SPIDER-MAN NEWSPAPER STRIP PART 14

OCTOBER 5TH, 1981 - DECEMBER 6TH, 1981
DECEMBER 7TH, 1981, 1981 - MARCH 21ST, 1982
By Stan Lee & Fred Kida (w/Larry Lieber)

Stan Lee and Fred Kida continue the adventures of a more "grounded" Spider-Man in the first of this week's storylines, which quite honestly could've been ripped from today's headlines! It's about a shady oil tycoon who decides he wants to be president -- and he wants Jonah Jameson to be his Secretary of Information in exchange for the Daily Bugle's endorsement. Robbie is of course against this, but Jonah has stars in his eyes and goes along with the billionaire, Thurston Thurwell.

Meanwhile, Spider-Man has become a celebrity following the previous adventure, in which he thwarted the assassination of a visiting cosmonaut. Mary Jane is smitten with the Web-Slinger, but still won't give Peter the time of day since he skipped out on her play to stop the assassin. So, to get back into MJ's graces, Peter offers to get her a poster of Spidey autographed by the Web-Slinger himself -- and to have Spider-Man deliver it. Spidey eventually does, but he ducks out in a hurry to do some crime-fighting, and MJ immediately decides that he's a flake.

At the same time, a group of young vigilantes calling themselves the Spider-Brigade have become the toast of the town. (I think they're more like a neighborhood watch than actual vigilantes, but vigilantes is the way they're described in narration and dialogue.) Thurwell can't stand this, as he believes the young men are taking the law into their own hands, and forces Jameson to condemn them in the Bugle. At the same time, Thurwell also anonymously offers $50,000 to anyone who can scale the side of the Bugle building like Spider-Man, certain that whoever tries will fail and be killed, thus turning public opinion against the Wall-Crawler.

SPIDER-MAN NEWSPAPER STRIP PART 13

MAY 26TH, 1981 - AUGUST 8TH, 1981
AUGUST 9TH, 1981 - OCTOBER 4TH, 1981
By Stan Lee & Larry Lieber

Stan Lee and Larry Lieber continue the "primetime TV" approach to Spider-Man that I love so much in both of this week's storylines. First, at a college dance, Mary Jane is harassed by a new student named Vince Rigby. Peter stands up for her, but a chandelier falls, nearly killing him and breaking his arm. It turns out that Rigby has telekinetic powers, and uses them for his own selfish purposes. But when he shows off for MJ, she tells Peter about Rigby's ability, which prompts Peter to inform Robbie and Jonah, which leads to Rigby going public and accepting a bounty from Jameson: if Rigby can best Spider-Man in battle, JJJ will pay him ten grand.

Fortunately, Peter's quick-healing abilities have his arm back to normal around this point, and he goes out to meet Rigby's challenge. Everything comes to a head at -- wait for it -- a roller rink, where MJ is on a date with Rigby, and where Jameson happens to be showing the niece of his biggest advertiser a good time, when Spider-Man shows up. Rigby goes berserk, ranting about how he will kill Spider-Man, but the web-slinger tricks him into overtaxing his power, so that when he finally attempts to move something relatively small (which Spidey secretly webbed to the floor), he's unable to. After this, Rigby's power shuts down, an outcome Spider-Man compares with blowing a fuse.

SPIDER-MAN NEWSPAPER STRIP PART 12

JANUARY 12TH, 1981 - MARCH 14TH, 1981
MARCH 15TH, 1981 - MAY 25TH, 1981
By Stan Lee & Larry Lieber

Our return to the Spider-Man newspaper strip coincides with the return of Doctor Octopus as well. Ock was last seen in early 1977 (the strip's second storyline, in fact), which means it's four years at this point since we last saw him! Contrast that with the Kingpin, who made multiple appearances over the previous few years, and Kraven and Doctor Doom, who each popped up twice, and it seems odd. Doc Ock was, at this time, generally accepted as Spider-Man's "main" villain, so the fact that he was used so sparingly is a bit of a surprise.

