The year of the comics

It’s Jerry Grayson’s fault. He knows all these people with opinions about comics and culture, and as the geek social fallacies would advise, said, “Hey, if I get all my friends together, they’ll be friends too!!” Which actually worked this time, for a jam let’s-all-try-it discussion for his own 1972 Project.

The whites, part 2

Here’s my next post about white people. Specifically, the one who isn’t there.

Balancing what exactly

I nipped back to the States for GenCon, to learn it’s culturally way too soon for me to set foot back there, but also to have some good times. I did see the full solar eclipse, but alas, gained no super-powers.

Scary war

I completely missed war comics as a kid, and the reason is easy: the covers scared the shit out of me, the few I found in the pile of comics I’d inherited, e.g. Sgt. Rock, no less than those I’d see on the stands when I started buying comics, like Weird War Tales and War is Hell.

The Baxter Building bathtub

September is Cosmic Zap month here at Doctor Xaos Comics Madness blog, and this is the last one for the series. I’m including this post on a Tuesday because this year brought us a September woefully short on Sundays and Thursdays, and because I wanted to finish the formal series on a more hopeful note. Namely, reading Lee and Kirby’s Fantastic Four with my kids.

Superstar

September is Cosmic Zap month here at Doctor Xaos Comics Madness. Today I’m talking about the heroes of the Zap, and their common concept: hippie Jesus.

It was already happening

September is Cosmic Zap month here at Doctor Xaos Comics Madness, and today I’m talking about its remarkably early onset.

Paint my van

September is Cosmic Zap month here at Doctor Xaos Comics Madness. “Cosmic Zap” was Steve Gerber’s term for the proliferation of mystic, space-SF, psychedelic stories throughout Marvel Comics and perhaps comics in general during the mid-70s, especially those written and illustrated by Jim Starlin. I’m posting about it through the month because it’s my birthday (the 4th).

That duck, ’nuff said

Where to start? It’s not too surprising that Marvel featured an in-fiction parody character, right? There have been quite a few of them, and in an era of constantly-launched and constantly-canceled comics titles, of complete editorial chaos, of plummeting sales in the obsolete newsstand venue, and badly-stumbling attempts to get superheroes into other media, Howard was a solid hit.

Today is for taboo II

The topic is Marvel mutanthood and racism, and its relationship both to prejudice against black Americans and to Jewish-American identity, or a sector thereof. It’s the sequel to Today is for taboo earlier this month.

Justice comes by night

What would you do?

BONUS POST: Thanks to Larry Lade and his June pledge at the Doctor Xaos Patreon! When I talk about “stepping out of the river,” I’m talking about Marvel superheroes and titles very similar to them. It doesn’t mean no comics at all, and that holds especially for 1992 or so, when I phased out of superheroes but continued buying tons of titles, and became a dedicated comics pusher upon my entire social life for about the next 15 years.

Fizzle

FOOM #11

In 1976, my first issue of FOOM came in the mail, about Jack Kirby’s return to Marvel. He actually hadn’t been gone all that long, but at that time DC and Marvel were perceived as Ormadz and Ahriman, and even that was too vague for me to process because the Marvel fanfare said nothing about what he’d been doing during his … uh, hiatus “over there,” i.e., the New Gods collectively speaking, and others.