Redartz: Welcome to the second part of our Bronze Age Triple-header! Last week we counted down our favorites from Marvel; this week, we give some love to those DC books we treasured. Again, our time frame (for the sake of our discussion; not an ironclad Bronze age definition) is 1970 - 1985. And again, the choices can be difficult. Mine were; leaving out many many beloved comics. But if held captive by the Secret Society of Super Villains and forced to make a list, I suppose this would be pretty close. And so, without any further delay, let's get started. Here are...
My Top Five Favorite Bronze Age DC's:
Detective Comics 475- Possibly my favorite single DC book. Steve Englehart, Marshall Rogers and Terry Austin. Batman and the Joker. All at their best. Certainly my favorite Joker tale, even over Neal Adams' classic Batman 251. To each their own, right?
Showcase 100- years before "Crisis on Infinite Earths", this terrific book brought a huge assortment of characters together to face a spaceborn threat. It actually was my first introduction to many of those characters, such as Bat Lash, Enemy Ace and the Challengers of the Unknown. Paul Kupperberg, Paul Levitz and Joe Staton gave us this enjoyable romp through a hundred issues worth of Showcased features. One of my favorite anniversary issues.
Justice League of America 200- And speaking of anniversary issues, this one may be the best ever. Hearkening back to vintage JLA adventures, with a spectacular team of artists, well written by Gerry Conway, and framed with art sequences by George Perez. A wraparound cover, tons of characters and tons of fun.
Legion of Super-Heroes 289- The issue that cemented the Legion as my favorite DC book at the time (even over the red hot Teen Titans). A great characterization issue, with a lot of focus on the Legionnaires and their relationships (perhaps unavoidably, as a number of them were stranded together). The issue that led into the classic "Great Darkness" saga; and an issue with stellar art and a fantastic cover. Paul Levitz and Keith Giffen really had it going here.
DC Blue Ribbon Digest 41- Yes, I know that reprint formats are verboten. But this issue was all-new, so I get a technicality here! 100 pages of new Sugar and Spike stories by the great Sheldon Mayer. Perhaps not an Eisner Award winning book, granted, but this was aces in my eyes. And to that I can only add, "Glx Sphtzl Glaaah"...
With that, I leave the post in your capable hands. What are the five DC books you love the most? And be sure to start thinking ahead to next week, when we finish our trio of lists with: your top five from 'everyone else'...
22 comments:
No lie, Red, when you introduced this series of posts last week, I immediately knew that two of my DC picks would be 1. JLA #200 and 2. Showcase #100. Back then and to this day, those are two of my favorite single issues of anything published by DC.
My other three picks are also 'big' books (as with Marvel, it's hard for me to narrow down a single issue of any of my favorite series, like New Teen Titans, LoSH, All Star Squadron, etc. that stands out so much more than the rest):
3. Superman #400 - like the JLA anniversary issue, there's so much goodness here: the interconnected stories written by Elliot Maggin, the art and pin-ups by the industry's finest talents of the time, and the beautiful concluding piece written and drawn by Jim Steranko. A damn near perfect Superman book.
4. Batman Annual #8 - a very engaging R'as Al Ghul story by Mike Barr, with absolutely stunning art by Trevor von Eeden and colorist Lynn Varley.
5. Batman Special (1984) - "...the Player On the Other Side"; again written by Barr, with gorgeous art by Michael Golden and Mike DeCarlo. Batman has to confront a man who's like a black-mirror image of himself, as he also witness the killing of his parents when he was a boy, but it took him in a different direction.
As a bit of a cheat, I'm adding an 'honorable mention' pick: DC Special Series #1, better known as the 5-Star Super-hero Spectacular, a dollar comic with stories featuring Flash, Aquaman, Atom, Green Lantern and Batman. Fun stories, great art and an eye-grabbing cover by Neal Adams. I read that book to tatters when I was a kid.
