Strange facts about Stan Lee

With the recent passing of the most famous comic book writer of all time I thought I’d write a piece about him. But what should I write about a man who has become the comic book industries grandpa. Well how about a list and explanation of some of the bizarrest facts about the man.

He created the Power Rangers (sort of).

I told you these would be weird. In the late 1970’s Stan Lee sold the rights to Spider-man to Toei a Japanese TV studio. The end result of this being a “Super Sentei” series. A Japanese staple of entertainment about a Teenager or a group of Teenagers (some series change the age of the protagonists) who gain transformation powers and battle monsters. 

Stan’s plan after selling the rights to the old web-head to a japanese company was to then splice the action scenes, which where more expensive and dangerous to film and also Japan has a lot more experienced martial arts actors and stunt men, then splice them with new footage of a western actor who would be the series Peter Parker.

Unfortunately this grand scheme of Stan’s was unusable as other than the iconic suit, this series in no way resembles the Spider-man western audiences are used to. It now lives on in infamous as remember the time Spider-man fought aliens from mars with a giant robot.

But as I said this idea would later be used by Saban entertainment to make the Power Rangers (and other short-lived franchises from the 90’s like Big Bad Beetleborgs and VR Troopers). So as I said the idea for Power Ranger’s production cycle was created by Stan Lee.

He Cameo’s in movies because he doesn’t work for Marvel anymore

Ever wonder why he actually crops up in Superhero movies? Well the answer is quite simple, he wrote into his severance contract “if any characters I created are to make a movie I must appear in said movie”. Stan insisted on it, The fact he has appeared in movies of characters he had nothing to with the creation of like Deadpool or the Princess Diaries 2. 

As well as these movie cameo’s Stan is known for doing voice overs in Marvel cartoons, and again there is a simple explanation for this. No one else was available to be the narrator for 1980’s Spider-man series. That said who else could deliver his lines with the same bombastic quality that made Marvel comics so Exciting and exhilarating? Or like they’re written by a sentient Thesaurus?  

But if you where wondering why Stan Lee doesn’t appear in Logan it’s because Stan Lee never wrote a single comic featuring Wolverine.

He grew his Moustache for a reason.

Stan Lee’s Glasses and Moustache combo is unmistakable and iconic. So Iconic in fact my Mum once in HMV once thought a piece of Breaking Bad merchandise was Stan Lee (and to be fair it was amongst a lot of Superhero stuff). But nope despite what you might think Stan Lee was not born with his facial hair and his first words may or may not have been “Excelsior”. Stan Lee in his most famous and prolific time as a writer for Marvel in the 60’s had a full beard this was until a disgruntled Jack Kirby left Marvel for their rival DC and created the Fourth World Saga. Within the Fourth World Saga is a character called “Funky Flashman” a con-Artist deliberately modelled on Stan Lee (subtlety not being something often attributed to Jack Kirby). With this being such an obvious piece of slander Stan had to change his look because it’s harder to con people if they know what you’re like.

Unfortunately him shaving his facial hair down to just a moustache made him look more like Peter Parker’s tyrant boss J. Jonah Jameson.

And one last piece of Stan Lee Fourth World trivia for you, after the first broadcast of Apokolips Now Part 2 (an episode of Superman the animated series), an extra who looked like Stan Lee was removed from the background of Dan Turpin’s funeral scene.

He tried to make the Marvel Cinematic Universe since the 70’s

After semi-retiring from writing comics Stan set his sights on Hollywood and had limited success. He had greater success with television selling the rights to the Incredible Hulk which ran for many seasons and was very successful making a household name for bodybuilder Lou Ferringo (also starring Bill Bixby as The Hulk’s alter ego David Banner). But just having one show was not enough for Stan, green-lit for a whole series was Captain America starring Reb Brown where Steve Rogers is an ex marine who cruises around america in a van solving crimes. A more faithful Spider-man starring one of the kids from the Sound of Music (Nicholas Hammond) which bored viewers into comas and often tops lists of worst TV shows. A pilot for Doctor Strange where psychiatrist Steven Sanders battles peoples magical psychological problems summoned by Morgana Le Fey played by Jessica Walters (best known for either Lucille Bluthe from Arrested Development or Mallory Archer from Archer). And not making to the screen was a version of Daredevil devised by Angie Bowie (ex-wife of David Bowie) that never finished a script for a pilot, but did have costumes made and a photo shoot done for it with herself as then Daredevil sidekick Black Widow. And of course the TV movie the Incredible Hulk returns was a back-door pilot for a Thor series.

All that is nothing compared to Stan’s now notorious Dazzler pitch which was to be set in a post-apocalyptic world with the warring factions of Rock and Roll and Disco, and was to feature Kiss and Donna Summer. It was also to have cameos from Spider-man and the Avengers as well as having then relative unknown stand up comedian Robin Williams playing Alison Blaires (Dazzler’s secret identity) boyfriend.

His Superheroes are a reaction to constrictions on Horror Comics

The publisher now known as Marvel comics didn’t always make nothing but superhero books, both the explosion of superheroes in 1961 they published various genres from Westerns to Romance comics. But what they sold more of was Monster and Horror Comics unfortunately due to the Comics Code Authority there was a ban on all thing occult or too violent so how do you get around this?

Well have a band of explorers get hit by Cosmic rays of course. Then they can fight as many monsters as they like and have an archenemy who dresses up as the Grim Reaper. But it’s not just The Fantastic Four that have roots in Horror in fact most of the heroes debuted in Horror books like “Tales to Astonish” where a man invents a shrinking serum and then must battle what are now giant ants later becoming their king. A man who if he loses control becomes a giant green monster who destroys everything around him or a slender man who likes spiders and skulks around dark alleyways waiting for criminals to tangle up in his web. Not to mention a master of Occult arts who battles other sorcerers and demons and band of misfit freaks who must hide from the world but also want to save it. (if you didn’t work that out that was a description of Antman, The Incredible Hulk, Spider-man, Dr Strange and The X-men).

He Wrote for Publishers other than Marvel.

We associate Stan with Marvel but he did do projects with other companies as well as couple for Marvel nobody talks about like Ravage 2099 or Nightcat an experiment to have a hair metal singer who was also a Superhero. He also created the Adult animated series Striperrella starring Pamela Anderson (which the level of series humour is she’s Agent 69 if you sniggered at that you’ll love the show). 

