Volume 3, Issue 2 of The Spider magazine (July 1934) is as clear an indication as any that Norvell Page (writing as Grant Stockbridge) is not going to pull any punches with his Spider yarns. His first Spider outing saw kids dying from the bubonic plague unleashed by the villain. In this one, we're only a few pages in when a young member of a club of wannabe Baker Street Irregulars, "The Spider Fan Club," is tortured to death by a gang of modern-day pirates using a knife charged with electricity.
This is part of a larger plot where the gang, led by the beautiful villainess who calls herself Captain Kidd, is using a pulpy invention to electrify rails so that that glow with almost magical "green fire" and electrocute all the passengers of trains so their corpses can be robbed without any witnesses. The trains are sent rolling on to their destinations with no one living on board.
It's a hell of a lurid set-up, and Page is up to the challenge of delivering on it. The pirates set some pretty good death traps for the Spider to have to escape from. There's also a bit of a mystery regarding a kidnapped inventors missing granddaughter that isn't a big point but has a nice little payoff.
The only thing missing, maybe, is any hint of femme fatale regarding Captain Kidd. The righteous and driven Spider finds her utterly loathsome (and with her disregard for human life, who can blame him!), and though Page says she is attractive, he doesn't give her the sort of loving description a Robert Howard would have.
Get The Spider: The Corpse Cargohere. Tim Truman did a loose adaptation of this story in comics format in the 1990s.
Xum's Who is a fan expansion of the DC Who's Who by Xum Yukinori, artist, podcaster, and comics fan, who unfortunately passed away in 2019. His son Isamu completed some of Xum's unfinished entries and got them all together for a limited print run. They are gorgeous dives into forgotten corners of the Pre-Crisis DCU.
For instance, Volume I gives entries to the Earth-One Superman and Wonder Woman, characters left out previously because of the erasure of their universe.
Characters deemed too minor for the official run like the Mikaal Tomas Starman, the Teen Titan character Golden Eagle, Lady Cop, and the Batgirl villain Lady Viper get their due. There are also characters whose exclusion from the original run seems odd (Giganta) and some whose exclusion points to the agenda behind the original run's compilation (Sugar & Spike).
I'm still waiting for someone to do an entry for the Black Eagle and his squadron of Tuskegee airmen but despite that lack, Xum's Who is a great thing to have in print.
Presnell's book lacks the first-hand production detail and photos which made Kesler's book so great, but he does offer a solid review of all the episodes and does highlight the historical context of some episodes. He also offers up some fun trivia in infographic format.
I think it's a good addition to the library of any Wild Wild West fan, and for a fan without a copy of Kesler's book, it's essential.
Anticipating receiving the copy of the Micronauts: The Original Marvel Years Omnibus Vol. 2 I preordered soon, I finally got back around to revisiting the contents of the first Micronauts omnibus--stories I haven't re-read in twenty years or more.
I noticed something in those first few issues that I either didn't notice before or had forgotten: the timeline of Baron Karza's rise to power is confusing.
Micronauts #1 (January 1979) by Mantlo and Golden and Rubenstein, opens with the scions of Homeworld's royal family, Prince Argon and Princess Mari being pursued and captured by the forces of the despotic Baron Karza. We are told that the king and queen have been killed, but given their kids are still on the run, every suggestion is that this is a recent event. Karza's coup/revolt appears to be a relatively new thing, though certainly it has been going on long enough he has significant forces at his command and alien allies (the Acroyear) from elsewhere in the Microverse.
Next, we see Arcturus Rann return to Homeworld has his 1000 years long voyage of exploration--and quickly get captured himself. We soon find out that after Rann left on his trip, warp drive was discovered, and the species of the Microverse were connect while he was in flight. "Within six months" of the advent of warp drive (whenever that was) the Microverse was at war thanks to Karza. Rann has heard of Karza. He was his tutor 1000 years ago!
While the information here is unclear, it would suggest at least that Karza's revolt isn't brand new. Perhaps it was centuries after Rann left that warp drive was invented, but whenever it was Karza was in position to launch a war of conquest against other worlds.
Finally, the protagonists of our series are all united in the arena, where Karza and his ally, the Acroyear ruler Shaitan are going to watch their struggles from a position of honor. Shaitan says to Karza:
"It's been almost 24 xats since your insurrection, Karza, and still you enjoy the unswerving loyalty of the rabble!"
We're given no idea how long a xat is, but clearly 24 of them is sufficient time that Shaitan seems surprised the people still support Karza, so I don't think "hours" or "days' would be a good translation.
We also find out Dallah and Sepsis who we've heard people swear by before were Rann's parents. They were deified by the resistance after they were martyred for defying Karza "almost 1000 years ago."
Where does all this leave us?
Almost 1000 years ago, Karza killed the rulers (presumably) of Homeworld Dallah and Sepsis in the Body Banks.
Either that or some other event marks the beginning of his insurrection "24 xats" before the present.
In the present, he has only recently killed the King and Queen of Homeworld (who aren't Dallah and Sepsis), and only at the start of this story manages to capture their children and their entourage.
