Smallville Mailsack ( October 1970, Superboy vol1 #169)
No. 164 was a sheer delight, but I want to comment on when the Superboy stories take place. Correspondent GK seems to think it’s the ‘30s. But that’s ridiculous. Even if it was 1939, Superman would be 40 years old because I read in an earlier ish that Superboy is 15 years old. I’d bet the stories take place around 1955 or 1960.
Editor Boltinoff responds:
“Correspondent LG from Honolulu… echoes the sentiments of correspondents GH of Louisville Ky, LF of St Petersburg Beach Fl, PH of Toledo Oh, and ER of Unionville Ct, who figures Superman to be 47 and urges us to advance Superboy into the era of 1950-52 or he‘ll hold his breath until he turns green like Kryptonite. You can exhale now, ER, and breathe easier because we‘re moving into that era right now, as you‘ll note in… the very next issue.”
update 190124: So I am responsible for changing DC’s editorial policy and for correcting a major continuity glitch, effective “the very next issue!”
When I showed this issue of Superboy off to my friends (and thug older brother) many couldn’t help but point out that the editorial response included the phrase “echoes the sentiments.” They insisted therefore that this meant that I had copied my comments from previously published letters. Certainly not, I replied. “Echoes the sentiments” alludes to the fact that numerous other fans were also picking up on the problems being created by Superboy’s lagging timeline, and that my letter was simply the best stated or most representative, and therefore the one they selected for publication.
Portrait of More to Come? ( September 1978, 1984 #3 )
setup 190131: King of the over-sized black and white horror fantasy anthology niche, Warren Publishing dipped its corporate toe into the burgeoning science fiction market with 1984. Styling his book “adult sci fi,“ editor Bill duBay generally presented scatology, gore, adolescent sex fantasies, and also some ripping good yarns and great art amid the inevitable dross, not all descriptions being necessarily exclusive.
Upon my receipt of the first issue, I opine scholarly…
Based on my vast experience with comics (or funnies if you wish), I predict that 1984 will serve up some excellent inspired material for the first few issues. An abbreviated period of literary and artistic stagnation will follow. If we’re lucky, there will be a feeble rally. But eventually, the magazine will succumb to sagging sales. We’ll see an early death and a reclassification to comic book legendry. And a few years from now we’ll all be saying, “Remember ‘78 when ‘84 was being published? Man, those were the days!”
Puh-leeeeeeeeeese! Prove me wrong!
update 190131: Neither Jim Warren nor his considerable fan base proved me wrong. I don’t get a great deal of satisfaction out of being right so often. I see the same patterns being repeated in comics, culture, and politics, and while there is a certain arch comfort to it all, it also makes me a little sad. Anyway, as I expected, 1984 (renamed 1994 as the eponymous year approached) managed to offer up some especially choice covers by Patrick Woodruffe, and several nice stories by the likes of Alex Nino, Richard Corben, and Wally Wood, among other luminaries, even as it presented an otherwise warm and steaming pile of gratuitous drivel.
Got Him By the Short and Curly ( February 1984, The SPiRiT #3 )
setup 190131: By the time that Will EiSNER had concluded his weekly involvement with new SPiRiT adventures, Denny Colt and company had already been reprinted in a variety of books, and would continue to be haphazardly re-presented until Kitchen Sink would launch its assiduously contiguous series in 1982. Theretofore, tracking the internal continuity of the adventures in and around Central City was usually challenging and often frustrating, but richly rewarding!
As attractive a package as the new SPiRiT comic is, it still leaves me dissatisfied. Originally, the Spirit appeared at the rate of once a week, or a page a day. The new bi-monthly effects a rate of .46 pages per day. This will just not do,
I confess, as dissatisfied as I might be, you’ve still got me by the short and curly. I’ve loved the Spirit since I saw Warren’s first edition. Before then I had been an avid comic book fan and had reconciled myself to my mother’s friendly ridicule. Finally, when I brought home that first Spirit she did an about face. “The Spirit!” she exclaimed. “Now that’s good! Much better than the crap you usually read. I thought he was gone for good.” Apparently she had grown up with Denny Colt and still had fond memories. Thanks, Mr Eisner, for finally shutting her up.