Had a whole week to think about it this time, but its still tricky. Again, I limited myself to comics I first read when they came out, so unimpeachable classics like the Wrightson-era Swamp Thing, and DC First Issue Special #6: Dingbats of Danger Street weren't eligible.
Also, a lot of stuff fell through the cracks because DC did anthologies, where the great often appeared alongside the uh..., not so great.
Anyhow, here goes...
1. OMAC #2 - "It is the Era of the Super-Rich! When money, like technology, reaches complex proportions..." Jack Kirby's prescient take on the world that is coming. My favourite series of the 70s, I was seriously tempted to just list the five best OMAC issues here.
2. Kamandi #6 - "The Death of Flower"; more evidence that Kirby is underrated as a writer.
3. Superman v Muhammad Ali - Neal Adams at his best, bigly.
4. Swamp Thing (vol 2) #21 - "Anatomy Lesson" Object lesson for writers on how to re-invent a character imaginatively without disrespecting their history by Alan Moore, all the more impressive because it was only his second ever full length comic book (after he finished off the existing storyline in the previous issue). Great artwork by newcomers Steve Bisette and John Totleben too.
5. Superman Annual #11 - "For The Man Who Has Everything"; Moore and Gibbons do the best ever Superman story. "Think clean thoughts, chum..."
Honorary mention (I am a cheater too) for Rima the Jungle Girl #3 - Rima lives in the jungle, understands the animals, and she's drawn by Nestor Redondo, theres a sci-fi back up with eyeball melting artwork by the mighty Alex Nino, and a Joe Kubert cover. Whats not to like there?
-sean
Wow, I could pick a Top Five just out of the ones already mentioned:
DETECTIVE 475 — it would be hard to choose just one issue out of the fabled Englehart / Rogers run, but yeah, this one just might be the best. Not just for their iconic treatment of the Joker, but also that excellent sequence where Batman pops in to Silver’s apartment to see if she’s figured out his secret.
SUPERMAN 400 is worth it for the Steranko story alone. He even makes the cheesy “Adam and Eve” ending work.
BATMAN ANNUAL 8 — I’m constantly amazed that this one isn’t more famous. Trevor Von Eeden had been doing solid but unremarkable work for years and then he dropped this bombshell on an unsuspecting public, a quantum leap in style and innovation. And Lynn Varley’s coloring is the icing on the cake. A shame it’s never been reprinted on good paper.
SUPERMAN VS ALI is probably the best All-New / Non-Reprint Treasury-sized comic ever created. It’s not just a regular comic printed large, Adams brilliantly used the oversized format for maximum gobsmacking visual impact on every page (and on several 2-page spreads). Not being a sports fan, I yawned when this thing was first announced, thought it sounded dumb, a waste of Adams’ talents, honestly couldn’t care less. But man, was I blown away when it actually appeared.
SWAMP THING v.2 no. 21 — Moore’s “Everything You Know About This Character Is Wrong” ret-con has been ripped off SO many times since, but it’s never been equaled. I became an instant fan, read everything of his I could get my hands on, hunted down back issues of WARRIOR and CAPTAIN BRITAIN (which were pretty thin on the ground in my area), etc. The Bissette / Totelben art is fabulous too.
So, I heartily endorse all of the above. But since YOU all have picked ‘em, I’m gonna pick five more!
KAMMANDI 2 — there are tons of excellent Kammandis, but this one was my first, AND it’s a humdinger.
SWAMP THING 8 — likewise, nearly any Wein / Wrightson issue of Swampy could be on here, but 8 was my first. And I love the Lovecraftian nature of the story, its spooky setting, and especially Wrightson’s spectacular Ooze Monster.
BATMAN FAMILY 20 — I’m a huge fan of Mike Golden’s art and this issue gives us a double shot : a 19 page Batman / Ragman team-up and a 13 page Man-Bat back-up story. Story wise, neither of these is anything special, but the art is just gorgeous.