But Comics wise he created the Mighty 7 for Archie Comics (pre-reboot) which similar to Nightcat tries to merge the barriers between universes by having Stan as an actual character and these are his superhero chums. For Darkhorse he wrote comics for the winners of the reality contest series on the Sci Fi Channel (and a rehashed version in the UK with kids that was broadcast on CBBC) “Who wants to be a Superhero?” which also featured Stan giving the contestants tasks and judging who needs to leave at the end of the episode.

More interestingly is he did do a mini-series for DC called “Just Imagine Stan Lee’s…” where he reimagined DC’s most popular characters; Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman, Robin, The Flash and Green Lantern. Superman reimagined as a hard-nose space cop now stuck on earth, Batman as a pro-wrestler (and a black man) which seems in line with the fact that in the Marvel universe Wrestling is real and often performed by Super-powered beings like The Thing and Spider-man. Green Lantern as a High School Biology teacher who now must protect nature from pollution and Robin as a young street tough who is fostered into a cult by the series villain the Reverend DARRK. 

He started writing comics professionally at 17

Stan’s whole career started at 17 and he was promoted to writer and editor from office boy after most of the staff where drafted into WW2. Stan wasn’t allowed into the Army due to him being underaged as well as in shades of Captain America too skinny and Jewish. But Stan was told his time as editor was temporary and that the owner of the comic publisher would “come back with a grown up” to take the responsibilities off the young kid but he never came back.

And what Stan did with this was truly something great he co-created some of the most well known characters in the world as well as creating an environment where the Artists would flourish under creative freedom. While DC under Bob Kane everyone was made to draw Batman like he did so that he could trace the panels for later use. Stan allowed Jack Kirby draw like Jack Kirby and Steve Ditko draw how he wanted. The Marvel method gave a lot of freedom to the artist but was heavily reliant on somebody like Jim Steranko to make a truly dynamic layout that could tell a story well. While modern comic writers are more strict with layouts Steranko at time threw the rulebook completely out the window and did more pop art inspired pieces, pages with no panels, scene melding into scene. Under Stan Lee, Jack Kirby could come into the office with sketches for his new character a naked silver-man from space, that Stan in his own words “thought was a weird idea” but it became a legendary character. Without Stan around Marvel would never have become what it was, and we thank you styrofoam packing peanuts I mean EXCELSIOR!

Those Un-Fantastic Movies

The Fantastic Four haven’t had the most well-regarded of film adaptations, have they? 3 different directors have had a go at making a film version of Marvel’s First Family (Roger Corman, Tim Story and Josh Trank respectively). So this obviously means the adventures of Mr Fantastic, the Invisible Woman, the Human Torch and the Ever-Lovin’ Blue-Eyed Thing are ‘uncinematic’ or ‘unadaptable’, right? Well, if you keep making the same obvious mistakes over and over again, then yes. I mean sure, the individual films have their own unique problems, like Roger Corman’s incredible shrinking budget and Josh Trank’s refusal to show up to work. But the same 4 (an oddly appropriate number) problems keep on happening.

The FF are Explorers, not Crimefighters

This one’s a real problem. What’s even more strange is that they acknowledge this in their origin “Exploring Space”. But then it’s dropped once they get superpowers. It’s almost as if they went just to pick them up, like a suit from the dry cleaners before a job interview. Most F4 comic book story lines revolve around them exploring somewhere new and making enemies with a tyrant or befriending a friendly king. The number of places in the Marvel Universe that was first explored or discovered by this family from New York include Attilan, Atlantis, the Blue Area of the Moon, Wakanda, Latveria, the Negative Zone, the Skrull Home World. And those are just the greatest hits. 

Removing them as space adventurers robs them of what makes them so special. If theres a mugger in New York, there are at least half a dozen heroes all tripping over each over to stop them (Spider-man, Luke Cage, Daredevil, Shang-Chi, Black Cat, Venom, Jessica Jones, The Prowler and Kirby knows how many more). But the Marvel Universe has only one team of super-powered explorers. 

I think this change is made because movies don’t like what is known as a Flat-Arc (wherein the hero isn’t changed by the story). But this is ridiculous because they can still evolve on an alien planet. 

The Character’s are Wrong

It’s fair to say that the Fantastic Four are a product of their time. While Sue is best defined as the “World’s Greatest Super-Mom” even before having kids (I’m sorry but it’s kinda true), the other three have different personalities to their movie counterparts (even with that said Sue isn’t very Sue). 

Reed Richards is the embodiment of 1950’s Rugged Manhood. He’s not just the smartest man in the world but square-jawed and emotionally distant as well. Reed in the movies is a wimpy nerd who has to bring extra lunch money so he can still get a cookie after the less nerdy nerds beat it out him. These two things are not the same at all and it’s really stereotypical. 

Johnny Storm is, frankly, an immature kid in high school who likes to show off. Sue has spent half her life looking after him after their parents were killed in a car crash when Johnny was 7, partially why Sue is the “World’s Greatest Super-Mom” before she even had her own kids. Johnny in the movies has his “Rebel Without a Cause” side cranked up to 11. But all this does this is create a really shallow version of Johnny Storm, especially as all of the Fantastic Four have above average intelligence (the other three are just dwarfed by Reed Richards). Johnny is more Marty McFly (complete with short temper) than a 2nd rate James Dean. 

The worst offender for the movies getting wrong is most probably Ben Grimm, the heart and soul of Marvel Comics. In the movie adaptations, he spends his time moping about lamenting that he used to be a handsome man but now he’s a giant toenail (fun fact: Ben Grimm’s rock skin is actually more similar to toenails than rock. Here’s hoping he doesn’t get athlete’s foot). While this is true of the comic counterpart to a degree, he actually gets over it pretty quickly. He’s a changed man as soon as he meet Alicia Masters. Ben Grimm is a fun-loving party animal. He loves to drink, gamble and fight. He always has a joke ready for when he punches a bad guy and he’s the Idol of Millions. He’s basically like the Marvel Universe’s Mr. T.

