Rants & Raves

FINAL FOUR

The last issue of Marvel’s flagship title, Fantastic Four No. 588, ends the series on a suitably quiet note. No words are spoken for 40 of the book’s 48 pages, as the remaining FF and most of the rest of the Marvel Universe mourn the death of Johnny Storm, aka the Human Torch.  Even Doom shows up and, uncharacteristically, says nothing. The usual volubility of the Marvel minions is muted, silent, out of respect, we assume, for the traditions of mourning: there are no words to express genuine grief.

Only on the last eight pages do any characters speak — and then only Spider-Man and young Franklin as the Webslinger tries to comfort the youngster and help him come to grips with the death of a relative. The two perch on an upper ledge of a tall building, enveloped by the silence of a distant cityscape.  Writer Jonathan Hickman displays a deft hand in conducting a conversation that broaches the delicate subject directly but without maudlin sentiment. Nicely done.

Nick Dragotta’s pictures are exemplars of clarity, no fussy feathering here — just linear definition, enhanced by Paul Mounts’ colors. And Mark Brooks turns in a similar linear performance for the Spider-Man and Franklin epilogue, “Uncles.” After that, Hickman explains the reason for ending the title and starting anew.

The idea, apparently, is to revive the FF as the seminal superhero club: the original group has become, over the years, a little set in their ways, let’s say, but the new bunch (a quartet again with the addition of Spider-Man) will necessarily be “a modern Marvel Universe book.” Saith Hickman: the relaunch is “about injecting the First Family back into the Marvel Universe proper.” And for that, they get new uniforms.

For the legions of Marvel fans, ending the company’s flagship title seems almost blasphemous, but at least, the last issue of Fantastic Four is a stunningly memorable one.

FIRST ISSUE: THE MISSION

An admirable first issue must, above all else, contain such matter as will compel a reader to buy the second issue. At the same time, while provoking curiosity through mysteriousness, a good first issue must avoid being so mysterious as to be cryptic or incomprehensible. And, thirdly, it should introduce the title’s principals, preferably in a way that makes us care about them. Fourth, a first issue should include a complete “episode”—that is, something should happen, a crisis of some kind, which is resolved by the end of the issue, without, at the same time, detracting from the cliffhanger aspect of the effort that will compel us to buy the next issue.

In The Mission, writers Jon and Erich Hoeber offer a leisurely paced horror story in which an unassuming protagonist, Paul — just an ordinary white-collar worker in the ordinary albeit recession-infected corporate world — is given a mission by a stranger who calls himself Gabriel. The assignment: kill a man named Neal Corman. Paul is suitably appalled (pardon the expression) and declines the dubious honor. But Gabriel (“You can call me Gabe”) has powers — and he demonstrates that he can kill Paul by giving him cancer. Paul still resists, but he finds Corman, who is playing with his, Corman’s, daughter.

Contemplating the scene, Paul thinks Corman is a loving father, possibly “the dad of the year.” But when he goes into the courtroom where the custody of the daughter is being decided, he watches in horror as Corman pulls out a pistol and starts killing people. Suddenly, Paul realizes that if he’d completed his mission as Gabriel directed, the lives Corman snuffed out would have been spared. The first issue ends there, a stunning cliffhanger.

During domestic interludes at his home, Paul shows himself to be a loving husband and father, a caring individual — not admirable, perhaps, but one of us. One of the issue’s completed episodes is Paul’s first encounter with Gabriel; another is his second encounter except this one ends with Paul seemingly accepting his assignment. Still, the purpose of a completed episode is served: we see the protagonist in action, his personality on display.

The Hoebers’ tale is visualized by Werther dell-Edera with stark simplicity: bold lines, spare shading, plenty of solid blacks. The backgrounds are a little too geometric for my taste (they seem draw with a ruler and a compass), but they provide the essential locale and do not detract from the story, which is otherwise amply illuminated by the pictures.

