"Back in the Day" Review: Daredevil #196

Back in the Day: Daredevil #196 (July 1983) by Denny O'Neil & Klaus Janson

Thirty years ago this gem was released which tells the story of how Daredevil met Wolverine for the first time. Instead of initially fighting like most team-ups, the two are aware of each other and mostly get along. Of course it’s Wolverine from 30 years ago so he spends the issue pushing buttons while the Daredevil from 30 years ago spends the issue judging him for being too violent.

The issue starts in the hospital Bullseye is in (his spine is broken). Wolverine is there, acting on a tip from Tarkington Brown that the people who laced his skeleton with adamantium are looking to do the same with Bullseye, when there is an attack and during the confusion, Wolverine inhales knockout gas and is shot. When he wakes up, Daredevil is on the scene and the two quickly decide to team-up to locate Bullseye.

Along the way there’s disagreement about how violent Wolverine is but, to his credit, Wolverine manages to either brush the comments off with a joke or to imply that Daredevil is too soft. Daredevil never lectures and Wolverine doesn’t try to punch him – which was unusual for both each character back then. I loved it because they mostly got along and because it was Daredevil and Wolverine in one issue.

I never could resist a superhero team-up and back then Wolverine didn’t have his own title or routinely appear in 10 titles a month. This issue isn’t the greatest example of Daredevil’s greatness (it was just a few issue past Frank Miller’s brilliant run on the title) but a great classic team-up. I don’t know when Wolverine learned Daredevil’s secret identity but now you know when they first met.

“Back in the Day” review: Uncanny X-men #167

Uncanny X-men #167 (March 1983)

The X-Men have been lost in space for months (the entire saga was about 10 issues long) fighting the Brood. Presumed dead, Charles Xavier recruited a new team, The New Mutants. Having survived all the Brood had to dish out they discover one more embryo may be in play and that Professor Xavier could be its host. So the X-Men return to earth with a vengeance, desperately trying to get to Professor Xavier before it’s too late. After a short battle with The New Mutants, they discover they are too late – Professor Xavier is a Brood Queen.

I am a huge New Mutants fan and when this issue came out, I was excited. Finally the New Mutants and the X-Men meet. And, of course, they fight. Unlike most first superhero battles over a misunderstanding, the X-Men realize that the New Mutants aren’t the enemy but they don’t have time to explain. While the two teams mix it up below, Kitty tries to get close enough to zap Professor X with a blaster she's carrying but hesitates when she sees him looking normal and asleep. But she comes to regret that decision immediately - the Brood Queen is already in control.

Then the X-Men and New Mutants watch as Professor X makes the metamorphosis from human to Brood. The X-Men manage to bring the queen down but Cyclops and Wolverine argue over what to do with it. Wolverine's solution: kill it. The irony of course is that 30 years later, Cyclops will kill Professor X during the "Avengers vs X-Men" series and it will be Wolverine who looks down on him for killing. Actually, I don't know if that's irony...it may just be weird.

With the Starjammer in orbit, the X-Men and New Mutants are all brought up to await news about Professor X's condition. They can't reverse the metamorphosis but they do have a genetic sample so they're able to clone a new body for him and drop his consciousness into it. So Professor X not only survives being turned into a Brood, but gets a new body that can walk!

Chris Claremont wraps up the Brood storyline with a lot of twists, turns, and payoffs. In one issue we get the X-Men’s return to earth, the first time the team meets the New Mutants, Professor Xavier transformed into a Brood Queen, and his consciousness being transferred into a cloned body…that can walk.

Paul Smith’s art is as clean and beautiful as I remember it. Each of the characters has their own unique look and, thanks to Claremont, unique voice, something that currently gets lost when month after month there are several writers putting their own stamp on each character. When this issue came out, Wolverine was only appearing once a month but now he’s a regular in three or more. This issue shows the team strong and in action but also shows some of their weaknesses: Nightcrawler fears that the New Mutants will not accept him and Storm feels replaced by Kitty's affection for Peter and Illyana. It also shows great character moments between Scott and his father.

