Check that out. One million hits to this here site since early 2007. Break out the champagne, Gav and Esther, because it’s party time. No raises, though, suckers.
Thanks everybody. Who knew that telling people that their opinions were wrong could be so worthwhile? You can check the history here. 1200+ posts for you.
Back before DC and Marvel were the two big forces in the world of comics, Dell Comics appeared to be the #1 team. It’s no wonder, considering they got to sell comics with such properties as the Disney and Warner Brothers cartoons characters. Preexisting properties seemed to be their forte, as in the 60’s, they released comic one-shots that retold the films of famous movie monsters, such as Dracula, The Wolfman and Frankenstein.
What’s notable is that those came out during the early days of the Comics Code Authority, which proceeded to lay down ground rules on the comic companies to pussify every one of their titles. This meant the lack of horror aspects, including how vampires and their like were not allowed to see print. Dell decided that they wanted no part of the CCA, even though lots of sellers refused to carry comics that weren’t approved.
Dell didn’t want the CCA regulating them and insisted to the public that they could damn well regulate themselves, so don’t worry about it. I think the pressure on the CCA mentality is one of the things that pushed them towards today’s topic. That, along with their need for original content and how the superhero comics were really taking over the market.
The company decided to take their monster properties and turn them into superheroes. It doesn’t sound too crazy. Morbius the Living Vampire has been a Marvel staple for years and enjoyed some time as the hero in his own series. Similarly, Marvel released comics for heroes Werewolf by Night and Monster of Frankenstein. More recently, DC introduced the Hellboy-esque Frankenstein, who shows that even in the present there’s still much you can do with the old Mary Shelly creation.
That’s… not exactly what Dell was going for here.
There was a castle on fire and a man jumping out of a test tube and I killed a man with a trident.
I’ll admit that this entire article is thanks to Brian Cronin, whose article on the CCA and their opinion on vampires led me to first seeing that cover. From there I knew that I had to own this, read this and tell you all about it. Blame him!
I mean, look at that cover! The ridiculous outfit! The off-center belt! The fact that Dracula is jumping out of a test tube held by Dracula! Sorry to say, despite the cover’s claim, there’s no point where they tell us the secret to his power of appearing in two places at the same time.
Back in the day, hermanos used to have all those cool “4th Letter is for…” graphics. Hm… his name does start with D. Yeah, let’s do it.
Neat!
10) Separate Ways
Cable/Deadpool #42 (2007)
Writer: Fabian Nicieza
Cable’s “death” in the comics was oddly done. It took place in X-Men #200 with this Cable/Deadpool issue acting like deleted scenes. Deadpool doesn’t even get a cameo in the big X-Men issue. No respect.
Having just done away with Sabretooth and having smoothed over things with Deadpool for the umpteenth time in their relationship, Cable explains that he needs to destroy the island and destroy all the future-related information in his computers. Deadpool volunteers to find where Cable keeps the backup of that information so he can help take care of it. Right before Deadpool can take off, Cable stops him.
Cable walks through the wreckage of his island paradise and thinks, “Thank you. I’m proud of you. Goodbye.”
I couldn’t imagine a better final moment between the two.
With Cable fighting Gambit and Sunfire, Deadpool is off to find that computer backup while taking on the Acolyte Senyaka. Cable is on the losing end of his fight and thinks about the concepts of sacrifice. Before the island can explode, he makes sure to teleport Deadpool off the island and back to his apartment.
“You sacrifice yourself to keep your dream from being corrupted. But most of all… you do it for the people in your life who matter the most…”
Back in his apartment, the layout is similar to the opening scenes of Cable/Deadpool #1. Deadpool immediately destroys Cable’s computer backup, looks out the window and says, “I wasn’t worth it…”
He turns on the TV to see news of Providence exploding, validating that Cable’s out of the picture. Going from sad to serious, Deadpool ends the issue promising, “…and I won’t let you down…”
I had a weird realization at some point last week, I think it was. I started writing about comics a little over four years ago on livejournal, in January 2005, and moved to blogger and my own URL on March 25. I drafted Gav and another friend to help write and we puttered along until September ’05, where we petered out. In November, I moved the blog to WordPress, losing the blogger posts in the process, and relaunched. Check the rhyme. Once we got going, we kept going. I’m not even remotely happy with my old posts, but that’s just me. Four years later and a couple roster changes later and we’ve got a great crew, varied tastes, and writers I would read even if this weren’t my blog.
4l! has a new logo now, courtesy of my friend Adam Rosenlund. I asked, he delivered, and I left impressed. We’re reworking the headers to fit the new logo, too. Rather than doing a cool comics scene or something super dialogue heavy, we’re going to post ones that are just great examples of comics art. The four we have up for this week are pretty easy. There’s a cool Reed Richards panel, a Venom bit for Gav, a Batgirl for Esther, and a Peter Parker for me. We’ll keep it moving with these, so that there’s always something new for you to see up top.
I’m thinking of new things for 4l! for 2009. I already have some things in the works, but give me time. If you absolutely can’t get enough of us, you can follow me on Twitter for a daily dose of disrespect and music references.
Well, it is. That’s actually what it stands for. Join me in wishing our very own David “hermanos/black dub/4thletter/guerilla grodd” Brothers a happy 25th birthday!
I myself will wish him a happy birthday… with jazz!
Also, I’ve mixed his tendency to discuss race with my tendency to talk about absurd and nostalgic things and bring you this clip.
I can’t say enough good things about the man, and I’m tired, so I’m not even going to start. I’ll just call him a complete class act and leave it at that.
