“Oh, no. No no no. That’s—that’s Venom. That’s Venom as me. That’s—and it’s not even the good one. It’s Mac Gargan.”

— Spider-Man, New Avengers #50

Due to popular demand, I guess I have to dedicate one of these installments towards Mac Gargan, the current Venom. First, a quick refresher on who Mac Gargan is and what he was up to before donning the hungry goo spandex.

Mac Gargan used to be a greedy private investigator, doing just about any job as long as the price was right. Jonah Jameson hired him to figure out the link between Spider-Man and Peter Parker. Mac wasn’t getting anywhere due to Peter’s spider-sense indicating when to slip away, so Jameson pulled out the big bucks for more desperate measures. Using an experimental serum and a cybernetic suit, he transformed Mac into the Scorpion. On the plus side, he was granted strength and agility to counter Spider-Man, along with a cool tail that shoots stuff. On the minus side, it drove him completely mad.

I think we need more villains who are only evil because whatever gave them powers also made them fucking crazy. A lot of the early Spider-Man villains had that going for them.

Scorpion existed for decades as a B-list Spider-Man villain. He was one of the many, many villains who in some way existed as the dark shadow of Spider-Man. Due to his insanity and his insatiable hatred for Jameson, Gargan tended to fail as a team player. Also, some of his insanity came from his inability to remove his costume.

Mark Millar reinvented Gargan for the better during his run in Marvel Knights Spider-Man, which I covered earlier in this series. At some point, Gargan had become a top henchman for Norman Osborn. His armor was gone, though with many operational scars left behind, and his sanity had been more or less restored. Sure, he was still a bad guy, but he was a coherent bad guy. Under Osborn’s orders, he orchestrated the kidnapping of Aunt May as a way to mess with Spider-Man and get Osborn out of prison.

As we know, the Venom symbiote – having skipped on its latest host – decided that Gargan was ideal. Perhaps it was how Gargan’s Scorpion powers are notably comparable to Spider-Man’s. Perhaps it was Gargan’s hatred of Spider-Man, spiked with his lack of Eddie Brock’s morals. But by the end of the day, Mac Gargan had become Venom.

Read the rest of this entry �

A few weeks ago, I looked over Dell’s Dracula. Due to the pressure to be a more wimpy, G-rated company back in the 60’s, Dell had to take its classic monster properties and reinvent them into a more superhero fare. Another one of these properties was The Wolfman, which received its own movie-to-comic adaptation in 1964.

When Dell made their attempt at superhero comics, they took the concept and made a series called Werewolf, which lasted for three issues. If it wasn’t for the name and the fact that it came out around the time of Dracula and Frankenstein, it would have fallen into even more obscurity. See, the Dell take on Dracula was still a guy from a European country who lived in a dark castle and could turn into a bat. Frankenstein was still a big, strong guy with a green face and flattop. Werewolf, meanwhile, has absolutely nothing to link him to being a werewolf.

When you hear “Werewolf”, you think of Warren Zevon songs, Michael J. Fox movies, Jon Talbain, superheroes by night, Jason Bateman sequels to Michael J. Fox movies, furries, Joe Estevez movies, nards, Rahne Sinclair, Sabrewulf, John Jameson, Adam Sandler covers of Warren Zevon songs, and that episode of Real Ghostbusters where vampires and werewolves started biting each other and becoming hybrids. That episode ruled. What you don’t think about is Noob Saibot punching out enemy soldiers alongside a wolf.

Again, there are no credits listed, but it’s assumed that the creative team was Don Segall and Tony Tallarico. At first I was disappointed in finding out that Werewolf is in no way monster related like its brother comics. Then I delved deeper into the title and discovered that it is balls-out insane. As you see on the cover, the guy is a super spy, which means we’re going to be getting all sorts of James Bond shit, only because it’s a comic book from the 60’s, it’s going to be absolutely ridiculous!

Read the rest of this entry �

Wonder Woman #36 came out on Wednesday, and things are happening in the Wonderverse.  The Amazons are in a state of bubbling, barely-restrained rebellion against Achilles, their new king.  Wonder Woman and Nemesis seem to have ended their courtship, and Diana is ordered by the daughter of Kane Milohai, the volcano god, to ‘remember her vow’ which means openly standing against Achilles.  In other words, things are looking very, very grim for our heroine.  Again.  I swear that woman has Peter Parker’s luck.  Everytime she does anything, she ends up the worse for it.