Keep turning a profit and keep printing The SPiRiT. We are few, granted, but we are weak, and will buy The SPiRiT in damn near any format.
update 190130: I guess I’d forgotten that my actual first exposure to the SPiRiT was in the pages of Jim Steranko’s excellent History of Comics, predating his Warren debut by a few years.
Go get yourself a copy after you’ve bought all of my stuff!
submitted but not printed ( April 1984, in re World’s Finest #304 )
World’s Finest 176, June 1968: A mediocre cover which served mainly to showcase the protagonists thereunder. A new seventeen-page story illustrated by that new Neal Adams fellow who’d lately been generating shockwaves through fandom with his treatment of the Spectre and Deadman and churning out a veritable flood of covers for the Superman line. So THIS is the much heralded “New Superman.” WF 176, just the second installment of a long and happy relationship? (*sigh*) Backing it up, a reprinting of six forgettable pages featuring the Martian Manhunter.
World’s Finest 304, April 1984: A cover stunning in its simple brutality, though just a little misleading. Supes gets no black eye inside, but Ed Hannigan‘s and Klaus Janssen‘s graphic license grabbed me by the throat and hasn’t let go yet. Up front: a cleaner, crisper reprinting (that new “mando” paper stock sure helps!) of the aforementioned seventeen pages, with corrected colors, no less! (And two new mistakes, also, but… ) Finishing the already satisfying package: a delightfully memorable five-page vignette which is more an exposition of the world’s fastest friendship than a story proper. It was a gentle, sensitive interlude. Even the “obligatory action” served mainly to display the distinct personalities of Kal and Bruce, as well as providing a soupcon of comic relief. Well done.
World’s Finest 176 and 304: Interesting bit of symmetry there.
“If I Wanted Cute” ( July 1984, DC Comics Presents #71 )
setup 190130: During its run through the Eighties, DCCP was a team-up book featuring Superman and a super guest star of the month. One December in 1983 I noticed the current issue had a more seasonal feature. The book at the time was edited by Julius Schwartz and Nelson Bridwell, though the letters’ column was handled by Bob Rozakis.
When I saw the cover of DCCP #67 I nearly recoiled in revulsion. I mean, Superman and Santa Claus? Really? Who do they think they’re kidding? Thinking it over, I considered that since Santa Claus is not an established character in the DC DisContinuum [or Degenerate Cosmos?], this would be your basic cute Superman Christmas story.
Still, I was disgusted; if I wanted cute, I’d read the A-Team.
Somehow I found the book in my hands and thought something like, “Well, how appropriate. If the Superdude is going to be teamed up with the Claus, what better adversary than The Terrible Toyman?” Perhaps it was only curiosity. After all, this was only a basic Superman story, as I reasoned above. Who did the folks at DC have in mind as the basic Superman artist these days? So I opened the book up to about the middle and…
Blinked! I looked more closely at the clean and simple blocking, the warm, smooth ink-line, and swore softly to myself. Could it be? Could it be? I looked at a few more pages, squinting this way and that, and… I knew. Great Rao, I knew! Just for the final confirmation I turned to the credits and…
Yes!! [Douglas! Clyde!] SWANDERSON!
Have you any idea how long I’ve waited for the ultimate art-team on Superman? I’d just about given up hope. I’d certainly given up Superman. Let me recant here and now. (And blush a little if Swanderson’s been seen prior to DCCP 67.) If Swanderson is back with Superman on a regular basis, then by golly, maybe I am too.
One final problem. Having purchased the [damned] thing, how do I sneak it into the house past my wife? I mean, really, Superman and Santa Claus? I’d never hear the end of it.
update 190130: Parts of this letter were reproduced from memory and re-inclusions are denoted by [bracketed italics]. Mr Rozakis was probably correct to clip the phrase “Degenerate Cosmos.” He, or many readers, might have inferred therefrom that I was some kind of fundy prude making a snide comment about the spandex clad buff bodies that are replete throughout super-heroic fantasy. I remember it so clearly because I knew it was actually a clever reference to plenary theory and quantum mechanics.
