Most comic book readers have a friend or two like "Miss X". These friends are intelligent, aesthetic people who usually share some interests with the comics readers in question. Yet, for whatever reason, these friends do not read comics themselves. Predictably, the topic of what comics to give these neophytes so that they may be properly "turned on" is a popular one amongst comics fans. (Obviously -- how many copies has Watchmen sold??)
In an effort to get some answers to this longstanding question, I persuaded Miss X to participate in a study with me. I chose a few comics from different eras and genres, grouped them into categories, and, once Miss X had read the comics, sat down with her over tea and cookies to discuss which among them had struck her comics-free fancy.
(AUTHOR'S NOTE: I made no attempt to pick groups of comics that were wholly representative of their respective "categories" -- just comics I like and would consider showing someone who didn't already read comics. Hence, no Neal Adams or Spider-Man in this Silver Age survey, et cetera.)
"The Pact" in New Gods #7, by Jack Kirby. DC.
THE CONVENTIONAL WISDOM
Probably the best of Kirby's post-Marvel work, the King's fans are split on whether his work on New Gods is better than the classic runs on Fantastic four, et cetera, with Stan Lee. It's agreed that this work has more raw power, more searing emotion, more flash and dazzle, more of what makes Kirby Kirby. But many also believe that the lack of Lee's more understated contributions to the Marvel stories Kirby did makes these books seem hollow in comparison.
MY TAKE
Damn the torpedoes, give us all the Kirby we can handle! It's true that this isn't as slick or polished as the Marvel stuff, but I don't read Kirby for anything even resembling polish. All the massive, epic storytelling, the big ideas, the near-abstract pop art, the Shakespeareanly overboiled characterization, is here in more abundance than anywhere else. Work like this is what made Kirby unique. This is as pure a dose of his soul-pounding vision as anyone could be expected to handle, like opening your brain to the brilliance of a feverishly blazing sun.
MISS X'S TAKE:
MS: So, what did you think of "The Pact"?
MISS X: I am not a big fan of the art. It's blocky, difficult to tell what you're looking at at times. There are a lot of colors, there are a lot of shapes, it can just be too much. And... the storytelling isn't very good. There are a whole lot of concepts that aren't being executed that well and the writing is really hard for a non-comics reader to understand.
MS: Ha. But conceptually?
MISS X: I think the story has definite merit and it's interestingly conceived, but it's not well done. He has a better idea than he's able to execute here.
"Adam Strange: Menace of the Aqua-Ray Weapon" in Mystery In Space #69, by Gardner Fox, Carmine Infantino, and Murphy Anderson. DC.
THE CONVENTIONAL WISDOM
Adam Strange is one of DC's classic "second-rate" Silver Age books -- the ones acknowledged to have just as much aesthetic merit as any of the company's big books from that era, but not as fondly remembered due to a lack of commercial success. Perhaps the most elegant and lyrical comic of the Silver Age, it was a showcase for career-best art from Carmine Infantino, as well as intelligent if formulaic plots from Gardner Fox. This short story is one of the more obscure Adam Strange tales, revealing as it does that the Rannian people Strange so zealously offends once participated in genocide. Oops.
MY TAKE
If you wanted to explain DC in the Silver Age to someone, this would be as good a story as a any to show them. Plotting that stays just this side of ridiculous, a very "early '60s" moral simplicity, plenty of spaceman camp, and Infantino art worthy of museum display. "Menace of the Aqua-Ray Weapon" has almost a Winsor McCay vibe, the action unfolding in a giant cavern made of ice crystals with a villainous race that look more like mischievous imps than fierce conquerors challenging our hero for supremacy. Infantino fully embraces Art Nouveau here, with decorative ice patterns framing every panel and water and steam effects taking the shape of fanciful curlicues. A delectable, sugary treat that bears almost no resemblance to reality but is as absorbing as life nonetheless. The addition of Rann's shadowy, genocidal history only deepens the story's power.
MISS X'S TAKE:
MS: Adam Strange; what were your thoughts?