I’m pleased and impressed by the characters in Wonder Woman.  Nemesis is convinced that he’s not on Diana’s level (the one weakness in his characterization is the fact that we never see him do anything which would lead to this conclusion) but that’s not what ends their relationship.  Neither is Diana’s ‘lie’.  It is only when he realizes that Diana wants marriage and kids, a normal life, that he pragmatically states that that can never happen after the life he has led, and breaks up with her.

Achilles is a surprisingly likeable character, despite his deep flaws.  We see him trying, again and again, to do what is right while obeying orders that are wrong.  He’s not a bloodthirsty zealot, only someone too mentally subjugated to follow his conscience.

Diana continues her quest to find out who she is, which is a legitimate quest.  The problem, though, is I don’t know who she is.  She’s supposed to be honest, but all that her honesty has shown me is that she loves her family and she’s compassionate.  What does she enjoy?  What particularly drives her?  What feels personal to her?  What about the world she lives in does she identify with?  What gets under her skin?  What foolish faults does she have?  I can fill in all these blanks for Green Arrow, Batman, Superman, Stephanie Brown, Barbara Gordon, Tim Drake, Dick Grayson, Scandal Savage and dozens of other characters.  Wonder Woman remains a fog of admirable virtues, and not much else.

Read the rest of this entry �

Read the rest of this entry �

Superhero comics encourage obsessiveness. I know you know it. Don’t pretend that it doesn’t. Paying attention to continuity, untangling the quagmire of a character’s past, and following all of the news and trivia of a company is something we’ve gotten pretty good mileage of here on 4l!, even.

And I mean, I make fun of it all the time, but it’s also pretty interesting. It’s kind of like solving a puzzle. A puzzle with several dozen pieces that all have the same shape, so putting it together is an event. The companies even encourage this with their crossovers and events.

Rizzoli USA, the folks who published Louise Simonson’s DC Comics Covergirls (a book I’ve wanted to read forever but haven’t gotten my hands on) sent over something pretty interesting last week. Marvel: The Expanding Universe Wall Chart is pretty much the perfect thing for a new reader or an old reader looking to pick up some new tricks. First, check out the size of the thing:

That’s twelve feet long by three feet tall. It’s enormous. Essentially, the Marvel Wall Chart is an expanding poster book, accordian style. As you pull it open, and it keeps opening and opening, it reveals more and more Marvel characters, all of which are sorted into “families.” The design emulates an atom, the thing that is at the heart of so many Marvel origins, and each atom features one major character as its nucleus. The Torch anchors the Golden Age and pre-Marvel characters, Spider-Man is at the center of his family, the FF take care of many other heroes and cosmic Marvel, the X-Men revolve around Professor X, and Dr Strange takes care of the magical characters.

Now, that’s all well and good, but images only go so far, right? On the flipside of the chart is a continuity wonk’s dream: pages and pages of info on your favorite characters. They’re sorted by theme, rather than character, so you can see things about teams, kid heroes, origins, names, and so on. There’s even a bit on marriages. I uploaded a flickr set with a few G1 shots of them so that you can see what I mean.

It’s all pretty neat, to be honest. It’s a little tongue in cheek (Hellcat and Hellstorm’s marriage contains the blurb “presumably this ceremony was not held in a church”), and Patsy Walker gets a lot of love, surprisingly. I like it.

Now, here’s the thing that should interest you. I’ve got an extra one of these, new in box/mint condition/still in the wrapper, which means that it’s contest slash giveaway time. Here’s the details:

1. Share your favorite bit of Marvel or DC trivia or continuity porn down in the comments
2. Leave a valid email address in the email box
3. In the name box, put your real name. First name, last name, both names, whichever you prefer. Just no pseudonyms.
4. You have until midnight, this Friday, to enter. I’ll put a reminder post up on Thursday in case you forget to enter.
5. Also, this is open only to US residents. If you want to share trivia, and you’re from Uzbekistan or somewhere, you can, but please mark that down in your comment.
5. Wait until Monday, when I announce the winner and ship them a big fat chunk of Marvel history.