You’re Wrong about Doctor Doom

Doctor Doom first appeared in Fantastic Four number 5 and he was a fully formed character. He had an army of robots, a suit that made him look like the grim reaper’s stunt double, a magic castle, his own made-up kingdom of Latveria and a time machine. He forced three of the members of the F4 to get him some magic pirate treasure. And thats a million times better than what we got in any of the movies. Sure, Doom has a personal vendetta against Reed Richards but it predates him becoming Mr Fantastic. It’s not that Doom is an entitled shmuck who wanted to marry Sue. No. Doom’s hatred of Richards is much more intense and much more personal, Richards destroyed his experiment, his one chance to talk to his deceased mother, and it scarred his beautiful perfect face. 

Doom is no tag-along, Doom’s power is all self made. He didn’t hitch a ride with the other four, he studied the Occult and raised his own army. And all to fulfil his destiny to complete his goals of getting revenge on Reed Richards for disfiguring him, redemption for his mothers soul (she sold it to Mephisto to protect their village from the Nazi’s) and total conquest of the world. Not to destroy it though, rather so he can rid the world of disease and poverty as everybody will be too busy worshipping his magnificence. 

Doctor Doom is almost always the aggressor in his stories with the Fantastic Four, as their insistence on still existing always circumvents his plans to bring much needed order to a world gone mad. But due to his popularity (he was even Stan Lee’s favourite villain), he’s appeared as an adversary for almost every Marvel hero. He’s gone to war with Wakanda and even tried to seduce Spider-man to the ways of villainy. Doom is a complex character as well as being an over-the-top characteur of a fascist. 

There are More Villains than Doctor Doom

Doctor Doom is possibly the greatest villain in all of Superhero comics. However, his back stories and motivations are more complicated than the average disposable movie villain. The method of adding him into the origin of the F4 just plain doesn’t work. It belittles him. Fortunately, the Fantastic Four have many villains. Assuming this is to fit into the MCU, Ronan the Accuser and the Skrull Empire have already been used, but they still have many more that haven’t yet been used. They include evil magician’s like Diablo and Nicolas Scratch, the communist villain the Red Ghost (who gained super powers for him and his apes by copying the F4) and Dragon-Man (often partnered with Diablo) who’s whole shtick is a bizarre lie as he is an Android and neither a Dragon or a Man. The Puppet Master, Alicia Masters step-Father, controls people with puppets he makes. The Moleman is the ruler of an underground world with loyal subjects called the Moloids. The Mad Thinker and his Awesome Android, The Frightful Four (a rival group of Scientists who make themselves an evil copy of the heroes). Annihulus and Blastaar (rival rulers of the Negative Zone who the F4 keep getting in the way of). Heck, even their original villain Namor the Submariner. With him, you can keep the whole “I love Sue, you don’t deserve her” shpeil as that’s actually his motivations.

So is it that the Fantastic Four are uncinematic? god no. The Movie versions have been plagued with problems, Roger Corman was hired to make the first one because of his extremely fast turnover in productions and Constantine films didn’t want to lose the rights to the series so they made a movie of them. Tim Story’s Fantastic Four was made for similar reasons, coupled with the popularity of the Spider-man and X-men movies they thought it could make a profit and it did and it spawned a sequel that some how managed to be worse. Tim Story also only had 1 previous directing credit for a box office flop starring Queen Latifah. Josh Trank’s Fant4stic was also made under the pressure of not wanting to lose the rights to the series. While his vision of a darker version of the F4 seemed strange it had some merits to it, like how Stan Lee’s original pitch for the series had protagonists all slowly dying from their super powers.

The most compelling argument for the Fantastic Four not fitting into a film structure is that the comics often revolve around on going plots from issue to issue. However that idea is flawed by the fact that all Marvel comics have that and well Spider-man has done pretty well on the big screen.

Cerebus Syndrome and The Gorillaz

So what is Cerebus Syndrome, and how do you know if you’ve got it? Well don’t worry it’s a term coined from TV Tropes, not an actual disease. The term was inspired by Aardvark Vanheim’s (Dave Sim’s self publishing name) series Cerebus the Aardvark. Fortunately to understand what it is you don’t have to be overly familiar with the World’s longest continuous narrative (it’s 500 issues of the same story), what it means is something that starts off as something silly or comedic and over the course of it’s story because more serious. As a perfect example of this in every regard I present to the committee the virtual band The Gorillaz.

The Gorillaz were created by Damon Albarn from Blur and Comic Book Artist Jamie Hewlett then best known for co-creating Tank Girl. Albarn’s band Blur had recently broken up and had lost the war of Brit-Pop to their rivals Oasis. The band were on a critical and commercial decline since losing lead Guitarist Graham Coxon and became a more experimental band (the later Blur stuff is almost a prototype for the Gorillaz sound) and while living with Jamie Hewlett whose most famous creation got made into a movie. This movie was not a critical darling either, but this was to be expected. Movies based on comic books were not universally beloved at this point, the world was recovering from Batman and Robin and even worse Steel starring Shaquel O’Neal. Imagine what was needed for a British comic being forced to fit the guidelines of A MOVIE and a PG-13 movie for a general American audience. Sex with her mutated Kangaroo boyfriend who she first met when he tried to steal her underwear would not fly, not to mention stories for Tank Girl are generally short and in Hewlett’s own words on BBC4’s Comic’s Britannia Documentary series “not works of great storytelling, they’re just an excuse to have her blow things up”. He’s not wrong, Tank Girl is at it’s best when it’s short and weird, breaking what it means to be a comic, the movie does try this but to absolutely no success. Instead of feeling in on the joke the whole movie is an incoherent LSD trip with a random musical number and an awesome soundtrack featuring a reworking Girl U Want by Devo and something to do with the badguy hoarding water.  

Albarn and Hewlett first conceived of the idea of a virtual band when watching MTV and both sharing the thought everything is so artificial. Realising the logic conclusion to this was to make a band that didn’t actually exist. Hewlett came up with designs for the band based on what was popular at the time, the band consisted of; Murdoc Niccals on Bass. A Satanist who in his earliest incarnations looks like a Hanna Barbera villain and based on the darker Nu Metal. 2-D or Stu Pott as the Vocalist with dead black eyes and looking like he came from a pop punk band. Russell Hobbs on Drums who looks like the bodyguard to a famous Rapper and was told to look inconspicuous and lastly and certainly not least Noodle a 10 year old Japanese girl inspired by the UK’s Pokemon inspired obsession with all things Otaku and Oriental.