There's also a nice moment when Gladiator shows up to deliver the news that Galactus was dying and the Fantastic Four saved him and how angry she is. She delivers a hologram message to the team in the middle of the night to tell them that they just saved an entity that destroys entire worlds just to sustain itself, to remind them that they aren't the only people in the galaxy, and to brand them as criminals. It reminds you that the Marvel Universe has a lot going on in it without going overboard with confrontations. That practice of checking in on other heroes in other titles continues today and maintains the illusion of a cohesive universe.

At the end of the book, with everyone safe and the X-Men and the New Mutants under one roof, Professor X decides Kitty should be on a team with members closer to her age and makes her a New Mutant. Of course this leads to one the best in-jokes: Professor X is a jerk!

My only complaint, reading this issues after all these years, is how slow Wolverine is getting up the stairs. He's starting up the stairs when Sunspot jumps at him and is swatted away. Then there's enough time for Wolverine to stand there while Sunspot composes himself and jumps on his back. Chris Claremont is a great writer but he doesn't let anything interfere with a good setup. Still, it's one of my favorite X-Men issues.

 

The X-Men bust into the mansion while The New Mutants are enjoying a little downtime.

Back in the Day: “Tales of the Gold Monkey” review

In 1981, Steven Spielberg gave us Raiders of the Lost Ark. In 1982, ABC Television gave us Tales of the Gold Monkey. I was a huge fan of Raiders of the Lost Ark and I was only nine years old when Tales of the Gold Monkey started airing. Back in 1982, if you saw something at the movies or something on television there wasn’t the option of going to a video store and renting it or buying it. You pretty much had to wait until it aired again as a rerun or until it got to syndication.

So it’s been 30 years since I’ve seen Tales of the Gold Monkey and it’s been out on DVD for a while now. I thought about buying it when it first came out but it was very expensive. I put it on my Netflix queue and it’s been sitting there for a few years. Recently Amazon.com has lowered the price of the series so I decided to queue it up at Netflix and give it a shot.

With most old shows that you watched when you were a kid, you tend to think they’re very good shows until you see them again as an adult. So I just finished watching the two-part pilot episode, and I’m ready to see more.

For those of you not familiar with the show, it takes place in the South Pacific in 1938. It features Stephan Collins as Jake Cutter, a freelance pilot living on Boragora with his dog Jack and his mechanic Corky. In the first episode Jake meets Sarah Stickney White who appears to be a damsel in distress but turns out to be an American spy. Because it’s set in the South Pacific and bears a very close resemblance to Raiders of the Lost Ark, they don’t shy away from (at least it looks like) homages to the first Indiana Jones movie and to Casablanca.

GOOD: Jake Cutter and his dog, Jack, have a very interesting relationship. Even 30 years later I remembered that one bark meant “no” and two barks meant yes. Stephen Collins is a convincing action star and I’m not sure why he didn’t get a lot of opportunities to show that on the big screen. It reminds me of Nathan Fillion who was extremely powerful as the captain in Firefly but is now relegated to a show where he’s not an action hero. It would be great to see either one of them in roles where they got to punch people in the face on a regular basis. Also I’d forgotten how good Corky was. As Jake’s mechanic, they both served together in the military and Corky had saved Jake’s life. But clearly Corky isn’t good at remembering things or controlling his drinking so while Corky fixes the plane Jake takes care of him.

There’s a fantastic appearance from Jonathan Hillerman who plays Fritz. He and the show’s main German spy, who is posing as the minister in town, disagree about who is in charge and Fritz stands in front of a painting of Adolf Hitler and takes off his hat. While they never directly say he is Hitler, the resemblance is uncanny.