Happy Birthday, my friend. Now go watch that CHIKARA DVD I gave you, you lazy jerk!
Gavin is a Marvel. He likes weird tie-in comics, Venom, and wrestling. Esther is a DC, and likes the various Batgirls, Batman, and sometimes books that do not have Batman in them, but that’s just because he’s in hiding before he picks the perfect time to make his appearance. David likes a mix of both, though he was raised a Marvel. He also talks about black people all the time.
We are 4l and we are awesome.
You can get us on RSS (with a separate feed for our comments) or via livejournal syndication. We have an archives page, which has no context whatsoever beyond dates, post titles, and comments. If that’s too much for you, Gavin stated doing a table of contents that he updates every few months with notable posts.
We take guest pieces, too. Drop an email to 4thletter@gmail to get it started.
The links table is horribly out of date. I will one day update it.
4thletter! is available via Livejournal and RSS, with an optional comments RSS feed, too.
I’m in San Francisco, Gavin’s a Jersey boy.
You can email me at 4thletter on gmail, AIM me at ethiopiates, or GoogleTalk me at 4thletter on gmail.
As far as Web 2.0 goes, I’ve got a tumblr, “it’s all science,” which is also available via rss, and a video blogging spot on vimeo, which is here.
We make it easy on you. Get familiar.
Garth Ennis is known for a few things. Blood, curse words, comedic facial deformities, sex jokes, a mild hatred of superheroes, and more blood and then a few more curse words. On the good side, he’s a pretty solid plotter, he knows his strengths, he does great dialog, and he’s the best war writer since Kanigher and Kubert.
Just in case you aren’t familiar, he’s written comics where a demon named Baytor becomes master of hell, Nick Fury strangles another dude with his own intestines, an alien sex pervert becomes a British diplomat and gets eaten by a tiger while dressed in a corset with an orange up his butt, a soldier constantly tries to trick his superior officer into kissing him by faking death, a guy gets his nose swapped with his penis and vice versa, an Australian pope has sex with nuns and curses, the Saint of Killers shoots God, a short man with glasses has sex with a giant statue made out of meat, superheroes are depicted as a bunch of people who are completely worthless human beings (and sex perverts), a dude has sex with himself and then shoots himself in the face in front of his son, and– actually, this is a pretty good sampling of the stuff he’s known for. Plus, this is going to completely ruin the search terms on this site.
Anyway, Ennis has got something of a rep. He’s done his fair share of gross-out comics, though it’s usually played for humor. But, I’ve been noticing something in his comics. He keeps sneaking in these little things that make a scary amount of sense. I don’t necessarily agree with Ennis on the religion front, but he makes good points about how to live life. Sexism, racism, whatever– it’s all stupid. It doesn’t matter. Leave it behind and just do right.
The quote up top is from The Boys #8, a series about some humans whose entire job consists of smearing and then beating the snot out of superhumans, who are all sex perverts and callous jerks. We’ve seen a bulldog have sex with another, smaller dog, and a Teen Titans-alike have a screwed up coke orgy. The book opens with a guy swinging around with his girlfriend like they were in a movie, only a superhuman comes crashing down and basically explodes her on impact, leaving the guy holding her severed arms. There’s also a dude who lives below a comic shop who basically calls Will Eisner a punk. And despite all this grisly stuff, you get little scenes like the one in that image up there.
Punisher: The Slavers dealt with white slavers. On the one hand, it’s a wish-fulfillment fantasy. We, the reader, get our revenge on the rapist and slavers of the world through Frank Castle’s actions. He kills quite a lot of them, and the series ends with him lighting a local boss on fire on video, looking into the camera, and saying “Don’t come back here.” He sends the video back to Eastern Europe with one of the allies of the slavers. On the other hand, though, I can’t remember the last time I saw the aftereffects of rape and kidnapping in a comic. One of the cops featured in the story actually quits the force, because she believes she can do more good helping track and assisting the girls who were kidnapped. The last two pages of The Slavers are heartbreaking. You don’t have the full context here, obviously, but I think the pages are worth sharing. Check out the softcover or the hardcover (B&N link) if it catches your interest. The softcover’s like ten bucks, it’s worth it. I cut out the pages where Cristu was burned alive because they aren’t 100% relevant here.
For reference: Viorica lost her daughter to the slavers.
“All she can do is live with what life they left her.” Ouch.
Read the rest of this entry �
As you may have noticed, David “hermanos” Brothers is off finding a place to live in San Francisco. As I type this, I wonder if I should go for the more classic Northstar reference or just keep it current with something about Wiccan and Hulkling. It’s too late now.
With hermanos gone and Wanderer on a never-ending quest to find a soundtrack that perfectly syncs up with the movie the Stupids, that leaves me in charge. Sure, I could post a series of crappy Photoshops or talk about some comics you don’t care about, but it isn’t that simple. With hermanos’ absence, I have to fill in the void. It’s like the latest She-Hulk arc, “Planet without a Hulk”, only I wouldn’t deny sleeping with the Juggernaut. Think of all the media appearances you can make with that on your record.
Now, then. Here are some posts I figure hermanos would make if he was here:
Yours truly is in San Francisco at the moment, hunting for apartments. (I did mention I was planning on moving out here, right?) I’m out here until Wednesday, and hopefully I can find a cool affordable place by then.
Anyway, here’s a short 4l is. Black Panther, Dwayne McDuffie, and McDuffie on Fantastic Four are all three cooler than cool.
Light posting from me, probably. Let’s see what Gavok has to say!