The Band now with Dan the Automator (added in the real world not as a fictional character) released an EP that could almost be a mission statement “Tomorrow Comes Today”. From there the progression was obvious a full album, with more people working on it, including Tina Weymouth and Chris Frantz from the Talking Heads, Miho Hitorai (who would share the role of the voice of Noodle on the album with Tina Weymouth) and most notably Del The Funkee Homo Sapien who would get a character for himself and would appear in the music videos for Clint Eastwood and Rock the House. The Album also gave Albarn more freedom than he would’ve had with Blur, as nobody had any real expectations, so with this freedom he mixed genres like indie rock, reggae and hip hop together. As well as sampling George Romero’s Day of the Dead for the song M1 A1.

The Gorillaz first album was overall fun, but what would you expect from a band with a now really cringe-worthy Z on the end of it’s name. The band would next release an album of B-Sides and remixes called “G-Sides”. But with this came the first forming of Gorillaz lore found on their website, and I don’t think anybody other than Jamie Hewlett could’ve come up with this. Highlights from it include Noodles favourite method of transportation being Fed-exing herself to her intended location, Murdoc and 2-D first meeting when Murdoc ran him over, then 2-D being in a coma, Murdoc kidnapped him and then getting into another car crash but this one woke 2-D out of his coma (as well as detaching his retinas and knocking out his front teeth).

Other than Laika Come Home which was a Dub-Reggae remix album (which in fictional universe was explained by 2-D never locked the door to Kong Studios and the Spacemonkeyz got in) was Demon Days. The Album was conceived while Jamie Hewlett was working on trying to get a Gorillaz movie green-lit, by Damon Albarn in china. This time any ideas of artificiality or Bubble Gum where gone, they had to prove they where more than a gimmick. This album was much darker, the kids trying to“get the cool shoe-shine” were now “Kids With Guns”. The Albums most haunting track is probably Fire Coming Out of the Monkey’s head, which is almost a bedtime story warning against greed as a mountain god is angry. The Album also boasted a more robust ensemble of musicians, but this time produced by Danger Mouse (not David Jason or Alexander Armstrong) and not Dan the Automator. The mindset behind the telling of “the Gorillaz story” also seemed more important, with the music videos being more steeped in symbolism (Feel Good Inc and El Manna) but as to not alienate more casual fans not all videos told a story.  While Feel Good Inc’s would only set up for El Manna, the story within Feel Good Inc had a deep meaning, I’m sure. Nobody seems quite sure, I personally think of it as being about 2-D being uncomfortable with his fame, while Murdoc and Russell are enjoying the perks that come with it and Noodle is oblivious and still enjoys making music (this being why she is outside of the windmill). El Manna takes place on the flying Windmill as Jimmy Manson (a guy Murdoc said could join the band before Noodle) tries to kill her to take her place in the band. The Video ends with Noodle being missing and this has consequences for the band in the future (even if they never hear from Jimmy again). 

The next album The Plastic Beach, was more focused on the characters and the storytelling. While the set up wasn’t told via music video all of the promotional videos for the album told a continuing story with the exception of Superfast Jellyfish. The story goes; Murdoc now strapped for cash having spent all the money from Demon Days on sex, drugs, around the world cruises etc. realised what he needs to get more money is to produce another album. Having promised to do that and hiring all the talent he could get to help like; Lou Reed, Snoop Dogg and De La Soul who wouldn’t come cheap. But he refused to work with Doom and Dennis Hopper like he did on the last album. He was now broke again, so he got a loan and help from the Demonic Gangster he originally sold his soul to give him a loan and help in locating the other members of the band. The only member he could locate was 2-D, who the pair kidnapped. Murdoc came up with handy solutions as to how he could replace the other 2, for Russell he bought a Drum Machine and as for Noodle ,well, he still had some of her DNA so he made a cyborg clone of her. Now in debt to his record label, all the albums collaborators and a Demonic Gangster, the solution was obvious, rob a bank. This is when the video for Stylo (featuring Mos Def) start our story with the 3 on the run, and I don’t think they’d get very far considering they’re a conspicuous trio of a green skinned satanist, an asian teenager and a blue haired man. In the escape from the cops (well, one cop John McClane from Die Hard) Cyborg Noodle is shot. The next video is On Melancholy Hill which has Murdoc piloting a submarine in an escape while 2-D is in the back trying to fix the broken Cyborg Noodle. The Real Noodle is trying to get to the Plastic beach (a man made structure of discarded plastic floating in the middle of the sea which Murdoc has built their new studio on so he doesn’t have to pay taxes to any government, and they need a new studio after he burned down Kong Studios for the insurance money) and her bumping into bandmate Russell who is now a giant after eating Radioactive Jellyfish. All the while the other collaborators are trying to get to the island to get their payments from Murdoc. The last part to this story is the unfinished Rhinestone Eyes (Hewlett and Albarn had already spent the entire animation budget). This leads to Noodle and Russell reuniting with Murdoc, Murdoc coming face to face with his evil bank manager and 2-D getting eaten by a Whale.

The next release from the band was The Fall which is was recorded by Albarn almost entirely on his iPad. But it has a real problem with it as it’s supposed to be a tour diary for 2-D but he’s supposed to be inside a whale. The other ignored release from the Gorillaz was a promotional tie-in with Converse called Do-Ya-Thing, which has a video that doesn’t fit in with story continuity especially as before the release of Humanz Jamie Hewlett made some instagram posts about the band and what they where doing during the bands 7 year hiatus. Now part of me thinks the hiatus was really so they could unveil the new sexy Noodle, because when Hewlett was asked about it in promotion for his return to Tank Girl and the earlier work being reprinted by image Comics as “he was bored of drawing those characters”. 

Humanz was released and the music videos continued to tell a story for the Gorillaz but… on the album itself it felt if they where absent. Many fans (myself included) where disappointed with this, it didn’t sound like Gorillaz, sure for promotion the band would now do interviews with Phil Cornwell and Kevin Bishop (as Murdoc and 2-D) interacting with the interviewer and in real time being rendered in 3d animation. Helping them to do all the things a real band could do. Advances in technology also allowed for the Gorillaz to do updates about what was going on in their world and each of the members has been known to create their own Spotify playlist.