Strangely, this strip seems to be ignoring that previous appearance. Here, Ock is released from prison on parole and decides that, even though he has "a fortune" socked away, he should lay low and live as a common man -- so he goes in search of a room for rent. Meanwhile, Aunt May has been recently robbed and has decided she shouldn't live alone, so she's placed an ad for a boarder. Naturally, Ock shows up and there's much discussion about the last time they encountered each other, right?

Nope. Ock does, of course, answer the ad, but it's presented like the first time he and May have met (and the first time he's met Peter, as well). This seems to be a sort of "soft reboot" of the strip's continuity. You may recall that in its earliest story arcs, the strip presented Spider-Man and his villains as if they had some sort of prior history. First Doctor Doom, then Doc Ock, then the Kingpin -- all were shown as having tangled with the web-slinger in the past (or at least having known about him), and in Ock's case, his past as Aunt May's beau was acknowledged as well.

SPIDER-MAN: THE FURTHER NEWSPAPER STRIPS

Nearly three years ago, I read and posted about the first four years of the syndicated Spider-Man newspaper strip by Stan Lee and John Romita, by way of IDW's Library of American Comics reprints. Well, I finished up that run and even though I had another volume on my bookshelf, I decided -- at least for the time -- to call it quits with the newspaper version of the Web-Slinger.

Since then, I've picked up the next couple volumes in IDW's series, bringing us to a total of five books -- and I've decided that now is the time to crack them open and continue with Spidey's funny-page adventures. I'm going to run through all three of these books, which will take us from January of 1981 through 1986, and feature Lee working with his brother, Larry Lieber, plus newspaper strip veteran Fred Kida, as well as TRANSFORMERS TV series character designer Floro Dery, on art.

Unlike the first run of strips we looked at, where I was familiar with some of the storylines from a book I had as a child, this material will be nearly entirely new to me -- I believe only one full storyline from this era was presented in THE BEST OF SPIDER-MAN, along with one storyline that had only its Sunday strips collected. So I look forward to seeing where Lee took Spider-Man's adventures following Romita's departure.

Incidentally, I remember that our local paper picked up the Spider-Man strip somewhere around 1991 or so, and -- I'll be blunt -- I found it pretty lame, compared with the comics of the time, in terms of both story and art. But those are the memories of a teenager reacting to material that was published a decade after the stuff we're about to read. I don't know if my thoughts on the strip in the early nineties was right or wrong, but at least as late as his final few story arcs with John Romita, Stan was still his usual entertaining self (even if some of the plots were a little iffy).

I guess we'll find out soon exactly what to make of these stories, as I intend to spend the next several weeks on them. How many weeks? I'm not exactly sure. On my first go-round, I looked at two story arcs per week, and the two books took eleven weeks to cover. Now we're looking at three books, so going at the same rate, this could very well take us more than four months.

It all begins Monday, Web-heads -- be there!

AVENGERS: EARTH'S MIGHTIEST HEROES II #1 - 8

Writer: Joe Casey | Penciler: Will Rosado | Inker: Tom Palmer
Colorist: Wil Quintana | Letterer: Comicraft | Cover Artist: Dave Johnson
Assistant Editors: Molly Lazer & Aubrey Sitterson | Editor: Tom Brevoort
Editor-in-Chief: Joe Quesada | Publisher: Dan Buckley

It kind of fascinates me how infatuated Joe Casey seems to be with the Avengers' "A-1 Priority Clearance". It was this intangible McGuffin through all eight issues of the previous EARTH'S MIGHTIEST HEROES series: "We need priority clearance. It's imperative that we have priority clearance. How can we get priority clearance? We have priority clearance! Our priority clearance is contingent on Captain America staying with the team. Now that we have former criminals joining us, will that jeopardize our priority clearance?" All this would make sense if the riveting priority clearance sub-plot had culminated in... anything. But it's just this thing Iron Man goes on and on about throughout the series, and nothing ever comes of it. They get it, but there's no huge event that shows what happens if they don't have it or how great things go if they do.

Now, maybe the above would've been better as part of last week's review... but I decided to mention it here instead, because -- we're not finished with priority clearance, folks. Almost as soon as EARTH'S MIGHTIEST HEROES II opens, the characters are going on about it again!

