The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 1948: Troll Halloween Special #1, 1994

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(Sorry, dropped the ball a bit. Last day of Pride Month, figure I should finish this up ;D)

 

 

 

 

 It betrays in me a prejudice that I was surprised to see a comic from early Extreme Studios that was written by a gay man. Then I really thought about the kind of spandex-clad hypermasculinity on display in a lot of these titles' art, and I thought about that time that Riptide scandalously posed for a porn magazine, and how similar, if not in execution then in stylization, a lot of this work is to Tom of Finland. (Definitely, absolutely 100% NSFW)

So there's that. Today's featured creator is Andy Mangels who, in his Wikipedia picture, has the most epic of mustaches. A quick poke about my collection reveals that he's the writer one of The Maxx's other appearances outside of his own title, which is an interesting niche for someone to inhabit. That story was in Gay Comics #24, which I reviewed a while back. Perhaps Maxx is one of those characters I'm going to have to track down a bit more. Anyway, a surreal little tale, as one might expect from a crossover of The Maxx with Extreme Studios' Wolverine clone. I'll admit, I come to like Troll later in his history. Alan Moore's re-writing, and then Brandon Graham's look at his future, all make these zany adventures from early Image slightly more sinister, and slightly more poignant.

That said, there's always going to be something sinister in a story that involves The Maxx and his cohorts. The Maxx, the series, is very dark, as was the super-awesome cartoon that used to air on MTV.

For Mr. Mangels, I am actually surprised that I haven't got more of his stuff in the collection - he seems much more familiar than just 2 issues in all these comics. I'm certain I'll run across more stuff as I fill in the gaps in my database information.

 

(Oh, and it's inked by Pedi, who did one of the best issues of the old Supreme series!)

More to follow.

Further Reading and Related Links

If you like Troll, here's one of his few other solo comics, another seasonal outing!

And if you want to get an idea of what this character actually is, read the masterful future saga that is Prophet.

The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 1074: Team Youngblood #7, March 1994

I'll write this up tomorrow. There's some interesting things being done in this crossover to do with back story, which I've been thinking about with this read of Supreme.

A few days back I leveled the criticism at Supreme and his Extreme cohorts that the type of drama they were gunning for is simply not possible without the weight of history behind them. The crossover we're (sort of) following is doing some interesting work in filling that history in.

I should mention we're taking a slight detour back in time - I realized I had another part of this crossover, so I went back to read it.

In today's issue, and in the rest of those in the crossover, the reactions of some characters to Quantum help us to understand the history of the Extreme universe. I call it this because, although the Image superhero comics share a universe, very little of what happens in one imprint's corner affects anything in the other imprints' corners.Apparently the Extreme U includes people possessed of the "Nu-Gene," and those who develop powers as a result are something of a cross between the X-Men and the Inhumans. Making Quantum, basically, Magneto. From this vantage, I think we can understand the fear evinced upon his escape. Remember that everything in this universe seems to be totally psychotic, and such is the case with Quantum. He literally just decides to tear it all down.

We also see, in the background, a man named Proctor trying to reassemble a team of "Newmen" who opposed Quantum previously. Here, too, we get a glimpse into a past that is slowly being both built and revealed. Much like Moore's Supreme, the past is being filled in in fits and starts...only to be hit, inevitably, with a revision wave in about 30 issues.

To be continued.

The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 760: Extreme Hero, 1994

What is it about Extreme/Maximum/Awesome that keeps pulling me back in? I mean, I guess there's the occasional good creator that is somehow convinced by Liefeld to work with him until the inevitable financial disaster. And perhaps, just perhaps, there's something about the ridiculously hyper-masculine aesthetic that I find fascinating, and slightly titillating. Though when we come to the 8 or 12-pack stomachs, I think perhaps these comics artists need a bit of an anatomy lesson.

This is a sampler that was distributed with the now-defunct Hero Illustrated, one of the numerous comic industry magazines that offered "news" to fans in the 90s. And anything new from Liefeld and co. in the 90s was news. As far as I know, none of the series in this sampler made it beyond maybe issue #3. Liefeld, as is well known in the industry, is insanely bad at business. I mean, really, who fucks over Alan Moore when he's writing one of your comics? Who does that? He, for some reason, booted Joe Casey from an excellent run on Youngblood, managed I think one issue that he decided to write and draw, and then the comic folded.

Anyway, the short stories in here are exactly what you'd expect. The art is okay, though very 90s Image. The stories are blunt. It's meant to entice us into reading the regular series, but the problem is that the regular series never appear. *sigh*

I'm hoping one day that I'll stop being so annoyed with Liefeld and 90s Image. But I don't know if it'll happen.

Onward!