I don’t know where in my piles of comics I read it, or if it’s even in one I own, but Stan Lee once recounted in a Soapbox how a fan complained to him that Marvel was putting out too many unpopular comics. For heaven’s sake, why not put out books people want to buy?
Lee’s response was sure, that would be great, if we only knew what they wanted. Which sounds obvious, but if it was obvious to everyone, the fan wouldn’t have asked. Nobody knows if your book/comic/movie is going to fly until it meets the audience. This applies not only to new series but reboots, new characters, attempted spin-offs — in short the kind of late 1970/early 1971 stuff I’m covering here.
Case in point, “The Iceman Cometh,” in Amazing Spider-Man #92 (Stan Lee, Gil Kane). In the previous issue Peter crossed paths with Bullitt, a right-wing, law-and-order candidate for New York mayor.
By this point, “law and order!” was a rallying cry for lots of voters. They were horrified by black protests, the Watts riots, campus protests. Plus a much higher crime rate than we see today, which many people blamed on cops being told to respect the rights of the accused — dammit, how can cops prove someone’s guilty if they can’t make illegal searches or force confessions out of them?
(For some Americans that era has lasted forever. Never mind the facts, crime is always at record highs, cities are urban hellholes out of Dirty Harry or Death Wish and liberal politicians are always bleeding hearts tying up the good cops in red tape.)
Richard Nixon won the White House on a law-and-order campaign, which was to a large extent a dog whistle for “crack down on African Americans and hippies.” We’ve already seen one right-wing rabble rouser in Daredevil‘s Buck Ralston —
— and now we have Bullit, hiding a racist core under a tough-on-crime exterior. His campaign for New York DA is manna from heaven to Gwen Stacey. Her father died during a battle between Spider-Man and Dr. Octopus and Gwen wants someone — anyone — to bring in Spider-Man (she is, of course, totally convinced her father’s death is Spider-Man’s fault).
Spider-Man ends up having to kidnap Gwen to cover up his secret identity. That triggers a Hero vs. Hero with Iceman, who’s determined to save that innocent girl from the Spider-Thug. Eventually Iceman learns Bullit is as bad as the webhead says and together they finish off the politician’s goon squads. Though not before we get this page —
(Bullit says worse to Robbie a page or two later). Much as I admire the Lee/Ditko era of Spider-Man, I like that post-Ditko, Jonah’s something more than a heel and a buffoon. Despite my disdain for Hero vs. Hero stories, this issue worked for me.
The Bullpen Bulletins revealed this was a backdoor pilot for a possible Iceman series, which obviously never materialized; I assume that’s because readers didn’t show enough interest. It was the first attempt to revive the X-Men, or at least an X-Man, as a going concern. The next attempt would be the Beast’s series in Amazing Adventures, which lasted all of seven issues. There’s also be guest appearances in Marvel Team-Up, Captain America — but it would take Giant Size X-Men and the introduction of a mostly new team before Marvel’s mutants became a hit.
Speaking of Amazing Adventures …The first four issues launched the Black Widow into her new series (which I’ve blogged about before) with a #1 cover by Jack Kirby and a multipart story by Gary Friedrich and John Buscema (the final chapter was by Mimi Gold and Gene Colan, with a Buscema cover).
It’s a “relevant” story in which Natasha’s cleaning lady begs her to keep the woman’s son from getting into trouble. As part of an activist group, the Young Warriors, the kid intends to take over an unused building owned by Scarola, a city councilman, and turn it into a food kitchen for their neighborhood. The councilman objects, as does the mysterious masked Don and his thugs. It’s the city and the Don against the Young Warriors; fortunately they have Natasha on their side, backed up by pipe-smoking journalist Paul Hamilton. At the end of #4, the Young Warriors have their building and the Don — unmasked as Scarola — has vowed revenge. Natasha’s got a potential recurring foe (though not an interesting one) and a supporting cast as her series progresses.
Only Roy Thomas wrote the next adventure and none of Friedrich’s characters showed up. Indeed, they never showed up again, anywhere, which is remarkable given the number of obscurities from this era that later writers have recycled. Friedrich and Buscema planted a seed but it did not take root.
Now for a seed that bloomed bigger than I imagine Roy Thomas guessed: “The Sword and the Sorceress” in Avengers #84 (art and cover by John Buscema).
As I wrote previously, I’m not sure what Roy’s plans for the Black Knight were, but at this point he seems to have given them up. The Black Knight initially appeared in #48, then semi-regularly until #61… and then nothing until the Avengers’ next encounter with Kang. Then nothing until this issue, which reads like Roy’s decided to retire his sword-slinging superhero.
In the opening, the Black Knight busts a gang of crooks using a helicopter for getaways, then snaps the chopper’s rotor blades with his ebony sword, killing the crooks — well, almost. He rescues them before the helicopter crashes, but his momentary ruthlessness leaves him unsettled. Returning to his castle, Dane reaches out to his ancestor, Sir Percy of Scandia.
This is the first we’ve heard of any sort of curse (and that include the original Black Knight series, I believe). Is it just me or doesn’t that seem like something Dane deserved to know before he agreed to take up the mantle?
The only way to end the curse is to fly to Arkon’s world and destroy the blade in the Well at the Center of Time. Dane flies to Stonehenge where his trans-dimensional Uber driver is…um, the Witch of Stonehenge?
We never learn anything about this crone. I’d assume she’s some trick by the Enchantress, who’s manipulating Arkon to attack the Avengers for her, but nothing in the story confirms that. Perhaps in the MU weird witches hanging out at Stonehenge is a normal sort of thing that needs no explanation (I’ve speculated before that normal life is probably weirder in comics than for us here on Earth-Prime).
Ultimately the Enchantress goes down, Arkon ends up with egg on his face and the sword is destroyed. Given Roy returns it to Dane in Avengers #100, I don’t know if he intended #84 as Dane’s retirement and reconsidered, always planned to bring it back, or what. However the curse, which doesn’t do much but kick off the plot, became a defining feature of the Black Knight over the years, with constant added complications and details about what it does and how it works. I doubt Thomas imagined any of what lay ahead.
One final seed before I sign off: Captain America #133, “Madness in the Slums” (Stan Lee, Gene Colan, Marie Severin cover) has the Falcon and Cap begin their official partnership. While they’ve worked together since Sam Wilson’s costumed debut, it’s been an ad hoc thing, like Superman teaming up with Batman. Now it’s official, reflected by the logo becoming Captain America and Falcon the following issue.
It’s not a particularly good story. Modok, it turns out, hates Cap for being handsome and normal while Modok is a deformed freak (yep, it’s Lee playing with disability cliches again); creating an android to destroy the slums serves the double-purpose of baiting Cap into a trap and luring the slum-dwellers to become unwitting pawns of AIM (Modok spouts lots of Red Skull cliches about stirring up hate to destroy freedom, etc.). It’s still a landmark. As that friendship would define the Falcon on into the MCU, I’d say it’s a seed that flourished.