EMH I chronicled the "between the panels" lives of the Avengers circa issues 2 - 16 of their original series. EMH II picks up during issue 58, the famous "Even an Android Can Cry", in which the recently-created Vision joins the team. And since Vision is a synthezoid, created to kill the Avengers no less, our heroes immediately find themselves wondering whether -- you guessed it -- his presence on the team will jeopardize their priority clearance... especially since Captain America is currently a part-time member.

AVENGERS: EARTH'S MIGHTIEST HEROES #1 - 8

Writer: Joe Casey | Art: Scott Kolins
Color Art: Morry Hollwell & Will Quintana
Letters: Richard Starkings & Comicraft
Assistant Editors: Andy Schmidt, Nicole Wiley, & Molly Lazer
Editor: Tom Brevoort | Editor-in-Chief: Joe Quesada
Publisher: Dan Buckley

As noted last week, AVENGERS: THE ORIGIN was actually published subsequently to AVENGERS: EARTH'S MIGHTIEST HEROES and EARTH'S MIGHTIEST HEROES II. As a result, while the story feels mostly seamless in its progression, there are some hiccups created by the fact that when he wrote EMH, Joe Casey was working with the established Avengers backstory, and not the revised and lightly ret-conned backstory he came up with for THE ORIGIN.

EARTH'S MIGHTIEST HEROES begins after the events of AVENGERS #1 (and therefore after the events of THE ORIGIN), with the Avengers signing their charter and bylaws, all drawn up by Tony Stark's legal staff. But the ever-disgruntled Hulk refuses to play along, putting a quick end to his involvement with the team. Unfortunately, part of Iron Man's pitch to the U.S. government was that the Avengers would keep the Hulk under control -- and now that the Green Goliath has become a free agent again, the Avengers need to track him down in order to earn their government clearance. But following a failed attempt to apprehend the Hulk, the group finds the body of Captain America, frozen in suspended animation.

Even though he doesn't appear in the first issue until its final page (and even then he's frozen in a block of ice), EARTH'S MIGHTIEST HEROES is really Cap's story -- either focusing on him, or centering plot developments around him. The entire second issue focuses on Cap adjusting to the modern day, while Iron Man conspires to use the super soldier's still-active security clearance for the Avengers' benefit. Cap meets Rick Jones, hanging around with the group since the Hulk's departure, and immediately forms a protective bond with the teen, who reminds him of his lost partner, Bucky.

AVENGERS: THE ORIGIN #1 - 5

"THE NECESSARY EVIL" | "FAITH-BASED INITIATIVE"
"RESPONSE TIME ZERO CULT" | "RUMBLE FISH" | "ONE SHOE DROPS"
Writer: Joe Casey | Artist: Phil Noto
Letterer: RS & Comicraft's Albert Deschene
Production: Taylor Esposito, Randall Miller, Irene Lee, & Mayela Gutierrez
Associate Editor: Lauren Sankovitch | Editor: Tom Brevoort
Editor-in-Chief: Joe Quesada | Publisher: Dan Buckley
Executive Producer: Alan Fine

Back in 2010, two years before the Avengers became a household name and worldwide phenomenon, Marvel published this five-issue limited series written by self-avowed Avengers fanboy Joe Casey, and illustrated by Phil Noto. It served as an extended retelling of the Avengers' very first issue, presenting an in-depth look at the formation of the team. And while I've gone on record many times about my dislike for "decompressed" comic book storytelling, in this case I have to say that I don't mind it all that much. I've found that whenever I try to read Marvel comics from the early sixties, they feel incredibly dense -- too dense for my tastes sometimes; especially those drawn by Jack Kirby. So here, giving the Avengers' first mission some time to breathe is fine by me.

I'm less enamored with Casey's decision to set the story in the modern day. Yes, I fully understand that the way "Marvel Time" works, the Avengers' first meeting would have occurred around ten years prior to when this story was published -- so in 2000 -- but just the same, I prefer when these sorts of flashbacks are set at some nebulous time "in the past" -- even when they're clearly set in the era when they originally happened! That's one of the things I loved about the Jeph Loeb/Tim Sale "color" series (and something I mentioned at the time when I covered them here years ago): they're all flashbacks, ostensibly to the 1990s at the latest, but Sale clearly drew them to take place in the early sixties, and they're far more enjoyable to me for that reason.