The first issue of Marvel Spotlight featured Red Wolf, a 19th Century Native American hero. This month a modern day character is introduced, a werewolf called Jack Russell. This is Marvel's first experimentation with the horror genre outside of anthology stories. For the next few years Jack Russell will only appear in solo stories and as a guest in other horror comics. After that he will slowly become integrated into the wider Marvel Universe.
Marvel Spotlight #2
Title: Werewolf by Night
Writer: Roy Thomas, Gerry Conway
Artist: Michael Ploog
Regulars: Lissa Russell
Roy Thomas plotted this first 27-page story, but it was written by Gerry Conway. That's a good match. I don't like Gerry Conway's writing in general, but he's an expert when it comes to writing horror stories.
It's Michael Ploog's first comic for Marvel. During his career at Marvel he was primarily responsible for drawing their horror comics.
The story covers Jack Russell's first three days as a werewolf. He's usually referred to as "Werewolf By Night", the title of his first story and his solo comic which starts later this year. I prefer to call him the Werewolf.
Jack Russell lives in Los Angeles with his mother, his step-father and his younger sister Lissa. He has inherited a curse from his father. On his 18th birthday he becomes a werewolf, and the change takes place for three nights every month. It's a lucky (?) coincidence that his 18th birthday falls on a full moon. He kills a mugger, and he barely resists killing a policeman.
His mother dies in a car crash caused by her husband's chauffeur. He takes revenge by killing him.
There's a difference between the Hulk and the Werewolf. When Bruce Banner becomes the Hulk he has hardly any memory of what he did as Bruce Banner, and vice versa. The Hulk only knows that Bruce Banner is someone he hates.
The Werewolf has full memories of his life as Jack Russell, and vice versa. However, the Werewolf thinks of himself as a different person who shares Jack's body. For instance, when he thinks about avenging his mother he calls her "the woman", not "my mother".
Amazing Spider-Man #105
Title: The Spider Slayer!
Writer: Stan Lee
Artist: Gil Kane
Villain: Professor Smythe
Regulars: J. Jonah Jameson, Joe Robertson, Randy Robertson, Aunt May, Gwen Stacy, Harry Osborn, Norman Osborn, Mary Jane Watson, Flash Thompson
Stan Lee is back, after taking a break from writing for four months! Let's sing and dance in the streets! Even the Crazy Credits commemorate his return, adding sly insults to the comic's other creators:
Stan Lee – We told you he'd be back!
Gil Kane – He never even left!
Frank Giacoia – We can't get rid of him!
Artie Simek – He's really gone!
I hope Artie Simek isn't gone. Without his inspired lettering we can't enjoy the comics.
Flash Thompson has returned home from Vietnam after being on duty since Amazing Spider-Man #47, almost four years ago. Harry Osborn also returns home after being in rehab since Amazing Spider-Man #98.
After failing twice before, in Amazing Spider-Man #25 and Amazing Spider-Man #58, Professor Smythe builds yet another robot to help J. Jonah Jameson capture Spider-Man. This time he uses the Spider-Slayer as a cover to steal a powerful computer element (whatever that might be).
After the theft Professor Smythe continues to observe Spider-Man with rooftop cameras he's placed around the city. He sees him unmask!
Avengers #96
Title: The Andromeda Swarm!
Writer: Roy Thomas
Artist: Neal Adams
Avengers: Captain America, Thor, Iron Man, Vision, Goliath, Quicksilver, Scarlet Witch
Villain: Supreme Intelligence, Ronan, Kree, Skrulls, Annihilus
Guests: Captain Marvel, Rick Jones, Nick Fury
Nick Fury gives the Avengers a spaceship capable of reaching the Skrull galaxy. They should have asked Reed Richards instead; he would have given them a ship capable of making the journey in a fraction of the time.
On the way they encounter a fleet of Skrull ships heading towards Earth. They're relatively successful and destroy a few of them.
The Skrull commander changes his mind about conquering Earth and decides to destroy it. He sends a small craft carrying a nuclear weapon capable of destroying the Earth. Goliath pursues the craft in his spaceship while the other Avengers are on the Skrull commander's vessel.
On the Skrull homeworld, Captain Marvel escapes from the Skrulls who have captured him. But where can he go?
On the Kree homeworld, Rick Jones talks to the Supreme Intelligence. Rick Jones is sent back into the Negative Zone, where Annihilus is waiting.
This issue contains excellent artwork by Neal Adams, and it's a fantastic story.
Captain America and the Falcon #146
Title(s): Mission: Destroy the Femme Force!