 

FIRST ISSUE: BUTCHER BAKER

An admirable first issue must, above all else, contain such matter as will compel a reader to buy the second issue. At the same time, while provoking curiosity through mysteriousness, a good first issue must avoid being so mysterious as to be cryptic or incomprehensible. And, thirdly, it should introduce the title’s principals, preferably in a way that makes us care about them. Fourth, a first issue should include a complete “episode”—that is, something should happen, a crisis of some kind, which is resolved by the end of the issue, without, at the same time, detracting from the cliffhanger aspect of the effort that will compel us to buy the next issue.

BUTCHER BAKER by writer Joe Casey and artist Mike Huddleston is a hilarious send-up of superhero comics. To begin with the most obvious quality, the first issue is a pulsatingly exuberant hodge-podge of drawing styles, from crisp black-and-white line to smattering brushwork, flecked occasionally with blue and red color, enhanced by full color (mostly fleshy tones) whenever Baker, “the Righteous Maker,” is in an amorous mood, surrounded by toothsome barenekidwimmin — which he is, often.

Much of the tale is narrated in the nastiest gonzo street argot by Baker, who flashes back and forth through a career of mayhem (“the greatest life ever lived,” he says), but he eventually gets to the business at hand: hired by Jay Leno and Dick Cheney to destroy the specially built prison that incarcerates super villains — and to obliterate said villains at the same stroke — Baker sets off in his “beloved Liberty Belle,” the super-powered cab of an 18-wheeler, eventually reaching his destination and incinerating the prison, the Crazy Keep, blowing it up and all inside, an act Baker feels “might end up as my Greatest Triumph — a final act of pure righteousness — but it’s not, not even close.” Well then, what is? Tune in next issue.

In ending the first issue on a note of ostensible triumph for Butcher Baker, Casey and Huddleston have, seemingly, unhinged the cliff-hanger mechanism by which we are usually seduced into buying subsequent issues. But the cliff-hanger is vital only to serial stories that depend upon plots, and Butcher Baker apparently does not: it depends, instead, upon the outrageous personality of its protagonist.

Baker’s obscenity-enriched rant throughout is characterization enough — and his carnal sybaritic lifestyle completes the picture. The finishing touches are added with the issue’s other complete episode (other than the blowing up of the Crazy Keep), which involves Baker and the state trooper who goes after him, perceiving, rightly, that Baker in the Liberty Belle, passing by at 127 mph, is exceeding all speed limits combined and therefore sets off in heated pursuit. Baker, however, foils the lawman, crowding him off the road; whereupon, the trooper, upside-down in his capsized cop car, vows vengeance, saying, “This prick — whoever he is — just made my supreme shit list.” More to come?

We’ll come back because we want to see just how much more scabrous Baker will get in subsequent salacious sallies.

Butcher Baker is the satiric comedy of extremities, making fun of superhero comics and all of us delirious fanboys — and a hoot throughout, picture and story.

EDIE ERNST: USO SINGER, ALLIED SPY

Edie Ernst: USO Singer, Allied Spy (96 8.5x11-inch pages, b/w; Pib Press paperback, $19.99) by Brooke McEldowney is an absolutely enthralling story of love and sex and the tenterhooks of espionage. This volume reprints the longest continuity in modern comic strip history, the ten-month tale told by the grandmother at McEldowney’s 9 Chickweed Lane about her World War II career as a USO singer. Edie, the grandmother, was, during the 1940s, a spectacularly seductive beauty. She was recruited to spy on German POWs and managed to fall in love with (1) her American handler and (2) a German prisoner who was a superb singer. The former was sent off on a suicidal mission and presumed dead. Edie was separated from the latter at the end of the War. Both, however, show up about ten years later. How Edie deals with two men, both of whose love she returns, passionately, is the rest of McEldowney’s tale, which he tells with his usual narrative flourishes of humor and compassion.

Pib Press is McEldowney’s imprint, so you should order directly from him at either pibpress@gmail.com or Pib Press, P.O. Box 942, Kennebunk, Maine 04043. You won’t regret it.