The displeasure of some fans caused Albarn to try and correct this by recording the album The Now Now (less than a year after the release of the last album) and this time guest collaborators were at a minimum and the inherent sadness that was present on Demon Days and The Plastic Beach was back. They addressed a criticism which is something you don’t do unless you’re dedicated to doing something.

But what does the future hold for the Gorillaz, well another album is (at the time of writing) in the works and this is confirmed and rumours are circling about an animated series. I really hope this is true because this would make the whole storyline of the Gorillaz easier to find and less of an easter egg hunt. I genuinely spent some time trying to work out if there is some sort of code to do with them wearing hats. An animated series for the Gorillaz would also fit nicely with Adult Swim with them ordering 70 episodes of Rick and Morty for it’s 4th Season they’re going to need a companion series for their biggest hit ever, and Warner Bros already owns Adult Swim and the Gorillaz.

The Tick vs The Watchmen

What better way is there to start this brawl than to introduce the contenders, starting with the Tick. Created by Ben Edlund in 1983 as a mascot for a comic book store and then later developed into his own series to pay for his film school tuition, the Tick is a 7 foot tall buffoon who spouts weird catchphrases and nearly non-sensical monologues about good and evil, all of which are things found within your classic superhero comic (who has ever said “for truth, Justice and the American way” without knowingly quoting Superman?). The world of the Tick, also known as “The City”, is filled with absurd comical characters. One example is Die Fledermaus, a cowardly version of Batman who is more into his swinger lifestyle than actual crimefighting. Another more villainous example is Chairface Chippendale, a man who wants to take over the world because his head is a chair. No other reason. He has a chair for a head and somehow can speak, in spite of not possessing a mouth. The Tick and his sidekick Arthur are the City’s greatest heroes, despite one being a complete twit who doesn’t understand, well, anything about modern society, and the other being an insecure mess with no powers other than a flight suit that looks him like a rabbit (although he insists it’s a moth). I could spend the whole article talking about the many different characters from Ben Edlund’s imagination, like Bi-Polar Bear, Dinosaur Neil and American Maid to name a few, and I would absolutely love to but I have to continue to the more depressing contenders in this fight.

In Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons’ 1986 magnum opus (as DC is so over-eager to market it as), the Watchmen are a bunch of inept, self obsessed fetishists, each one representing a different ideology prominent in US politics. Rorschach, an Ayn Rand worshipping hypocrite who hasn’t showered in 3 years, spends his time writing unsolicited articles to a Far-Right publication about his various conspiracy theories that he comes up with (in spite of having no proof), including such little “gems” as “drinking in a bar means you like Child Pornography” and “not being Republican means you’re gay”. Dr Manhattan, a god-like entity who sees all of his timeline at once, is impotent when it comes to making any real change. He’s also a nudist as, seeing himself as no more than an observer, there is no real need for him to keep up appearances. Nite-Owl is a social reformer representing the centre-left who has all the gadgets but cannot affect real change, whereas Silk Spectre, representing the centre right, is a self centred woman with massive daddy issues. The Comedian, representing the far right, is a gun toting psychopath who kills for fun and is a dead ringer for Nick Fury (no, not Samuel Jackson). Last but definitely not least is Ozymandias, the worlds smartest man who changes the world by giving up all traditional Superhero methods. He changes the world with Philanthropy and enacts a master diabolical plan to fake an alien invasion as it’s the only thing that would cause lasting peace between America and Russia (remember; this was 1986, when world politics looked like a tangled mess of week old spaghetti).

So why would you compare these two pieces of work? Both are satires of the Superhero genre; one for comedy and the other for tragedy. Oh, unless you’re the kind of person who loves the Zack Snyder movie and doesn’t realise that Watchmen is a satire. In the words of Grant Morrison, Snyder “recreated Watchmen visually but completely missed the subtext”. Although he wrote nicer things about the movie in the chapter of “Supergods” when he was a DC employee, the real point was made there. Watchmen, like a lot of superhero comics, is a response to William Wertham and his book “The Seduction of the Innocent”. Watchmen is exactly how Wertham saw the Superhero; overly violent thugs overwhelmed by their sexual kinks and not good role models for children. As well the portrayal of violence in Watchmen being truly horrific and stomach turning, it eschews the usual superhero comics trope of “they have a fight, triangle wins”. You see an almost sadistic glint of joy in Rorschach’s mask as he doles out punishment or Nite Owl vomiting behind the trash cans at the sight of blood. Unless you only saw the movie of course. Then you can hear idiot frat boy Snyder high-fiving over how knurly that stunt was. Zack Snyder is also an outspoken objectivist (supporter of Ayn Rand) which explains why the film version omits Rorschach’s dubious theories and ignores key descriptions of him, like replacing his emotionless monotone for Jackie Earle Haley’s second rate Nolan Batman imitation. If he changed his role in the world anymore, we’d be hearing lines from all the other characters how much they miss him (as opposed to the ones in the book where they talk about how glad they are he’s not around). But it’s not just within the film where this warped misunderstanding of the book exists. DC released a sequel to Watchmen called “Doomsday Clock”. The most unlikely scenario happens in it; everybody in the world believes the incoherent ramblings of a semi-literate mental patient that he sent to a pro-Nazi magazine that wasn’t even allowed on news stands. The only person of power who would believe this tripe is Alan Fine.

That’s why the Tick is superior. People get right away that it’s a work of satire. On reflection, the Tick might be better viewed as a parody. Parody and Satire are very different from each other; parody loves what it mocks, satire hates what it mocks (thats why you never hear the term political parody). We’ve also never had a wild departure from The Tick’s authorial intent by the simple virtue that Ben Edlund has always been involved with all the Tick’s incarnations. But the Tick-Watchmen connection is more apparent with the Amazon Prime series, not simply because they share actors. SPOILER WARNING! The Terror’s evil plot is mocked by Arthur for being overly convoluted, a plot similar to the one Ozymandias reveals at the end of Watchmen. The Tick was willing to admit that this is overly contrived and made a virtue out of it. No wiggle room, the Tick makes it’s point. Watchmen leaves it vague and Alan Moore’s detachment from the project has left it in the hands of the fanboys. And they do not understand it. The Tick fans do however understand it. They are under no illusions that it’s silly, weird and wholly unashamed of what it is.