Holocaust in the Hally of Hydra!
Writer: Gary Friedrich
Artist: Sal Buscema
Villain: Hydra, Kingpin
Regulars: Sharon Carter, Countess Valentina, Nick Fury, Dum Dum Dugan
This is a single story split into two parts that have been given individual titles.
Sharon Carter is badly wounded, so Countess Valentina takes over the leadership of the Femme Force until she recovers. She also wants to take over as Captain America's girlfriend.
She says she wants Steve Rogers to relax? She's having the opposite effect on him. He's getting nervous, his hands are shaking, and he doesn't know where to look.
Hydra kidnaps Sharon Carter from the hospital. Captain America goes to rescue her. He wants to go alone, but Countess Valentina follows him with the Femme Force. The Supreme Hydra is taking orders from an unseen person. I'll give it away: it's the Kingpin, who we last saw in Amazing Spider-Man #85.
Sub-Mariner #46
Title: Even the noble die!
Writer: Gerry Conway
Artist: Gene Colan
Villain: Llyra, Tiger Shark
Regulars: Diane Arliss, Leonard Mackenzie
Guests: Human Torch
Namor battles Tiger Shark in Llyra's ship, and Tiger Shark has a slight advantage. They leave the ship, and Namor wins easily, because Tiger Shark's underwater powers are fading. A blast is fired by the ship, knocking both opponents unconscious, and they're pulled aboard.
They're put into a machime to transfer Namor's strength into Tiger Shark. Walt Newell puts on his Sting-Ray costume, which he hasn't used since Sub-Mariner #19, and comes to aid Namor. He's not a very good fighter, but at least it's a distraction. Llyra attempts to use a gun against Namor, but Leonard Mackenzie, who now recognises Namor as his son, stops her. Tiger Shark kills him. Namor lets Tiger Shark and Llyra leave while he grieves over his father.
Fantastic Four #119
Title: Three stood together!
Writer: Roy Thomas
Artist: John Buscema
Fantastic Four: Reed Richards, Susan Richards, Ben Grimm, Johnny Storm
Villain: Klaw
Guests: Black Leopard (Black Panther)
Roy Thomas starts the comic with a bang. The Thing and the Human Torch are arguing, smashing up the building around them.
Reed Richards has invented a cleaning robot. He calls it Auntie: AUtomatic Neuro-robot in charge of Tidying-up with Increased Efficiency. Wow! I don't know why he's always complaining about being poor. If he sold Auntie he'd make millions.
The Fantastic Four receive a distress call from Wakanda. Thieves have stolen a powerful weapon called a Vibrotron (TM). It weaponises Vibranium. King T'Challa pursued them into the neighbouring kingdom Rudyarda, but now he's disappeared.
Ben Grimm and Johnny Storm have made up, so they fly to Rudyarda to investigate. They find King T'Challa in prison for walking the street without identification papers as a black man. Yes, Rudyarda is that sort of country. They break him out of prison.
T'Challa doesn't call himself the Black Panther any more, he's the Black Leopard. Somehow his new name doesn't have the same ring to it.
The three heroes find that the Vibrotron thieves were working for Klaw, who we last saw in Avengers #83.
After saving Rudyarda from Klaw's threat, the heroes are asked to leave through different doors.
Ben Grimm shows the Rudyardian officials what he thinks of their doors.
The Incredible Hulk #148
Title: But tomorrow the Sun shall die!
Writer: Archie Goodwin
Artist: Herb Trimpe
Villain: Fialan
Regulars: General Ross, Major Talbot, Betty Ross, Jarella
Guests: Nick Fury, Dum Dum Dugan
There's some weird science going on in this comic. I'll just tell you what happens, and I'll leave it up to you to decide if it makes sense.
Pierre Corbeau is a scientist who's found a way to cure Bruce Banner of being the Hulk. An orbiting satellite gathers solar energy, which is directed at the Hulk. This turns the Hulk back into Bruce Banner permanently.
At the same time, Jarella, who we last saw in Incredible Hulk #140, is being challenged by a rebellion. She travels to the surface world to search for the Hulk. An assassin called Fialan follows her.
Sun flares begin, which threaten to destroy the Earth within a few days. Dr. Corbeau says the sun flares are being caused by two things: the usage of the solar energy to cure the Hulk, and an unidentified rip in reality.
The sun flares can only be stopped if Bruce Banner becomes the Hulk again and Jarella returns to her subatomic world. Bruce Banner runs into the solar chamber to change back into the Hulk and defeat Fialan. Jarella gets into a special craft built by SHIELD to return home.