We're given contradictory clues that Karza somehow both began his coup a long time ago, yet only recently completely it, and we have two royal families with an unclear relationship.
Perhaps there is further information in later stories that would clear this up. Certainly, I can think of a backstory that would make sense of it all, but I do wonder what Mantlo intended?
It's been reported on Mike Grell's website that two volumes of a Mike Grell's The Warlord Omnibus is coming in 2025. What will be in them? Well, certainly First Issue Special #8, Warlord volume 1 issues #1-71 (most of the issues after 52 were either scripted or ghost written by Sharon Grell, but Mike gets sole credit in the issues), Warlord Annual #1, and the 1992 limited series issues #1-6.
The 2006 reboot had nothing to do with Grell's series and is best forgotten. The 16 issues of the 2009 series were written by Grell (and sometimes drawn by him), so hopefully they'll will be in the 2nd omnibus. There's also a guest appearance in Green Arrow (1988) #27-28 by Grell and Jurgens that hopefully gets included.
I wish the full run of the original series was getting collected. Even though the Grell issues are my favorite, I started reading Warlord in the Burkett era/Jurgens era, so I have some nostalgia for that stuff too. Still, if having it relegated to apocrypha is how it must be to get Grell's Travis Morgan saga in omnibus format, then so be it.
There have been a lot of really catchy cartoon theme songs over the decades. Here are ten from American action/adventure cartoons (that call is debatable, but I wanted to exclude strictly comedic ones like The Flintstones, for example) that I think one could make a good case for being among the best. Here they are in chronological order.
Jonny Quest (1964) Trey: This fast-paced, Space Age jazzy number composed by Hoyt Curtin really says action and speaks strongly of the era when it was recorded. According to Curtin in a 1999 interview, the band used for the sessions was a jazz ensemble with four trumpets, six trombones, five woodwind doublers, and a five-man rhythm section including percussion. It stands among the greatest theme songs of all time, period.
Jason: I agree completely, but I must confess I can only regard this banger (and everything before 1985 on this list) through an obscuring mist of nostalgia. Coupled with the attractively Alex Toth-designed highlight reel of explosive violence and weird mystery, this complex, hyper-condensed piece of music captured my tiny heart from the first bongo beats. How could any TV cartoon series live up to the high bar set in this opening sequence? When I saw the show, it was many years in syndication, and the contrast with the then-current Saturday morning fare was profound. Even the theme music was more grown up!
Trey: Like the next one on my list, this catchy tune has escaped from the realm of cartoon themes into pop culture in general, being covered many times and even appearing in-universe in Spider-Man films. It was written by lyricist Paul Francis Webster and composer Bob Harris. The music was recorded at RCA Studios, New Yorks, and the vocals at RCA Studios in Toronto (where the cartoon was produced) featuring 12 CBC vocalists (members of the Billy Van Singers, and Laurie Bower Singers groups).
Jason: Here again, I regard this one as immortal and, in any honest evaluation, rank it among my favorite songs of all time by several entirely subjective criteria. The Ramones version remains my top cover version while the Michael Bublé cover stands unchallenged as my top Michael Bublé song of all time.
Trey: This bubble-gum pop earworm was written by David Mook and Ben Raleigh, and originally performed by Larry Marks. It's probably the most covered theme on this list.
Jason: It's a perfect piece of pop, quintessentially of its era, and ranks up there aesthetically with any "Sugar Sugar" or "Yummy Yummy Yummy" you'd care to name.
Super-Friends (1973)
Trey: Another one from Hoyt Curtin, this is a more of a rousing, martial piece. The producers must have known they struck gold, because they kept it for 13 years, changes to narration aside. It is certainly eminently recognizable. I like this remix for a Cartoon Network promo by Michael Kohler, "The Time is Now."
Jason: A stately call to arms for the forces of good! This type of instrumental-only action show theme song, often characterized by blaring brass sections and delivered with Wagnerian exuberance, practically constitutes a genre unto itself and dates back to the Fleischer Studios Superman shorts from the 1940s.
Trey: In the early 70s, America was in the midst of a "kung fu craze," this show and theme rides that wave. It's short of funky, but also recalls the cliched "Oriental riff" and perhaps borrows a bit of inspiration from Schifrin's theme for Enter the Dragon. Scatman Crothers who voices the main character also sings here.
Jason: That this song is diabolically catchy, I cannot deny. It has stuck with me through long decades during which I neither sought out nor otherwise encountered the source material.
Trey: This theme is a pure slice of the 80s and credited to the duo that dominated the era, Shuki Levy and Haim Saban. Levy's got a page devoted to his theme work, here.
Jason: MASK marks the spot on the timeline after which I will no longer be buoyed by any shred of nostalgia, having ascended to the snottiest and most dismissive epoch in my extended adolescence. I don't recall ever having heard this before, but I am immediately struck by the Flashdance-adjacent aesthetic.
Trey:SilverHawks may be a lazy attempt to iterate another hit from the ThunderCats template (see also TigerSharks), but I think it's got a superior theme song to the original. It was composed by Bernard Hoffer who did a lot of work for Rankin-Bass but was nominated for an Emmy for composing the theme used in the PBS News Hour (originally The MacNeil-Lehrer Report).