PEANUTS GUIDE TO LIFE

Only a Peanuts completist needs Peanuts Guide to Life (128 6x6-inch pages, b/w; Running Press hardcover; a Gift Book from Hallmark, $12.95). Instead of reprinting whole strips, the unnamed editors have compiled an assortment of “wise sayings” culled from the strip:  “Life is like an ice cream cone: you have to learn to lick it.” —Charlie Brown; “Keep looking up: that’s the secret of life.” —Snoopy; “When you go someplace nice, you should always shine your feet.” —Snoopy again; “I’ve got to stop this business of talking without thinking.” —Linus; “I guess babysitters are like used cars: you never really know what you’re getting.” —Schroeder. Each saying appears alone on a page in Schulz’s distinctive lettering style, and facing that page is a picture of the person being quoted. Altogether, about 59 wise sayings — enough, surely, for a lifetime.

MIKE LESTER

Rome (Georgia) News-Tribune editorial cartoonist Mike Lester has once again garnered one of the most prestigious awards in journalism: the Society of Professional Journalists Sigma Delta Chi Award for Editorial Cartooning in newspapers under 50,000 circulation. The awards recognize the best in professional journalism in print, radio, television and online for 2010. Lester won the award for his work in 2006, too.

Lester’s cartoons, distinguished, in my view, by their antic exaggeration, are published on the Opinion page of the daily News-Tribune (and online at RN-T.com) as well as all around the country through syndication with Cagle Cartoons. The paper’s report went on: “In addition to his work as an editorial cartoonist, Lester is an artist whose work ranges from advertising and marketing graphics to illustrations for children's books and licensed products. A new book he illustrated, Scritch-Scratch, recently received a glowing review in the New York Times and his A Is for Salad made the paper’s Top 10 list. The University of Georgia alum has spent the past 25 years as a commercial artist, illustrator, cartoonist, animator and writer. He's been with the Rome News-Tribune since 2002.

Said Lester: "I'm quite honored to win the Sigma Delta Chi Award and want to thank our entire newspaper staff, but specifically our editorial department — Kathy Davis and John Willis — whose job it is to reel me in from time to time. They might need to tighten the drag a bit. But mostly I want to thank our readers, advertisers and everyone in our community who depend on the Rome News-Tribune to stay in touch with their community and their world. An informed populace is indeed vital."

When I was studiously conversing with Lester at the Memorial Day weekend meeting of the National Cartoonists Society, he remarked that the Rome News-Tribune was the best paper with circulation under 50,000 in the country. I asked him the names of others. He stopped. Thought hard. Then said: “I guess there aren’t any. Sorta takes the glow off the award, doesn’t it?”

A PEANUTS FAN'S DELIGHT

With The Complete Peanuts: 1979-1980 (340 6.5x8.5-inch landscape pages, b/w; hardcover, $28.99), Fantagraphics’ landmark series reprinting all of Charles M. Schulz’s masterwork reaches the fifteenth volume. Published at the rate of two volumes a year, without fail, each book a quiet triumph of understated design by Seth. This volume begins with a Foreword by tv’s Al Roker, who was the last to interview Schulz as the cartoonist was slowly, day by day, dying.

Roker tells us he was a comic strip fan since he was seven, when he discovered Peanuts. He dreamed of becoming a cartoonist (or, “better, an animator”) and clipped and saved Peanuts, pasting them up in a notebook in strict chronological order and rejoicing when, at the age of 12, he saw Franklin, a kid who looked like him—i.e., an African American—arrive in the strip in July 1968. By then, Roker had discovered the Fawcett-Crest reprints of the strip, realizing that “somebody” had stolen his idea, collecting all the strips in book form.

The book, as all its predecessors, concludes with an exhaustive index to the content and a short biography of Schulz by publisher Gary Groth. This massive archive-worthy reprint project has only twenty years to go, ten more volumes. Three strips to a page, every page dated. A historian’s dream. A Peanuts fan’s delight.