Sound good? Let’s get it in. Show me what you got.

Aaaaaaaaaaand cut it.

Read the rest of this entry �

Cut for spoilers. Read the rest of this entry �

The status quo for Venom had been changed, perhaps forever. The Venom symbiote had moved away from Eddie Brock, leaving a cancer-filled husk of a human being. While Mac Gargan found success as the new Venom, Eddie would be nearly forgotten about, suffering in a hospital bed. Eddie Brock himself was never a match for Spider-Man from the start. What hope would he have as an antagonist when he’s weakened by a disease?

Around that time, directly after Civil War, Marvel was making a big deal out of Spider-Man’s new look. Or old look. Whatever. The third Spider-Man movie – which featured the black costume – was on its way to theaters and Marvel chose to capitalize it in a way that really didn’t work. Spider-Man would start wearing a black costume again. The whole thing was a list of letdowns.

Was it the Venom symbiote? No. It was just a spandex costume he wore because he wanted to kill the Kingpin. Wearing black means he’s totally hardcore now.

So he’s going to kill the Kingpin? Ha! Come on, this is Spider-Man. The only people he’s killed are Gwen Stacy and Wolverine’s spy girlfriend, both unintentional. Spider-Man’s too much of a pussy to even kill Darkseid with a god-killing gun if he had the chance.

Okay, but the black costume will have some kind of storyline blow-off, right? No, not really. He wears it for an arc or so of his different comics, confusing people who will pick up and read World War Hulk for years to come. Then he simply stops wearing it. Like, at the beginning of One More Day, where it would make sense for him to still have it on, he’s back to his regular tights. Everyone was too distracted by the, “Jesus Christ! Really?!” aspect of that story to give a damn.

But what does that have to do with Eddie Brock outside of cosmetics? The reason Spider-Man was so cheesed off at the Kingpin in the first place was because a hitman accidentally shot Aunt May when going for Peter. Now she’s in the hospital in critical condition.

Aunt May in a hospital bed? Huh. I guess that’s one thing cancer-ridden Eddie Brock could take in a fight.

It’s a nice reference to the famous Kraven’s Last Hunt cover of black costume Spider-Man rising from beneath the earth in front of his own tombstone.

The Last Temptation of Eddie Brock takes place in Sensational Spider-Man #38-39. It’s written by Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa and drawn by Lee Weeks.

Read the rest of this entry �

Firs:  This is a fantastic cover.  I dare you to look at this cover and not want to buy the comic.

Second:  Most superhero comics involving teenage heroes revolve around the question of identity.  This can get stale, but Adventure Comics has an advantage over the competition.  It isn’t the old question of presenting one identity to family and friends while living the hero’s life in secret.  Every important person in Kon’s life already knows his identity, and is happy with it.  There isn’t any tired sneaking around, no depressing damned-if-you-do-or-damned-if-you-don’t choices.  Instead the identity question is there because Kon has two biological parents, one of which he was literally programmed to emulate, and needs to reassure himself that he’s most like the one he admires.

Third:  I’m seeing young love, and I’m not seeing stupid love or needlessly-dramatic love, and I like that.  All the false crises that a lesser comic would pump up, (Wonder-Girl kissed Robin!  Oh no!) this one dismisses (Kon was dead at the time. ((He was on the moon.  With Steve.))  She can kiss whoever.).  Okay, their encounter was a little too gluey and sacharine.  I could have done without the ‘you are too good for me,’ ‘no, you are too good for me‘ aspect, and I’m still looking for a couple who genuinely has fun together instead of just being romantic, but I have high hopes for these two.

Fourth:  It seems that all young-super books are improved by the addition of super-pets.  Krypto is a running joke and a freaking joy.

Fifth:  I’m expressing another hope, now.  The last page of the book had Lex Luthor seeing that Kon was alive again.  In the last few issues of Teen Titans before Kon’s death, Luthor is shown as thinking of Kon as his son and acting charitably on his behalf.  I hope that they’ll continue that aspect of the character instead of tipping him into general villainy.  We have had, and will have, a thousand chances to see Lex Luthor be a bad guy what likes to do bad.  This is one of the few chances we’ll have to see him as a bad person who still cares about someone.  I hope this book will take advantage of that.