The Superheroes Journey

Banner by James Dawson

In 1949 Joseph Campbell created the theory of the monomyth, the theory is based on a study of various cultures stories of Heroism. He found recurring trends in every cultures’ great mythical stories, realising that all heroes are the same he wrote the book “the Hero with a thousand faces”. But cultures moved, so has the Monmouth, how do 20th and 21st century heroes fit the mould, and where better to look for modern heroes than Superhero comics, I mean theres a clue in the name. So I’ve decided to take 7 seemingly random (chosen for diversity) and test them against David Adams Leeming definition of the Monomyth (as Campbells originally had 17 criteria) and check how well they keep to the 8.

The 8 being:

1. Hero must have special circumstances around their birth

2. A Call to Adventure (something happens as a catalyst for change)

3. Hero must leave their normal world for a new one

4. Hero must go through some trial to prove they are worthy

5. The Hero or someone they know must die (usually mentor figure)

6. Hero goes into an evil place

7. The Hero is reborn with a new identity

8. The Hero atones for their past 

This Formulae has been found in a lot of fiction since it’s creation, George Lucas even modelled Luke Skywalker’s story in Star Wars on this after reading The Hero with a Thousand faces.

Wonder Woman

First Appearance of Origin Story All Star Comics 8 (William Moulton Marsden and Harry G Peter).

Created by Hera the Amazons where made to to be champions for women who where maligned by patriarchy. After realising the Amazons where a threat to his order, the Tyrant Zeus ordered his son Heracles to enslave them using the metal from his shield. The Amazons were saved from their enslavement by their queen Hypolita’s cunning plan to choke out their enslave with her own chains. On the run from man’s world, Hera guided the Amazons to their new home, Themyscira where they lived in peace for centuries entirely separate from men and man’s cruelty.

Hypolita’s life started to feel empty, filled with a cosmic longing to be a mother (Marsden had strange theories just go with it), she crafted a doll out of clay. Hera decided to breathe life into the doll and the doll was named Diana and became princess of the Amazons.

The peaceful man free life could not last forever, and washed up on the shores of Themyscira was an American spy called Steve Trevor. Diana filled with compassion decided to heal this stranger back to health, but being a man he was not allowed to stay. Hypolita declared that a champion from the Amazons must accompany him, and this would be decided with a contest for the strongest Amazon to take up the mantle of “WONDER WOMAN”. Diana entered the contest in disguise so that her mother would not know it was her and won the contest. Now with all the tools of the Amazons Diana became Wonder Woman and started punching Nazi’s. 

So How does this fair against the Monomyth, well being made of clay and brought to life by the goddess of women and motherhood qualifies as a special birth. Steve Trevor’s injured body is a call to adventure, the order becomes skewed by her trial coming before she leaves home so does her new identity. in some retellings she is betrayed by Hypolita who casts her out for lying to her. No form of atonement is made but that is the end of the story and this origin is the beginning of the story so its nearly a perfect Monomyth. 6/8

Robin the Boy Wonder

First Appearance of Origin Story Detective Comics 38 (Bill Finger, Bob Kane and Jerry Robinson)

The youngest of a group of Circus acrobats called “the Flying Graysons”, Dick was skilled acrobat. But the Circus they worked for wasn’t doing so well and it’s owner Mr Haly was heavily in debt to a mobster called Tony Zucco. When Haly refuses to pay Zucco he sabotages his star attraction the Flying Grayson, with his parents dying Dick Grayson is left orphaned. Bruce Wayne happened to be watching the Circus that night and changed into Batman to hunt down the criminals who escaped. Bruce Wayne adopted Dick and trained him to be his sidekick, they then team up for the first time to hunt down the extortioners and well superhero comics the good guys win the bad guys lose.

This isn’t really a heroes story, Robin was introduced a sidekick but it was worth a look. This one doesn’t score as well as Wonder Woman’s, Dick doesn’t have a special birth, theres no real call to Adventure, although other tellings of Robin’s origins he choses to be Batman’s sidekick this one seems more like he’s just told to be his sidekick. Theres no atonement as in the early part of the story Dick doesn’t do anything, theres no trial he’s just given his position. 4/8

Green Lantern

First Appearance of Origin Story Showcase 22 (John Broome and Gil Kane)

An Alien crashes his spaceship on earth, dying he needs somebody to carry on his legacy as the Green Lantern of 2814. The Ring chooses Test Pilot Hal Jordan to become the Green Lantern. Abin Sur (aforementioned alien) instructs Hal on how to use his ring.

This one is complicated as the actual origin strip is very short and barely a story, later retellings of this (like Secret origin by Geoff Johns and Ivan Reis) expand it with things like a trial and full lantern training from the Guardians of Oa and Kilowog and a mentor relationship with Sinestro, as well as a subplot around his father and redemption for his teenage rebellion.

So actual strip 3/8 and Secret Origin 6/8

Fantastic Four

First Appearance of Origin Story Fantastic Four 1 (Jack Kirby and Stan Lee)

At the height of the Space Race a private company set up their own shuttle to go into space. But this being a space race, the Russians had made further advancements, and not wanting to be left behind 4 intrepid adventures took the shuttle out before it had been tested. Without proper safety tests, the shuttle was vulnerable to Cosmic rays, this altered the giving them superpowers. Reed Richard the lead scientist was given the ability to stretch, his lab assistant Susan gained the ability to turn invisible, Ben the test pilot (who had the biggest doubts about taking the shuttle out) was transformed into an orange rock monster and Johnny who is there for some reason was able to burst into flames and fly.

After crashing to earth the four declared they would use their new powers for the betterment of all mankind and dubbed themselves the FANTASTIC FOUR.

So how does this fit in well, Call to Adventure, leaving home for a new world, there is a trial in plotting the shuttle, and a rebirth. 4/8

Daredevil

First Appearance of Origin Story Daredevil 1 (Stan Lee and Bill Everrett) 

One day crossing the street Matt Murdoch was almost hit by a truck which spilled chemicals into his eyes, this blinded him but also gave him amazing other powers. His father who was the boxer Battling Jack Murdoch was having trouble making ends meet and agreed to take a fall in a Boxing match to pay his sons medical bills. However Jack refused to take the fall deciding he’d be a better father to Matt if he was a good example. But the Fixer and his goons did not like his change of heart and killed him.

Matt Grew up to become a criminal defence lawyer, but he also secretly fought crime. One day finding the Fixer and tries to catch up to put him on trial, but the Fixer being an older man now when being chased suffers a heart attack.