And the sun flares stop.
Thor #196
Title: Within the Realm of Kartag!
Writer: Gerry Conway
Artist: John Buscema
Villain: Mangog, Satrina, Kartag, Hela
Regulars: Odin, Sif, Fandral, Hogun, Volstagg, Hildegarde
Thor and the Warriors Three are on a quest to retrieve a secret from the Twilight Well, guarded by Kartag the Keeper. They're given hospitality by a woman called Satrina. She's a witch who serves Kartag. She uses illusions to stop them continuing with their quest. Thor is the only one who sees through the illusions, and he fights the monsters that surround them. They continue to the Well, and Thor goes to challenge Kartag alone.
Sif and Hildegarde fight and defeat warriors, but they still don't know what their mission is.
There are heavy casualties in Mangog's attack on Asgard. Odin casts a spell that is intended as a last resort:
"This day, by my power, by my glory, the sacred world doth forever pass away".
Daredevil #84
Title: Night of the Assassin!
Writer: Gerry Conway
Artist: Gene Colan
Villain: Mr. Kline
Regulars: Foggy Nelson, Black Widow, Ivan
The Black Widow has gone to Switzerland to get away from the persecution she feels in America. Mr. Kline approaches her, pretending to be a Russian surgeon who's discovered a cure for blindness. She rings up Matt Murdock and asks him to come to Switzerland.
When he meets the supposed surgeon, Matt recognises immediately that he doesn't have a heartbeat, so he follows him to spy on him. He sees him communicating with his boss, Baal, who is the only living being on Earth 12,000 years in the future. Baal has sent Mr. Kline to change the past so that the catastrophe that will wipe out the human race will never happen. To do this Daredevil must be killed.
It actually sounds justified, doesn't it? Killing one man to save the whole human race. The trouble is, it just doesn't make sense. Why go back so far in time? If Baal is to be left alone on Earth 12,000 years from now, why not go back 100 years or even less to make the changes? Going back 12,000 years leaves so many variables open. How does Baal know that somebody else won't do the awful thing that Daredevil would have done? It's all so silly.
Daredevil sees that the Scorpion and Mister Hyde were really androids, not the real villains. Why does Stan Lee (if it really is Stan who wrote it) say that it was in issues #84 and #85? Issue #84 is the current issue, and issue #85 hasn't been released yet! He means Daredevil #82 (the Scorpion) and Daredevil #83 (Mister Hyde).
It's claimed that Mr. Kline used the Owl in issues #81 and #82. Wrong again. It was Daredevil #80 and #81. I often wonder about the comment boxes signed by the editor. I'm sure that it's usually the writer who makes the comments. If that's true, it means that Gerry Conway can't even keep track of his own stories.
At the last moment the two beings arrive that we saw briefly in Sub-Mariner #42. It's said they come from a time more distant than Mr. Kline's, 30 centuries in the future. Wait a minute! That's only 3,000 years, so it's before the time of Baal. The only explanation I can offer is that Gerry Conway blundered, and he means 30 millennia. But even then it doesn't explain how men could exist on Earth after Baal was the last man on Earth.
This is an awful story. It looks like Gerry Conway was attempting to create something epic, linking all the comics he wrote, but it's a mess. He was given too much freedom. Somebody should have been looking over his shoulder to prevent such a catastrophe from happening. The editor, the proofreaders, the artists... somebody somewhere should have stopped this inexperienced teenager before it got this far.
Astonishing Tales #10
Title: To end in flame!
Writer: Roy Thomas, Gerry Conway
Artist: Barry Smith
Villain: Nazis
After last issue's fill-in story, this is finally the conclusion of the story that began four months ago in Astonishing Tales #8.
On the outskirts of the Savage Land there are English and German soldiers who have been fighting the Second World War for the last 30 years. Ka-Zar discovers that the older soldiers on both sides know that the war is over, and they secretly meet to discuss strategy. They think their young people, the ones born in the Savage Land, will only be happy if they're fighting. That's an interesting idea, but totally infeasible.
Ka-Zar reveals the truth to the young people. Zabu pushes the elders into a volcano. Now there can be peace.
Other comics published this month:
Our Love Story #15 (Gary Friedrich, Sal Buscema)
Rawhide Kid #96 (Gary Friedrich, Dick Ayers)
Monsters on the Prowl #15 (Steve Englehart, Syd Shores)
The short story written by Steve Englehart in Monsters on the Prowl is the first story for which he received writing credits. He claims to have written other stories in the romance comics and Sgt. Fury and his Howling Commandos, for which he wasn't credited.
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