DETECTIVE 429 — I’m in the half of comics fandom that DOESN’T hate Frank Robbins with the fire of a thousand suns. I love ALL of Robbins’ Batman stories (and his Shadows are awesome too) but this is my favorite. Every page is a gem of composition and chiaroscuro.
OUR FIGHTING FORCES 146 - it has a really nice John Severin Losers story up-front, but it’s the back-up that knocks me out
: “Burma Sky” by Archie Goodwin and Alex Toth. People rave about Toth’s jet dogfight stories in the Kurtzman EC books — and they ARE great — but this is the Air War story to beat. The jet fighter stories are stylish vignettes — ‘Burma Sky’ is a condensed epic. Seriously, I don’t know why this story isn’t more famous.
b.t.
Ahhh, how am I supposed to pick just five?! I'll go with JLA 196 (the middle chapter of that great Secret Society of Super-Villains epic); Legion 294 (from the Great Darkness Saga); New Teen Titans Annual 3 (final chapter of the Judas Contract); All-Star Squadron 25 (introducing Infinity Inc); and some kind of Batman story ... either one from the Englehart/Rogers Detective run, or something a bit later from Moench/Newton.
Let's see. This would by my five:
Adventure Comics #431, Aparo and Fleisher's take on the Spectre makes his debut by melting and skeletonising rascally wrongdoers.
Superboy and the Legion of Super-Heroes #197. Timber Wolf returns from the dead. Not that I had a clue who he was when I first read this tale.
Phantom Stranger #26. Our hero teams up with the Spawn of Frankenstein to foil a pair of demons who're causing nothing but trouble.
Prez #1 because it's so odd.
The Shadow #7. Frank Robbins proves that it is possible for me to like his work.
Steve, a big part of the Legion's appeal was not having much of a clue who most of the characters were.
Actually, you could say that about DC superhero comics generally. Even with the Justice League - I recall being mad as a kid for the Crisis On Earth-X crossover in #107 and #108, despite not having a clue who the Freedom Fighters were, or for that matter quite a few of the JSA (like that odd geezer in the hat and gas mask).
And - as I've bored you about on your blog more than once - the multiple Earth thing (a fairly rarefied concept in the early 70s) made it all seem even more mysterious and enigmatic...
-sean
"Anatomy Lesson" was my first choice as well-- sheesh!
I was SO FLIPPIN' INVESTED in Marvel throughout the Bronze Age that I'm not actually qualified to offer an informed opinion. I mean, I have NEVER regularly bought and Superman or Batman titles. Ever. But I would like to toss a potential over-looked gem into the discussion: Showcase #94- featuring a solid DOOM PATROL reboot by Paul Kupperbeg and Joe Staton. It was a terrific fresh start for the team with several new faces, and Staton toned down his stylization enough to give it an attractively "clean" look, while still keeping his own unique flair. I was sorry it didn't make the jump to a regular title. . . I would have bought it--!
Also we SURELY cannot forget 1st Issue Special #8 with The Warlord, yeah?
HB
Edo- you were on my mind when I considered those books! In particular the fondness we share for that Showcase story. And btw, Superman 400 was a near miss for the initlist.
Sean- A fine list. And you mentioned Rima! Redondo's art was a stunner, and fit that book perfectly. Oh, and regarding that Superman Annual- you've tickled my memory. Can't recall reading that, but your quote from Batman(?) suure seems familiar. Were they meeting Diana?
B.t.- kudos for finding a way to extend your list! Good to see a DC war book named here. The array of artists that worked on those tales was stellar...
Mike W- picking just 5 is a mental challenge of Herculean proportions. But you answered the call quite well! And thanks for the Titans nod, it was tough to leave them off my count.
Steve DC- Great list! Somehow I managed never to have read an issue of the Shadow. I've heard love for Kaluta's work therein, Robbins' style does seem to be...appropriate for such a book. Add issue 7 to the "must check this out" pile.
HB- yep, it's extra tough for we Zuvembies to properly assess the volumes of DC Bronze age product, as so much of it escaped our attention. It's been enlightening, doing this blog, learning from everyone about some of those overlooked winners. It will be interesting to see how much comes out in next week's 'everything else' edition.