You wouldn’t think it but… 6/8 

Dr Strange

First Appearance of Origin Strange Tales 115 (Steve Ditko)

Important note unlike all the other character Dr Strange first appeared full formed in Strange Tales 110. This origin was some what of a revision and Dr Strange was made to be less asian. He was also only Master of the Mystic Arts and still under the tutelage of the Ancient One until Marvel Premiere 5.

The Brilliant and selfish surgeon Stephen Strange gets into a car crash. This causes his hands to no longer work properly, and he cannot continue as a surgeon. Seeking a cure for his hands he travels to india (later retelling make it tibet) where he meets the Sorcerer Supreme The Ancient One who refuses to heal him for his selfish actions. Instead Stephen trains in the mystic arts, but the other student Mordo has made a deal with Dormammu to try and kill the Ancient One. Stephen tries to warn him, but has a spell cast on him by Mordo to prevent him from doing so, Strange learns more Mystic Arts to defend his teacher, thus proving himself to the Ancient One. The Ancient One also tells Stephen he was destined to be a Sorcerer.

7/8

HellBoy

First Appearance of Origin HellBoy 1-4/Seed of Destruction (Mike Mignola and John Byrne)

in 1944 The Nazi’s where losing the war and they called upon the help of Rasputin the former advisor to the Czar. Rasputin’s actually had an ulterior motive, that was not to let the Germans win World War 2 but to summon a Demon who would be the destroyer of the earth. The Allies intercepted the Demon who was far less impressive than you’d expect (in fact he was just a baby Demon). The Allies raised him in the BPRD (the Bureau of Paranormal Research and Defence), he grew especially close to Dr Trevor Bruttenholm who he’d even refer to as Father.

Then in 1991 Bruttenholm is killed by a frog monster, Hellboy finds his dead father and declares revenge and confronts Rasputin in the catacombs of Cavendish Hall. The 2 Battle and Hellboy is the victor, Rasputin tells Hellboy he can’t escape his destiny of being the destroyer of earth. HellBoy refuse to accept this.

Now I really oversimplified the story but with this one being about 20 times longer than the rest of them (most of them didn’t fill a full comic book and this is 4 issues). But this is just for analysis of a specific thing so you’re just here for the number.  4.5/8 he only gets half for leaving his home-world as he summoned as a demon.

Conclusion

The Monomyth formulae clearly exists to some degree as non of them got 0/8 but due to the nature of these just being origin stories certain elements end up getting used in later stories. Also the longer a version of the origin the more elements from the Monomyth get incorporated, Green Lantern is a good example of this, his original version of his origin is really short and later version like First Flight and Secret Origin (First Flight not mentioned earlier because it’s an animated movie and not a comic but it would score 7/8) which are both longer get more Monomyth elements. That said many writers are aware of the Monomyth and will be using it as template for their Heroic stories.

The Most Epic Crossover you've probably never heard of

Since a Disney Exec said “Infinity War” is the most “Epic Crossover ever” the internet has been set on a mission to disprove this. Stating any number of things being the actual biggest crossover in the history of media. Yet many things seem to have been forgotten about with more abundant meme’s claiming Kingdom Hearts or the Episode of Batman 66 where Batman meets the Green Hornet.

Well now it’s my turn to give my candidate 2011-2016’s War of the Independents published by Red Anvil Comics, boasting 200 characters from various independent publishers over 4 comics. Unfortunately unless you know the american independent comics you’re reaction to every new character will be “Who?” because honestly I’ve only heard of about 6 of them in the book and well it’s also lacking in any form of story (not really a surprise it’s by Scott “why does nobody like me” Lobdell).

The Crossover I’d actually like to talk about has characters even non-Comic readers will know (and a couple of the 200 from War of the Independents). I’m here to tell you about Gen 13 issue 13. So what exactly is Gen 13 issue 13, is it called 13 because thats how many guests are in it? 

Created by Jim Lee, Brandon Choi and J. Scott Campbell, Gen 13 is a comic series about 5 teenage runaways hiding from an evil Government agency called International Operations, who gave them superpowers looking for “Gen-Factors” which the team all conveniently inherited from there fathers who where part of the Black Op’s group called Team 7 which also had resident human Grifter from Jim Lee’s other image comics (later Wildstorm when he split from image and later sold his studio to DC Comics). The series was created to increase the number of books produced by image after Rob Liefeld’s departure from the publisher, it was also from Jim Lee and J Scott Campbell to try and distance themselves from image’s style that Rob Liefeld innovated on of lumpy costumes and big guns. So instead we got hot girls in small skin-tight costumes and making wisecracks while smiling. The stories in the series generally focused on 3 out of the 5 characters more than the others, Caitlin Fairchild a 6 foot 6 computer genius who is strong enough to lift a 16 wheeler truck over her head, Caitlin before her transformation was always ignored by boys and many stories revolve around her coming to terms with her new body and releasing what sleazes men can be all while trying not to lose her sweet trusting nature. Roxy Spaulding whose easily identified by the pink streak in her hair and Leather Jacket, youngest member of the team and has telekinetic powers but to avoid the cliche they claim Gravity powers and Edmund P Chang (the focal character of issue 13) who I can best describe as an asian version of Jack Black as a superhero who the artists seem to forget is asian (similar to Jubilee in X-men). Oh and Bobby Lane also known as Burnout and Sarah Rainmaker are also in the team (with the powers of The Human torch from the Fantastic Four and Storm from the X-men respectively).

So other than the titular team of the book who is in Gen 13 issue 13 a comic so big it had to be separated into 3 comics. confusingly marked 13A, B and C which is confusing to anyone who hasn’t read one because A, B and C are often used to mark variant covers of comics, which actually makes things worse considering the meta-commentary of the comic.