MISS X:I loved the art -- it's clear what's going on, the storytelling is good in that you know where your eye is supposed to move on the page and it's easy to understand what's going on in each panel. There's a connectedness throughout.
MS: And the plot?
MISS X: I didn't think the plot was that memorable, but it was well done. Really well executed, even though the concept wasn't that strong.
MS: So like the opposite of the Kirby?
MISS X: Uh huh.
MS: A lot of people say they find DC Silver Age stories really staid and stuffy, what do you think of that?
MISS X: Yeah, there's a spontaneity in the Kirby that's almost like outsider art... it's like the difference between a Rembrandt painting to a Rousseau painting, there's a lot more immediacy, there's more spontaneity, there's something more people can connect with maybe in a Rousseau or a Kirby, but it's not as technically good or as well-concieved as something like this. I feel like this might be a more mediocre story, but the way that it's executed it easier to understand and as somebody who's not a big comics reader it's a lot more fun.
MS: Like the Infantino art?
MISS X: Mm-hm!
"The Return of the Question" in Mysterious Suspense #1, by Steve Ditko. Charlton.
THE CONVENTIONAL WISDOM
Ditko's big step away from Marvel and Stan Lee's antiheroes, this is also a coming-out party of sorts for his Objectivist philosophies, and the beginning of the forty years he has spent exploring them in his comics. It might not be as entertaining as his run on Spider-Man, but this work is much more forceful and assured; Ditko is finally in complete control of what he's doing in his his comic, both formally and rhetorically. Incredibly influential, this comic paved the way for a million grim, driven heroes after it, from the Punisher to Watchmen's Rorschach to Ditko's own, even more extreme Mr. A.
MY TAKE
Effectively Ditko's last influential mainstream work, this comic is the pinnacle of everything he was trying to say about morals and heroism, everything he was using the comics medium for. It's worth reading only for the outrageous rebuttal of everything Ditko thought was wrong with Stan Lee's Spider-Man scripting, but the real meat here is how much Ditko transcends his more famous Marvel work on a story he can put his heart as well as his drawing hand into. The art is buttoned-down and tightly wound; free of very many decorative elements or lineweights(perhaps because of Charlton's notoriously shoddy printing), it assumes a masterful minimalism that almost resembles woodcuts, serving the story better than any art Ditko did before or since. And what a story! This is perhaps the best-written mainstream comic of the Silver Age, Ditko's terse scripting communicating a desperate urgency as it spins the tale of a man fighting the entire world, determined to win and refusing to compromise in the slightest. A perfect mixture between primitivism and virtuosity, this story holds up better today than almost any other comic of its time.
MISS X'S TAKE
MS: Steve Ditko's Question.
MISS X: It was one of my favorites. I like the kind of kitsch factor it had. Everything was really clear, everything just serviced the story well. I didn't think the art was gorgeous but it worked for this comic. The story was concise, well-considered, and very well executed.
MS: What did you think of the political/moral content?
MISS X: Um, I didn't give much thought to it, it was very much from a different era and I wasn't as interested in that part of it. What I did like was that it had a clear message, it stuck to that message, and everything seemed well put together.
MS: Did you like the Question as a character?
MISS X: Not really, I don't think he's a compelling character. He was well written.
MS: His moral standpoint didn't bother you?
MISS X: No.
MS: The "kitsch factor" you mentioned -- is there more of that in something like this for you than there is in something like Adam Strange?
MISS X: It's different. This was more like a "Twilight Zone" episode, with that kind of "Rebel Without A Cause" writing, whereas something like the Infantino has more of a '60s space age age appeal. This had more of a '50s kitsch, the other one had more of a '60s kitsch to me.
"The Galactus Saga" in Fantastic Four #48-50, by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby. Marvel.
THE CONVENTIONAL WISDOM
The peak of Marvel in the '60s as well as the Lee/Kirby partnership, this is the perfect marriage of Marvel's cosmic and human sides, an epic in which the compassion in humanity finds a way to triumph over the disdain of a god. Usually referred to as the peak of Kirby's artistic career at Marvel, and often as the best thing Stan Lee wrote for the company as well.