Also, good call on the Doom Patrol and Warlord. Some of those 'tryout' titles hid some gems...
Red - I'm "digging your scene" this week and last!
Superman 249 - 1972 - Bought it at Ribordy's Drug Store in Crown Point, Indiana! Neal Adams cover, Swan interiors. Supes runs up against Terra_Man! Is this the first time that DC decides to make Supes vulnerable to something besides (silly) magic and kryptonite?
Adventure 431 - 1974 - Bought it off the spinner at the News Agency in Crown Point Indiana! As we all know this is the Spectre under Jim Aparo. I thought this cover and story was the best of the run!
The Brave and Bold 10 - 1972 - Bought it off the spinner at Weiss's Grocery Story in Gary, Indiana! Aparo innards! Bats takes a bullet from a sniper that has nicked (?) his heart.
Justice League 100 - 1972 - Bought if off the spinner at Weiss's Grocery Store in Gary, Indiana! My head exploded! Not only did JLA give us Golden Age JSA'ers but now we were introduced to Golden Age Seven Soldiers of Victory from DC's Leading Comics from the 1940s. WOW!!! (I'm happy to say I do have an issue of them in Leading Comics in the long box!)
The Shadow 1 - 4 - 1972 - Kaluta covers and interiors (sometimes with Bernie Wrightson). Got it off the spinner at the News Agency in Crown Point, Indiana! It just reeked of Pulp stories from the 1930s with the art.
Kaluta's Shadow and Aparo's Spectre really were perfect renditions of their genres, n'est pas???
Honorable mention to Frank Robbin's run on The Shadow as is art had a very 1930s feel to it and anyhow The Shadow was not a super hero so his art worked!
I can count on my fingers the number of DC comics I've bought in my life, all of them around 1982-83, so I'm not qualified to take part in this discussion. DC didn't publish any British comics as Marvel had done so I was clueless about most DC characters with the exception of Batman and Wonder Woman thanks to their TV shows and Superman because of the films.
A few years ago the British comedian Al Murray said:
"DC didn't care about us so f**k DC" and I rather agree with him.
I don't agree with him at all Colin, and think its a bit sad Brits would feel that way considering DC published high profile work by people like Brian Bolland, Dave Gibbons, Alan Moore, Neil Gaiman, Steve Dillon and others at a time when the best regular gig they could get in the UK was a few pages in 2000AD, or - more occasionally - a Marvel UK mag.
For quite a while there, the British comic industry was basically a division of DC.
Redartz, you must have read that Superman annual at some point - or maybe seen an excerpt online somewhere? - because it was indeed a Batman quote, speaking to Robin, and did involve Wonder Woman.
-sean
Charlie, no Dingbats in your list then...?
-sean
For me, this is very easy, as I've read so few DC comics. Here's my list:
1.) Karate kid # 15
Marvel beat DC on realism; but DC beat Marvel on surrealism - lobster men surfers, searching for the 'ultimate wave'; talking dogs, dressed in deer stalker hats like Sherlock Holmes. What were the DC writers smoking?
2.) Shade the Changing Man # 6 - More surrealism - lots of Ditko weirdies.
3.) Secrets of the Haunted House # 12 - A horror tale based on a performance of Hamlet. Like Karate Kid # 15, my brother got this at a school sale.
4.) Return of the New Gods # 16 - as a kid, I bought this because Orion looked a bit like Captain Marvel. The art was pretty good.
5.) Green Lantern Vol 2 # 102 - Again, it looked like a Captain Marvel story. DC comics sometimes had a strange charm that's hard to define.
Like Colin, I don't really feel qualified to comment. Most of these comics are on here for sentimental reasons.
Phillip
You know... between last week and this week... I don't have exact dates of publication but is it fair to say that everyone's respective Top 5 tends to be within a range of a few years?
