copy" at this point, and that would be generous. . .
But Avengers #100 is a huge sentimental favorite. That gathering sequence in the beginning is just lovely-- and man, it's funny to remember how incredible it was to see them pull in the entire "full" roster of any & all former Avengers. . . which seems like such a small bunch by almost all later standards, eh? LOVED how the Hulk was used. . . and that he rather saved part of the day just by being being and formidable,w/out fully realizing it. ("Pretty girl, hey?")
And speaking of my Incredible friend, this was an above average year for his title as well. Many issues saw Herb being reunited with John Severin as inker, and issue #150 may have been one of their finest efforts. And the story itself was a bit of a masterpiece of comic-book storytelling. Plenty of human drama, w/ Alex Summers coming to grips with his powers. . . here, of all places. . . and it being handled quite deftly. And, as usual, a truly confused and misunderstood Hulk trying to do the right thing, and not having a grasp of his situation at all. And, wow, a world-rocking moment when unconscious Bruce whispers "Jarella. . . my love. . ." as Betty is trying to revive him. . . with LONG-suffering Glenn Talbot waiting right there at hand. The moment the years-long "old" soap opera came to a merciful end. . . my pal and I were both, like, "Oh, MAAAAAAAAANNNNN!!!!"
#151-- a terrific near-horror story. Again, with tremendous visual pacing. Herb at his best was one of those guys who really could tell the story sans dialog, and tell it darned well.
Utterly forgettable next two issue.
Then !54-156 gave us doll-sized Hulk vs. a secret NYC Hydra plant, and stompin' 'em w/ Ant-man's help; a Microverse Hulk who gets trapped on one of the Shaper's first world-experiments; and a return to Jarella's world in a bittersweet chapter that outperforms the first one at every level. Just breakin' an 11-year-old kid's heart!
And. . . was Marvel Spotlight #2 (Werewolf By Night intro) at the beginning of '72? That. . . was a gooood horror issue! Heck, let me toss #4 in there as well. We were right at the dawning of the horror craze, weren't we? Ha!
HB
This was the year BEFORE I started buying comics. I was most likely in my Peanuts phase. Though looking at your covers, this year has to hold some significance for me.
As I have recounted before, my introduction to comics was looking through the issues the GIs gave me when I would go on base with my Dad. He was stationed at Fort Hood at the end of the 60s. We moved in between my first and second year of kindergarten. So 1969? One of my memories is flipping through a Kamandi book. I remember his blond hair and denim shorts. His friend with the flower in her hair. But there's no way that could have happened pre-70s. There had to have been a time in 72 that I was on base with him. It would have been after he got back from Vietnam and before he went to Germany.
Seems my memories don't jibe with "the facts"...
(I knew the stakes were high right from the start.
When she dealt the cards, I bet my heart.
Now I just found a game that I can't play,
And this is where the cowboy rides away.
And my heart is sinking like the setting sun,
Setting on the things I wish I'd done.
It's time to say goodbye to yesterday.
This is where the cowboy rides away.
We've been in and out of love and in-between.
And now we play the final showdown scene.
As the credits roll a sad song starts to play,
And this is where the cowboy rides away.
And my heart is sinking like a setting sun,
Setting on the things I wish I'd done.
Oh the last goodbye's the hardest one to say,
And this is where the cowboy rides away.
Oh the last goodbye's the hardest one to say.
This is where the cowboy rides away).
From Terry in Virginia:
Favorite comics of 1972? I'm in obvious agreement with some of you here, although I wasn’t reading Marvel at all until about a year later, so my list is almost exclusively DC:
Green Lantern/Green Arrow #89 (one of my favorites, although I liked the whole O’Neil/Adams run)
Batman #244 (the Ras Al Ghul conclusion, as Groove mentioned)
Swamp Thing #1
New Gods #8 (Kalibak versus Jack Kir.. er, Dan Turpin)
Forever People #7 (Kirby)
Mister Miracle #9 (origin of Scott Free and his escape from Apokolips; an essential chapter to Kirby’s Fourth World)
Avengers #103 (Roy Thomas, Rich Buckler)
Justice League #98 (conclusion of Mike Friedrich’s Starbreaker trilogy; I pretty much stopped liking JLA when Mike was replaced by Len Wein with issue #100)
Tarzan #207 (DC and Joe Kubert’s first issue)
Weird Worlds #1 (Pellucidar and John Carter stories with Alan Weiss and Murphy Anderson art)
Jimmy Olsen #146 (Kirby)
I missed out on the Barry Smith Conan, but if we ever get to talking about 1973 faves, I’ll rave about the John Buscema-illustrated tales). And some of the greatest Bronze Age stuff from Marvel kicked in around the same period of 1973-74 (Starlin’s Captain Marvel, Brunner’s Dr. Strange, Buckler’s Deathlok and Black Panther, etc.)
As much as I like Kirby’s Fourth World, I was lukewarm to most of Jack’s post-New Gods stuff. Kamandi, The Demon, Atlas, and OMAC just didn’t impress me that much….
Finally, I have to agree with Groove that Adventure Comics got really interesting around this time....
1972 is a strange missing year for me. When I was young, my cousin gave me “old” comics that ran through the silver age and into 1971. And then I picked up a couple years later on my own, so on the first pass I totally missed the “boxed in” Marvel covers.
Of these, Avengers 100 was a book I purchased at an early con after a long search, and Kamandi was something I sought out much later in life. But the FF book with Gabriel is one that I really enjoy. The second herald really fascinated me.
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