The only thing I’ve got left to do is to give you a plot summary because I could just list characters (but I could easily just be listing all my favourite 90’s indie comic characters). The Comic opens with Gen 13 at a comic book store and some nerd takes the variant cover he wants for issue 1 of Captain Pyro, Grunge slips and bashes his head and enters a dream where Sequential Art is under attack from the Frenzy Beast. Grunge wakes up in a Diner with a fairy who looks a lot like Roxy and the Riverdale Gang (Archie Andrews, Ronnie, Jughead, Betty and Veronica) where Ronnie tells Grunge about the Valley of the Dolls which he can get to if he follows the Yellowbrick road accompanied by Roxy-Tink. On his travels on the Yellowbrick road he finds non-other than the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles trapped in a pile of their own merchandise which the Evil Frenzy Beast trapped them in, and they now only wish to be comic book heroes (a feeling I share anytime I hear news anything about Rise of the TMNT). After saving what was then image comics biggest acquisition he find Fone Bone (from Jeff Smith’s multiple Eisner winning series Bone) in trouble being tortured by the Rat Creatures (also from Bone). Being selfless Superheroes Grunge and Roxy save Fone from his captors and come across the Beans from Larry Marders Beanworld comic strips, who after almost being eaten give directions to image world. Where in quick succession we get Savage Dragon kicking out the Incredible Hulk and Wonder Woman from a club, and a scene of 2 Rob Liefeld character parodies (but they could easily be real ones he was better at coming up with generic characters and team names than finishing comics) reading an evictions notice.

Travelling through Image-Land Grunge goes to a tower where he finds Jim Lee who gives him a magical item from one of his previous jobs.  Trying to find this Valley Grunge then meets Spawn who tells him he’d be crazy to go there which causes Mike Allred’s Madman to show up as his escort. Continuing their journey he then meets up with The Maxx and Rainmaker (now in Julie Winters Jungle Queen outfit) who are ambushed by the Frenzy Beasts “Bad-Girls” whose membership includes Witchblade and Lady Mortem (a parody of Lady Death because somebody had to be a spoil sport and not let them use their characters well other than Rob Liefeld). Grunge is then saved by Shi (from her self title series created by William Tucci), Katchoo and Francine (from Strangers in Paradise). They then travel by convertible to the final battle against the Frenzy Beast, where Hellboy, Monkeyman and O’Brien both on loan Dark Horse Comics and created by Mike Mignola and Art Adams, as for Monkeyman and O’Brien just imagine a series where Beast from the X-men and She Hulk team up and you’re not a million miles away. All Our heroes are set upon by the Frenzy Beasts minions (and it’s quite hard to keep track of everyone that is there) until Grunge confronts the Frenzy Beast one on One after getting motivated by motivational speaker Anthony Robbins and using that thing Jim Lee gave him to summon up non other than Wolverine to defeat the Frenzy beasts minions. Grunge one on one with the Frenzy beast realises that the problem with the comics in the 90’s was that there was more a focus on collecting and variant covers than on actual storytelling and defeats him, once conscious Grunge gives up his Chromium variant back to the nerd and realises that there are more important things to comics than hoarding them like enjoying them with friends. A bit hypocritical considering this series opened with 13 variant covers for issue 1 (I also have 2 copies of issue 1).

 

So is it the most Epic Crossover ever? well it has a story and all the characters. But if you think my summary was jarring the comic has pretty much the same pace, and very few of the cameos actually contribute to the plot. But it is nice to see them all drawn by J. Scott Campbell.

And the actual thing a Disney exec said was “most ambitious” and yes Infinity War is the most ambitious, purely by it being a film and requiring even more people to make, not just by the addition of an actor for each character but special effects artists, musicians for the film score.

But it was nice to dig out this obscure piece of comics history and trivia, especially as due to various right holders changing I doubt there will be another trade of it and the one Image printed people are charging extortionate prices for so you’re only real hope to get it legally is to stumble upon it at a 2nd hand comic store.

Sex Criminals Volume 1 (One Weird trick) REVIEW

Hey did you know there are non-Superhero comics, yeah even more surprising their are comics made by publishers other than Marvel and DC. Sorry I had to point this out, but its a weird assumption people have. So What is Sex Criminals about? And Why Did I chose to write about this instead of any other Comic. Well I thought this book needed highlighting more than it does, partially because it’s title is so hard to Google, seriously from the title it could be about any pervert. 

Sex Criminals is about Jon and Suzie a couple who meet and find out they have the same superpower, in a strange world where Superpowers are activated by Orgasming, (so I’d think twice before shaking Superman’s hand). Written by Matt Fraction who is probably best known for his controversial runs on X-men and Iron Man where he was criticised for having too much of “A Hipster sense of Humour”, because he’d credit Cyclops as “owner of a Jetpack” (I don’t understand why thats a problem if I owned a Jetpack I’d tell everyone, everyday). Fraction was also around the time of the books initial release disliked enough that he was given the Fantastic 4 to write after editorial mandates forced Jonathan Hickman off the book and Fraction was expected to make the sales tank far enough that Marvel could cancel the book (he failed in this objective and it took James Robinson to accomplish Marvels goal). Art duties on Sex Criminals are held up by Chip Z’Darsky (and possibly some of the writing), Z’Darsky’s art in this book has a very matter of fact attitude to it, which is probably what distinguishes the book from pornography to being about a world with Pornography in it. Or it could be that it exists in the Sitcom idea of pornography where every movie has a funny title and pornstars have crafted their names to immaculately fit the movie they’re making. Also unlike Z’Darsky’s other work these jokes are throwaways where as in say his run on Howard the Duck any one of these jokes like “the Bondage James Bondage Handcuffs” would be the punchline not the opener or would go on far too long for anyone to care about it.

The way the story is told is unusual for a comic, in fact the language of the comic is more like a film. Seriously pretentious comic fans will talk about “Cinematic storytelling” to either try and explain that it uses both words and pictures to tell a story (despite comic strips in some form have existed long before celluloid) or to justify Bryan Hitch’s slow pace and black panel gutters. Sex Criminals is not an action movie with a slow pace that you wish would hurry up to the shooty-bits, it’s more like a Woody Allan movie or John Hughes, it heavily uses “Direct mode of address” (the characters talk directly to the audience or 4th wall breaks) for Suzie to tell her life story. It could easily be converted straight to film but unlike Watchmen which Zack Snyder tried to do this it wouldn’t lose it’s meaning moving from a melodramatic medium to one where people actually move.

The book also humanises all of it’s characters even a minor one (who they don’t actually meet in this volume) Jasmine St. Cocaine, a pornstar that Jon has a certain attachment and Suzie looks a bit like. She gets to defend herself against Suzies accusations about all pornstars.

I should probably actually mention something about the plot, umm… Girl meets boy, boy quotes Lolita, they decide to rob a bank to save a library.