Or are folks spreading them out from 70 - 85?
Like mine is basically 72 - 74? I assume the same for others?
I find it interesting that no one lists the highly regarded Green Lanterns of 1970? Perhaps we were a bit young at that time?
Charlie:
I can’t speak for anyone else, but yeah, most my picks are from the earliest days of my hardcore comics fandom — as you say, roughly ‘72 to ‘74. When I first started collecting, I was buying mostly Marvels, and mostly new ones. But I soon realized there was lots of cool stuff being reprinted in MARVEL TALES, MARVEL DOUBLE FEATURE, MARVEL SPECTACULAR, etc — and even if the stories was “old” , there were all new to ME, so why not get them, too? DC-wise, I had to REALLY like the art to buy them. Comics drawn by Jim Aparo, Bernie Wrightson and Jack Kirby were snapped up in a heartbeat; everything else I had to really think about. There was a dog-eared copy of RIMA 4 on the spinner rack at The Treasury department store that I flipped through many, many times and never did buy (until years later).
By ‘75/ 76, I was pretty deep into the throes of comics addiction. If I ran out of Marvels to buy, I’d get Charltons and DC stuff with decent to poor art, just to get my “fix”. SIX MILLION DOLLAR MAN, DOOMSDAY +1, VENGEANCE SQUAD, SCARY TALES — BATMAN by Ernie Chan, SUPERMAN by Curt Swan and Tex Blaisdell, and even WONDER WOMAN by Jose Delbo and WORLDS FINEST by John Calnan on occasion. That’s pretty much “rock bottom” right there!
(For whatever reason, I could never bring myself to buy Gold Key comics. Not once. They didn’t appeal to me in the slightest.)
By ‘77 I started to lose interest and began to taper off, even from Marvel. By ‘79 / 80, I was becoming VERY choosy, and by the early ‘80s, I was probably buying just as many DCs and Independents (First, Pacific, Eclipse, Fantagraphics, etc) as Marvel, if not more.
I know the cutoff for the Bronze Age is supposed to be ‘84, ‘85, but the comics of that period seem SO different to me — I have a hard time thinking of books like THE ROCKETEER and LOVE AND ROCKETS and NEXUS as being Bronze Age books. But I guess they technically ARE, depending on where exactly one draws the line.
b.t.
Oh, and yeah, I pretty much missed the O’Neil / Adams GREEN LANTERN run. I did have a back-up by them in an issue of FLASH (acquired from a friend) that I liked a lot. But Neal was mostly MIA in the early years of my collecting. I remember thinking it was a pretty big deal when he started doing covers for DC again on a fairly regular basis, around ‘77.
b.t.
Like some others have said, I didn't read a lot of DCs during the Bronze Age, so I have a limited range to choose from.
New Gods #7 - "The Pact" - One of my most-loved issues ever of any comic. Jack Kirby's inside story behind the Fourth World books, probably the deepest richest piece of his heart that he ever got down on paper. So many people have said that Kirby was a great comic book artist and creator, but that he could not write. I think they likely have never read these issues. New Gods 6-9 were about as good as it gets, to me.
Swamp Thing #1 (first series) - Bought it off the spinner rack when it came out, which I can't say for the Fourth World books. Nothing else looked or felt like this when it came out. The first ten issues with Wrightson's art were all so good - I could have picked instead any of the following three issues as my top choice, especially that werewolf story.
Mister Miracle #9 - "Himon" - the follow-up to New Gods 7, a grown Scott Free makes his great escape from Apokolips and starts a cosmic war. This really should be a movie, the climactic escape scene would be breathtaking.
Kamandi #14 - "Winner Take All" - The wild conclusion of a seriously strange four-part saga where Kamandi becomes a death race jockey on a giant grasshopper "devil" called Klikklak. Basically Kirby's uniquely bizarre take on the old boy meets dog, boy loses dog tradition.
Plop! #1 - Ridiculous, silly, dumb, and I loved it at the time. I mutilated many issues by putting those Basil Wolverton back covers on my wall.