MY TAKE
The "Sgt. Pepper" of comics, "The Galactus Saga" does everything right, encompassing all that's appealing about Lee and Kirby in equal measure. The Kirby/Joe Sinnott team would go on to gel better together, but never again to create such purely iconic pages. Kirby, often said to be the "cosmic" side of Marvel while his writing
partner took care of the "human" half of things, beats Lee at his own game here with the creation of the Silver Surfer, an unfeeling alien whose sudden discovery of emotion forms the emotional core of the story. A watershed moment in superhero comics that deserves every sentence of praise it's gotten.
MISS X'S TAKE
MS: Let's talk about "The Galactus Saga".
MISS X: I liked it. It's really well done. I liked the Kirby art a lot better in this comic -- it was clearer, serviced the story better... fewer colors, more streamlined figures. It worked, there was more of a flow between the panels. I liked the development of the Silver Surfer's character. It was just well done.
MS: A lot of people think that in Kirby's Marvel work there was more of a humanistic side to relate to.
MISS X: Yeah, I agree. What bothered me about the Fourth World was the absence of a human side an the overabundance of craziness that I find hard to figure out.
MS: What did you think of the FF as characters?
MISS X: I really didn't like Ben (The Thing), I thought he was gross. The Richards couple were OK, and the kid (Human Torch) didn't have any personality. I mean none of them had very much personality, it just seemed like they were there to service the story. Ben had the most personality and he was just yucky.
"The Girl in the Golden Flower" in Strange Adventures #18, by Robert Starr, Alex Toth, and Sy Barry. DC.
THE CONVENTIONAL WISDOM
I don't know if there is any. I've never seen any criticism on this story, it just kind of pops up as the clear stunner in the "DC Pulp Fiction Library: Mystery In Space" collection from about a decade ago.
MY TAKE
Stories like this are as good a reason to read comics as any other -- tiny works of genius that appear in the most unexpected places. This little pearl is a Ray Bradbury-flavored six-pager about Brad Mulford, a lonesome astronomer who discovers an unusual flower in the window box of his remote home one morning and resolves to care for the strange beauty. As he does so, his dreams become an odd storyline that simply continues whenever he goes to sleep, concerning his romance with a beautiful inhabitant of an alien planet.
Toth's art is incredible. Wide-open and color-drenched, it has all the strikingly minimalist quality of his more famous later work, but here the artist's famous inkiness gives way to a pastoral high focus which wears a Bernard Krigstein influence very much on its sleeve. His articulation of the disconnect between Mulford's slick, Eisenhower-era home environment and the serene, achingly sparse beauty of his dream-world imbues the story with lilting, wistful strains of emotion that seem to drift on the air currents, affecting to the reader without your knowing quite why.
The story is remarkably delicate in its spare construction: only two characters, one of whom exists solely in dreams, share its stage, and Toth's graceful figurework links them far more effectively than thought balloons declaring love could do. The understated script edges in on the artwork only when necessary, as when Mulford realizes the flower in his window box is telepathically communicating its physical needs to him by invading his dreams in the guise of his beloved one ("Flora"), and when, inevitably, the flower dies, leaving Mulford alone in his dreams forever. The waking-life segments of the story never leave Mulford's little cottage (beautifully designed in Danish-modern style by Toth), turning it into a prison in which he waits to fall asleep again. Even the device of telling the entire story in round-cornered flashback panels adds to the nostalgic, sensitive aura that perfumes its pages.
Rather than explain the story's happenings with DC scifi's usual textbooky bluster, Starr reaches out for a much more beautiful reason for what is going on -- Swedish scientist Svante Arrhenius' theory that "seeds of life" roam our universe, looking for habitable planets to grow on. It's a charmingly antiquated idea that almost has the ring of magic about it, taking Mulford's dreams out of the cold, spacey realm that Adam Strange and his ilk inhabit, and into a more hermetic, alchemical place, one where magical-realist miracles seem entirely possible. It also takes the story itself to that same place, removing it from the legion of zany '50s scifi comics and placing it in the rarefied atmosphere of EC's Bradbury adaptations, or the better-drawn issues of Classics Illustrated. That is, in the pantheon of early, truly literary comic books.