Jason: The haunting refrain of the title elevates the pop appeal of this theme, while also delivering the first genuine guitar shredding (or is it synthesizer? Or, heaven forfend, keytar?) yet heard in this listing. This is another first listen for me, and the professional craftsmanship is again evident. It's almost like there's a few surefire formulae in this theme song game.
Trey: This iconic instrumental song with a futuristic (in now a very dated way) vibe was credited (as so many 80s and 90s cartoon theme songs were) to Haim Saban and Shuki Levy, but was written by Ron Wasserman who was under contract to Saban at the time. Wasserman says of the composition and recording in a 2022 interview: "I’d learned to play or emulate any instrument so I would have played every part. Just me, a MIDI keyboard, and a computer."
Jason: So iconic I know it, though I don't think I've watched a full episode of this series. While I am enjoying listening through this listing, maybe I'm starting to develop cartoon theme song fatigue at this point. Do I hear a bit of Miami Vice in this ditty, or have I taken leave of my senses?
Teen Titans (2003)
Trey: This was a well-written series with perhaps a deceptively cartoony look. The great power poppish theme song was written and performed by Japanese pop rock duo, Puffy AmiYumi.
Jason: This one I enjoy without resorting to ironic detachment or nostalgia of any kind. There's more than a small debt to Johnny Rivers' "Secret Agent Man," but it's so dang catchy all is forgiven.
Trey: My daughter loved this show when she was younger, and still revisits it's occasionally. It has a very catchy theme written and performed by Patrick Stump, who Wikipedia tells me is lead vocalist and rhythm guitarist of Fall Out Boy.
Jason: Stump correctly ascertained that a Spidey theme needs to be propulsive enough to communicate the frantic action that will (presumably) follow. It's as good as any post-Fallout Boy emo tune I can currently recall (don't ask how many). Still, good stuff for the kids. Did your daughter enjoy the theme?
Over the summer, I decided to check out the men's adventure paperback series Fargo by John Benteen after discovering it was cheap on Kindle. I became aware of the series thanks to the upcoming graphic novel adaptation, Fargo: Hell on Wheels, by Howard Chaykin.
Amazon bills the series as a Westerns, and I suppose some of them are, in the same way The Professionals (1966) or Fist Full of Dynamite (aka Duck You Sucker) (1972) or other adventure films in Western locales are considered Westerns. They take place in the early 20th Century (1912-1915 in the ones I've read so far) and involve imagery and action out of Westerns (tough men in wild country on horseback with guns), but they involve a range of locales more again to traditional adventure pulp. They range to the jungles of the Philippines and Panama, as well as the more traditional Mexican desert or Yukon.
I've read reviews that refer to Fargo as sort of a "Western Conan." I can see what they mean in that Fargo is tough as hell, irresistible to women (apparently due to sheer manliness, as he is described as unhandsome and hardly has a scintillating personality), and good at most everything in his warrior and outdoorsman purview. However, Benteen's attention to detail regarding gear and preparation for obstacles his hero faces, and his penchant for pitting Fargo against enemies that appear to be a match for him, serve to make the series feel more grounded and realistic. Only slightly pulpy instead of completely so.
Benteen's prose is lean in the mid-Century way, not pulp purple. His action and dialog are punchy and mostly effective but without any lyricism or descriptive vistas despite their natural locales. Unfortunately, but expected given their genre and when they were written, they carry a streak of misogyny, some of the volumes moreso that others. There is some cultural and racial insensitivity lurking in their too, but in the volumes, I have read the narrative is generally not unsympathetic to both Native Americans and Latinos, though Fargo does exhibit some ill-feeling toward the Moro, who he fought in the Philippines.
They're all quick reads (under 200 pages) and fast-paced. So far I've read:
Fargo (vol 1): Set in 1914 during the Mexican Revolution, Fargo is hired to rescue an engineer (and his mine's haul of silver) from deep inside that war torn and escape bandits with revolutionary pretensions.
Panama Gold (vol 2): A prequel set in 1912. Fargo is asked by Teddy Roosevelt himself to investigate and thwart an attempt to foreign powers to use a mercenary army to sabotage the nearly completed Panama Canal.
Alaska Steel (vol 3) In 1914, Fargo is hired by a movie starlet to find her wayward husband so he can claim his oil money inheritance. The problem is, he's disappeared in the Yukon where he was seeking his fortune as a prospector.
Apache Raiders (vol 4) Fargo is back in Mexico in 1915, smuggling guns for Pancho Villa. He encounters a "lost" tribe of Apaches (a group that never got sent off to Florida) whose leader is playing a general Indian uprising.
Massacre River (vol 5) Perhaps the pulpiest of the one's I have read, Fargo is in the Philippines on a job to escort the daughter of a Chinese businessman to her arranged marriage. If Filipino insurgents weren't enough trouble, there is a family of wealthy, Confederate Lost Cause holdouts, looking to create a new empire and kicking the U.S. out.