In one of the discussions about the legend of the Gold Monkey, they mention a number of the things that Hitler is looking for including the Lost Ark of the Covenant which was a nice Raiders of the Lost Ark reference.

BAD: This is an 80’s show the way I remember them: crappy special-effects and despite the gunfire no one ever gets hit. That’s not necessarily a bad thing, just something I wanted to point out. Sarah Stickney White comes off as the damsel in distress until it’s revealed that she’s an American spy and then she still comes off as the damsel in distress. I’ve read a couple of articles about how Buffy the Vampire Slayer ushered in the era of strong female characters. And I quietly disagreed though I had no proof and thought about old shows like Battlestar Galactica and Tales of the Gold Monkey. In the first episode she gets tied to a tree and when something threatens her she screams for help. I know it was 1982, but even Amy Allen in the A-Team never screamed at any sign of danger. I don’t know she was weak character because it was 1982 or because it was set in 1938.

Also the villains might have scared me as a kid, but as an adult they’re pretty silly. Especially the German soldier who hires Princess Kogi to help him find the Gold Monkey and spends the episode looking terrified of things.

IN CONCLUSION: I don’t know if this series holds up compared to my memory but it’s still a lot of fun to watch. I’m good to give the rest of the episodes a shot and see if it’s worth adding this series to my collection. If you haven’t seen it and you are a big Indiana Jones fan you should give it a look.

“Back in the Day” review: Uncanny X-Men #205

Uncanny X-Men #205 (May 1986)

Thanks to Spiral’s Body Shop, Yuriko has been transformed into the living weapon, Lady Deathstrike. With a few cybernetic mercenaries at her side, she unleashes her new abilities on Wolverine. Injured and disoriented in the South Street Seaport during a blizzard, he runs into an ally who will help him stave off a berserker rage and claim victory:five-year old Katie Power, also known as Energizer of Power Pack. Katie becomes separated from the woman (Teacher? The story never says) taking her to see a choir when the mercenaries run through knocking the woman down during a blizzard.

Wolverine has been hurt so bad he’s reverted to an animal state so Katie has to keep him out of Lady Deathstrike and her mercenaries’ grasp long enough to get his mind back. Thanks to Katie and his healing factor, Wolverine snaps out of it and takes the fight to his enemies.

Back when Chris Claremont was writing the X-Men, he focused on character-driven stories and this issue is a good example of that. He takes time to define Lady Deathstrike and her mission before putting her into action. Katie Power's inner and outer dialogue is as detailed and random as you'd expect from a 5-year-old but he also shows the side of her that belongs to a superhero. With Wolverine, he shows him doing what he does best while relating to and protecting Katie from seeing it. Then there's the confrontation between Wolverine and Lady Deathstrike where they argue their differences. Three distinct characters (Lady Deathstrike, Katie Power, and Wolverine) and Chris Claremont does a wonderful job with all three.

Barry Windsor-Smith did the pencils, inks, and color for the entire book. Sometimes I have a problem with the cover showing something that doesn't actually happen on the inside. But in this case, the cover of what it may have looked like (this book was before the Weapon X mini series in Marvel Comics Presents) when Wolverine got his adamantium mirrors the first few pages of the book where Lady Deathstrike and her mercenaries are getting their cybernetics added. This reminds readers that Wolverine has been through what they've gone through and that the fight is more or less even. Once Wolverine regains his mind and takes the fight to the enemies, the action panels convey all the skill and savagery Wolverine brings to a fight and doesn't pull punches. The gorgeous action scenes that Windsor-Smith draws are hard not to stare at.

The Wolverine/Katie talk at the end of the book is one of the best Wolverine moments. He's known for straight talk and he doesn't lie but he softens the delivery for her benefit and is able to impart some wisdom at the same time. When this issue came out there was no Wolverine series so a solo adventure was rare. This one issue adventure serves to introduce a powerful new foe, show Wolverine doing what he does best, and show the unlikely bonding between Katie and Wolverine.