During late Pre-Crisis continuity Lethargy Lad was known as “College Boy”, and his and Early Riser’s finances were so tight, between tuition, rent, and groceries for the growing Lethargy League, that the Sacred Comic Book Budget took a serious hit. So serious a hit was it that a couple of rare contributions to special issues or annuals by Curt Swan and Murphy Anderson were actually missed. This is why, when I discovered their work again in late 1983, I thought that it might be their first teaming since their run on Superman and Action Comics had played out ten years earlier.
Since spinning off the young Lethargy League into their individual series, and returning to solo-star status, Lethargy Lad has managed to fill in a few more gaps in the “historical records.” Nevertheless, that comment about sneaking things past Busy Body was only partly a joke. Later she agreed that no one beat Curt and Murph in making Superman look like Superman, and we were both delighted when, just a month later, the Team Supreme returned for a follow-up tale in the pages of DCCP 68.
Corps Values ( September 1984, Green Lantern vol2 #180 )
setup 190128: “September” 1984 was a “Red Letter Month.” I’m no Mad Maple or Irene Vartanoff, so two submissions published in one month was pretty exciting for this eager letterhack. Given publishing schedules, these appeared more likely in June, and were probably written around March, though possibly weeks apart.
First up to Len Wein at the helm of DC’s Green Lantern:
“It was a beautiful kite.”
( * sigh * )
It was a beautiful story.
There is only one Gil Kane, alas, and I for one can’t get enough of his Green Lantern. I know he is not wedded to DC, nor to Green Lantern in particular, but try, try, wheedle-cajole-and-beg at least two GLC shorts out of him per year. As one of the primary creators of the Corps it is only fitting that he continues to help unfold this tapestry. Pursuant to “Final Duties,” high praise is due also to Len Wein for his elegantly understated narrative.
As a continuity fanatic, and as a self-designated unofficial Corps historian, I ask you to agree to the following assertions by not contradicting them, or to correct them by citing a reference to Green Lantern #X, Y, or Z, which may be missing from my library.
Kwo Varrikk is the same Green Lantern who first appeared in GL #11 and was identified only as the Green Lantern of Rojira (also homeworld to Rori Dag, the first Green Lantern.
Rojira, Minos III, Minos IV, Krodarr, Vrygoth, Elysium, and Balgus VI are all in space sector 1177, a number selected to commemorate GL #s 11 and 177, the hallmark issues of Kwo Varrikk’s career.
And now, Len and Gil, about the new Green Lantern of Sector 1177, what’s his story?
Wein responds: While we’d love to accommodate you, LG, we’re not entirely certain we can. Seems to us the Green Lantern of Rojira, while having the same bald head and skin color as Kwo Varrikk, also had his nose in the middle of his forehead above his eyes, which Varrikk decidedly does not. Of course, it would make life a whole lot simpler if Varrikk was indeed the GL of Rojira and we chalked up the nasal discrepancy to artistic license, but we’re not quite ready to take such a giant step by ourselves.
So we throw the floor open to you, dear readers. If anyone out there agrees that Kwo Varrikk is the ring-slinger of space-sector 1177, or disagrees, or has another opinion entirely, write and let us know.
Update 190128: I don’t recall any follow-up from fandom assembled over the issue of Kwo Varrikk’s provenance, but it was never renounced any more convincingly than Editor Wein’s charming shuffle-and-dodge. While I can’t claim it’s exactly canon, IT DID SEE PRINT. Then it was reiterated by Wein himself, albeit as weakly as he’d earlier challenged it. He also neglects “The First Green Lantern” from GL 67 which clearly depicts a Rojiran with Kwo Varrikk’s approximate physiognomy and coloration. The one long shot image from GL 11 was perhaps ambiguous. The alleged nostrils may well have been a deeply furrowed brow. Or maybe Varrikk had recently been in a fight, and due to the plasticity of Rojiran physiology, his face was deformed. This fanboy’s gonna go with that, at least in the timeline running through MY head.