There is no real conflict here, no soul-shattering declamations -- nothing, in fact, but beautiful art and emotion, a comic that would be surprisingly mature even today, but stands head and shoulders above its contemporaries in terms of using the medium to create literary value. The personification of a man's sexual desires -- yearning, really -- in a flower, is first-class stuff, a perfectly elegant way to get around the expected romance fare of the time. It's infinitely touching to watch Mulford care for his flower as though his life depends on it, to watch his heart break whenever it sheds a petal. A little gem out of a clear blue sky, "The Girl in the Golden Flower" is just about as good as it gets.
(It has a cop-out ending, of course, in which Mulford meets a real girl just like the one from his dreams, but it take up all of two panels, disrupting the story's emotional reality not a whit.)
MISS X'S TAKE:
MS: What did you think of "The Girl in the Golden Flower"?
MISS X: I thought it was creepy; I thought it was weird that he was in love with a flower. I also wasn't quite sure what the story wanted you to believe -- at the end the flower dies but then the girl comes back, it was very confusing and it wasn't clear what the continuity was supposed to have been with that. And it was awfully convenient that he'd heard about the possibility of spores from space landing on other planets.The way he was interpreting that bit of information and deciding that this weird flower had to be an alien flower -- just because there's a flower that you've never seen growing in your garden, you usually wouldn't assume it was an alien spore. And -- were his dreams real, were they not, it was just kind of strange. And I didn't think he was a likable character.
MS: What'd you think of the art?
MISS X: It was decent. I thought it was definitely working for the story but I didn't think either the art or the story was anything special.
"My Heart Broke In Hollywood" in Our Love Story #5, by Stan Lee and Jim Steranko. Marvel.
THE CONVENTIONAL WISDOM
Steranko's final Marvel story, this exploration in psychedelic, poster-art aesthetics is a bold experiment in storytelling and graphic design, but an unoriginal script hampers it from going where it could have.
MY TAKE
Despite the now-dated novelty look of Steranko's Peter Max-ish graphics, it's still the work of a master at the top of his game. Beyond the static figures there are beautifully-designed pages, a fauvist use of color, an approach to spotting blacks that is both innovative and breathtaking to look at, and the extension of Steranko's attempts to solve such problems as animation of figures and creating dramatic impact with layouts. This is a Steranko who has worked entirely free of the Jack Kirby influence that powers much of his earlier work, an artist creating a new kind of comic entirely, unlike anything else that came before it. As such, it's doubly sad that this story is hampered with one of Stan Lee's worst-ever scripting jobs, with every line a clunker and every plot development a cliche. No wonder Steranko left comics shortly afterward, only to make the briefest and most sporadic of returns from then on. This story, at least in the pictures, remains, however -- a look into what might have been, and a testament to the utter genius of one of comics' less-praised virtuosos.
MISS X'S TAKE
MS: Finally, we've got Jim Steranko's "My Heart Broke In Hollywood."
MISS X: Uh, really creepy, really sterotypical. Kind of all style over substance, I guess. It felt like "Valley of the Dolls" or something.
MS: What'd you think of the art?
MISS X: Mm, really psychedelic, like '60s ad art. Which is a cool aesthetic, but this wasn't like great art for me. And I don't think it works well to tell a story -- it's very static. There's almost no human movement, the panels where the characters are moving look really awkward. He draws like he's just studied mannequins. And the story was vapid, misogynistic, and rather insulting.
MISS X'S RANKINGS (best to worst):
1. "The Galactus Saga"
2. "The Return of the Question"
3. "Adam Strange: Menace of the Aqua-Ray Weapon"
4. "The Pact"
5. "The Girl in the Golden Flower"
6. "My Heart Broke In Hollywood"
Next: the Golden Age!
1 comment:
Very interesting look at an outsider's perspective. Good idea. :)
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