I agree with bt that I have a hard time with the Bronze Age cut-off. The 80s stuff with Alan Moore etc really does feel like a distinctly different era.
I would probably define my Bronze Age as running from either the Marvel expansion in 1968 or Kirby's Marvel departure in 1970 to around the death of Dark Phoenix in 1980.
Regarding the GL/GA run, I can honestly that to me they've always felt a bit over-rated.
I don't remember even looking at them when they came out, but as I started seriously collecting in 72/73 I would always see references to how good they had been.
When Vancouver's Comicshop opened a year or two after that it was one of the fabled titles that I was eager to try, along with the Kree/Skrull War issues and the Fourth World books. Those ones lived up to the hype, and I hunted down every last back issue. GL/GA I bought a few issues but quickly lost interest. I certainly liked the Adams art, but the stories seemed too preachy or something, trying too hard to have a social cause in every issue, etc, and neither of the lead characters really appealed to me.
I've gone back since and read the trade paperback that collected the run, I do appreciate it as a unique moment in comics history blah blah blah, but would likely never list it among my favorites.
I could probably fill this with a bunch of Batman stories but I'll spread it around;
DC SPECIAL #29- "The Untold Origin of the Justice Society". My infatuation with the Golden Age heroes was strong. It's weird, today I'm a sucker for nostalgia, and when I was a kid without my own nostalgia I adopted those of another generation.
DETECTIVE COMICS #479- The Clayface story conclusion. He was both frightening and sad.
Plus Rogers & Giordano.
SUPERMAN #249- "The Challenge of Terra-Man". That character fascinated me. Mysterious, confident, a cowboy on a winged horse that just about took out Supes! Bonus, the Bunker's make a cameo!
v mark:
I agree with you about the O’Neil / Adams GREEN LANTERN run. When I finally caught up with them (when DC reprinted the lot of them in a deluxe Baxter series in the 80s), I thought the art was great — seriously GREAT — but the stories were absolutely too preachy for me. I myself am a “Lefty” but I felt sorry for poor old Hal! Issue after issue, he and Ollie argue about some “relevant” issue, with Hal the Space Fuzz representing the Conservative/ Establishment/ Right-wing point of view and Ollie representing the Left / Progressive/ Socialist point of view, and by issue’s end Hal always has to admit that Ollie was right. Not only that, but Ollie is always an absolute dick about it. To say they haven’t aged well is a massive under-statement. Nice art, tho!
And KAMMANDI 14, OMG, yes. “Old Yeller” as a giant mutated grasshopper. That full-page splash with a distraught Kammandi and his fallen pal, with the Lucky Winner parade marching into the scene...man, it gets me choked up just thinking about it. Brilliant stuff.
b.t.
I too feel the same way about the venerable GL/GA run. I recall reading it at the time and, through the eyes of a 10 year old, it was pretty intense. And clearly at that time it was pretty intense for everyone else as well, given the accolades.
As an aside, I was just re-reading Captain America 136 from 1971 and Stan's Soap Box for the month of April is actually imploring people to write letters about the comic stories and stop writing about the social issues. IN particular, he says like they only got two letters for Captain America discussing the merits of the previous issue and everything else was about the Vietnam War, the environment, etc.
Point being that that GA/GL run was smack in the middle of a very tumultuous time in the USA and Europe and... well... times have changed and the books seem very dated now.
But the art is still great!
V Mark- Excellent! Glad you gave "Plop!" Some live. One of the often overlooked gems of the 70's comic scene.
Killraven- good picks! That JSA origin was a fave of mine as well. And regarding Detective 479- yes, another top notch story in a spectacular run of memorable issues. You're quite right, the Giordano inks on Marshall looked terrific.
To all who feel that the O'Neill/Adam's GL/GA perhaps haven't held up so well, count me among you. Obviously great art, and important historically (particularly as a departure for DC), but they just ...well, seem rather leaden...
Post a Comment