“It’s been a fun life.” ( September 1984, LSH vol3 #2 )
setup 181114: Paul Levitz was a perfectly adequate editor in his own right, but I think it may have been DC’s policy that writers not edit their own work. I don’t know. At any rate the Legion at that time was edited by Karen Berger, to whom I addressed the following remarks. Nevertheless, Levitz himself handled the “Letters to the Editor” column because, well, I suspect because he liked to.
Herewith are my remarks from 1984 regarding Levitz’ and his collaborators’ super-heroic confabulation, The Legion of Super-Heroes, and in particular, their character, Dream Girl.
Brilliant. Just brilliant. I couldn’t have said it better myself. In LSH vol 2 number 310, Nura Nal coins her own best epitaph (and I hope she never needs it as such.)
Preparing for an action which, at best, will neatly suck Omen out of her universe and, at worst, kill her, her compatriots, and possibly all of Khundia, she succinctly sums up her existence and completely crystallizes her character.
“It’s been a fun life.”
Beautiful.
Not, “It’s been a useful life,” nor “…a productive life,” nor “…a meaningful life,” nor any other of the abundant clichés of individual subordination. “It’s been a fun life.” Nura knows. I know. Paul Levitz apparently knows. (Whether or not he believes it himself. Steve Ditko obviously knows — see AVENGiNG WORLD.) If human existence has any purpose at all, it is the pursuit of pleasure. Whether we derive pleasure from a job well done, from helping others, or from helping ourselves, fundamentally we’re in the game for number one. It’s the human thing, we must depend first on ourselves for our own happiness. Aside from contractual obligations, nobody owes us anything, and we owe nobody our lives. Not our church, not our party, not our race, nor tribe, nor “society,” and certainly not the state.
Thank you Nura. Thank you Paul. Keep up the good word.
Levitz responds:
“Whew! One of the best parts of writing the Legion is seeing what depths of character readers can analyze out of brief sentences. While we’d agree with your analysis (largely) with respect to Nura, LG, we’d hate to be accused of believing as our various characters do. — pl.”
update 181114: I don’t condemn Levitz’ hesitation to commit to radical individualism; Nura Nal and Steve Ditko and I represent the narrow end of that particular bell curve and I know how awkward it gets out here.
In spite of that, Paul Levitz remains a great personal hero of mine. In the mid to late 1970s he and Neal Adams led the charge to help Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster reclaim their interests in Superman. Going up for decades against the metastasizing goliath that had become Warner Communications, Siegel and Shuster had all but given up hope.
Adams gets a great deal of the credit for their eventual triumph, and he deserves it, but people often neglect this very impressive difference. At the time Neal Adams was a powerhouse in the industry. Just about every publisher in town was courting him and he was writing his own golden ticket. To speak of Adams as Adams himself might, “The son of a bitch carried some goddamned weight and the corporate suits dared not fuck with him.” If Warner held a grudge Adams could stroll across the street.
Paul Levitz, however, carried no such weight. He was admittedly a tyro writer and a rising star with an MBA on the way and Earth-Two’s Bat-Daughter in his portfolio, but still, he knew the history of DC AND Donenfeld’s toxic legacy. He knew what had happened to writers before him who had pushed too hard.
He pushed anyway.
For the Fathers of the Man of Steel, he couldn’t not push.
Paul Levitz and Neal Adams may disagree with me on matters of art or food or politics, but I still hold them both in the highest of esteem, both as artists, and as men.
update 201026, The Levitz Himself sets me straight: “Thanks for the kind words, but I had no role in getting Jerry and Joe their credits [in the] 1975 deal with Warner. That was due to Neal, Jerry Robinson and a number of others. I was honored to be their primary contact at DC from about 1981 on, and to play a role in improving their compensation in those years, and to have worked on the agreement that courts eventually ruled as a final one with the Siegel family, but I can’t take credit for anything on the 1975 deal.” (lifted from Levitz’ response to my posting some of the above onto the seriagraphic celebration cite, The 13th Dimension.)
