Two Questions: Lottery Winner and Best & Worst Dinner!

Martinex1: Okay, Bronze Age fans... here are two rather random questions for you to kick off the weekend!

QUESTION 1: In the States, we just had a rather large lottery drawing.  We know that  back in the Bronze Age we were all dreamers... so what would you have done if you won $1.6 Billion?  (And with that much money you don't have to limit it to one answer).

QUESTION 2:  I can distinctly recall my favorite meals from my childhood.  I can also remember a particularly repugnant dish that my mother whipped up.  What were your favorite dinners?   And conversely what was the worst you recall?

Chew the Fat: Christmas Catalogs!!!!!

 
Redartz:  Greetings and salutations! And before you say anything, I know it's not quite Halloween yet and here we are referencing Christmas. Well, if you remember back to our collective youth, the yearly tradition of Catalog browsing started about this time each year. At our  house, late October meant watching the mail for the arrival of those huge volumes of toyland dreams. Montgomery Wards, Sears, J.C. Penneys; all three were regular residents of our coffee table for the last three months of the year. 

My brother, sister and I would spend hours trading off one catalog for another, poring over pages of books, toys, games, race cars, record players, and just about everything else. The Christmas catalogs were a perfect means to put together that list for Santa, or later on, that want list for parents and relatives. Actually, the ritual of catalog browsing became a greatly-anticipated part of the whole holiday scenario. 

And aside from the obvious attraction of the toys, sometimes the catalogs offered other enticements. I still fondly remember a couple of years when the Sears  catalog was full of Dennis the Menace cartoons; making the Christmas dreaming even more fun...

For those interested, here's a great website for looking over those vintage catalogs. Many years represented, and you can leaf from page to page just like we used to...

 http://www.wishbookweb.com/the-catalogs/








And now, here's some images to prime your memories. Enjoy, and then we can compare our 'want lists'...


 

Follow the Leader: Episode 96: Mount Rushmore of Female Vocalists!



Martinex1: Happy Tuesday!  Another chance to Follow the Leader (or be the leader of today's discussion).  Movies, comics, literature, music, food, culture, and anything Bronze Age are all fair game.  Have at it. 

Short Cuts: A Little Musical Mashup...

Redartz:  Okay, today we have a sort-of 3-in-1 discussion. Let me explain...

The other day I was listening to a playlist on my tablet, a very eclectic one I might add. One song that came up was  "Heartless" by Heart. It suddenly struck me as somewhat amusing that a song with that title would be performed by a group with that particular name; call it ironic, call it oddity, call it a "nudge, nudge, wink, wink" from the artists. Anyway, I got to thinking, what other song titles become amusing when paired with the performer's name? Another one that quickly came to mind was "Who Are You?, by the Who. A busy work day prevented me from coming up with more, and that's where you come in. 

Today, we'll play a little musical wordplay game (hence the triple category discussion above). What song titles can you link to a performer in order to make it ironic, punny, amusing, self-contradictory? And for our exercise, you aren't limited to songs and the specific artists who performed them. You are free to pull any song title and join it to any musical artist. For instance, I submit a one-hit wonder group from 1975,  (known for "Magic"): performing an Alan Parsons hit, gives you Pilot, "Eye in the Sky".  Get it? Granted, not the greatest example; but you can do better. Have at it, crew...
 

Rank and File: The Year's Best Comic Stories, 1982!

Redartz:  Hello gang; are you ready to delve into some of the finest four color offerings of that vintage year 1982? I am too, so let's jump right in. As always, the choices are simply my subjective picks , based upon personal enjoyment, history, and whether I've read it or not. After all, can't really make a call on an unfamiliar book...

Here we go:   

Amazing Spider-man 229-  "Nothing Can Stop the Juggernaut", by Roger Stern, John Romita Jr. and Jim Mooney. One of the high points of Stern's admirable run on the title. A showpiece for Peter Parker's determination and self-sacrifice.













Dr. Strange 53-  "The Land of the Pharoahs" by Roger Stern, Marshall Rogers and Terry Austin. A very clever, entertaining climax to the all-too-brief run by the Stern/Rogers team. The intertwining with the classic Lee/Kirby Fantastic Four tale is most engaging. And Doc never looked better.












 

X-Men / Teen Titans-  "Apokolips...Now", by Chris Claremont, Walt Simonson and Terry Austin. Arguably the greatest inter-company crossover ever. Claremont voices both teams, and both mega villains, perfectly. And Simonson  inked by Austin? Spectacular.












Marvel Graphic Novel:  The Death of Captain Marvel- "The Death of Captain Marvel", by Jim Starlin. A poignant tale of loss and nobility, with many fine moments among the gathered individuals. Starlin gives Mar-vell a sendoff worthy of a warrior. And Starlin's writing and drawing carry it off in fine fashion.















Legion of Superheroes 293-  "Within the Darkness", by Paul Levitz, Keith Giffen and Larry Mahlstaedt.  Darkseid is revealed as the power behind the "Great Darkness", one of the Legion's greatest sagas ever. This spectacular tale reveals why the Levitz/Giffen/Mahlstaedt Legion was my favorite DC title back then, even more than the Titans.














Love and Rockets 1-  Numerous stories by Gilbert and Jaime Hernandez. Fantagraphics' long running series starts here, and with great artistic and literary form. Great, great reading.













 

Fantastic Four 243-  "Shall Earth Endure?", by John Byrne. Everyone vs. Galactus, indeed. One of Byrne's best FF stories, art and story definitely at the top of his game. Loved seeing Spidey and Daredevil sit back and watch.
















 

Ms. Tree's Thrilling Detective Adventures-  Several stories by Max Allan Collins and Terry Beatty. Terrific old-school detective fare with great characterization. Beatty's art at times makes me think of Ditko, and that's a high compliment.












 



Marvel Graphic Novel: God Loves, Man Kills-  "God Loves, Man Kills", by Chris Claremont and Brent Anderson. A melodramatic, but affecting, tale of prejudice with Marvel's Mutants. Nice to see Brent Anderson's take on them.











 


Fantastic Four Roast-  "When Titans Chuckle", by Fred Hembeck, Jim Shooter and just about everybody. Enough puns and visual jokes to fill a dining hall full of heroes, which is pretty much what happens. Absolutely, the "Just Plain Fun" book of 1982!














Another Marvel- heavy year, in my opinion. But the indies are really starting to make an impact, and DC still has a lot to offer. The new formats such as miniseries and graphic novels add some serious competition to the monthly newsstand titles. All things considered, it's a great year to be reading comics. Your thoughts and nominations?

Panel Discussion: Floating Heads - the Inside Track!

Martinex1: "Floating Heads" is a favorite artistic trope from the Bronze Age.   Marvel Comics particularly embraced the look on its comic covers with characters' disembodied noggins seemingly viewing the action and even commenting on the core scene.  Historically, when considering this design we have focused on the comic cover, but today let's take a look at some significant examples within the pages of the books. 

From splash pages to general panels, floating heads were utilized more frequently than you may have imagined.   Whether representing spirits, dreams, past loves, narrators, hidden identities, links to the negative zone, or roll calls - this artistic flourish is quite unique to the comic book medium.

Spider-Man sure had his share of examples, as did Captain America.  Captain Marvel and Firestorm embedded the technique into their storytelling of linked characters.  Great artists like Sal Buscema, Mike Zeck,  Pat Broderick, Gil Kane, Jim Starlin, and John Byrne used the style frequently. 

There are more examples than I could possibly find, but I tried to capture a representative cross section. Take a look and feast your eyes...today there is plenty to enjoy!  Cheers!