1963 annotations
Abhiji...@transarc.com
I've written up some annotations for 1963. Originally I was going to
wait to finish the series up till the Image annual came out. But since
it keeps on getting delayed, here are the annotations as is :
Post comments or send them to me directly. Enjoy !!
Abhijit
The annotated 1963
-------------------
Written by Abhijit Khale
Please send comments to Abhiji...@transarc.com
Disclaimer : All 1963 characters are copyrights and trademarks of their
respective owners. All Marvel and DC characters mentions are copyrights
and trademarks of Marvel and DC respectively.
General comments :
1) Alan Moore is known to do a lot of research on his subject matter. Thus,
when he makes a seemingly casual comment, it may be just that, or it may
have deeper meaning. This annotation tries to find out cross-references, if
any.
2) The annotations do NOT cover things like : Who is the Wasp ? Who
are the FF ? Some minimal knowledge of Marvel (and DC) is assumed.
3) Most early 1960s Marvel comics (especially Iron man and the Hulk) were
crudely anti-communist. Alan Moore parodies that heavily.
4) Early Marvel was also quite sexist. Most female characters (Wasp,
Invisible Girl) were shown as frivolous, air-headed, dependent on their
male colleagues and occasionally flirtatious. This is something Moore
parodies heavily. Also, note the comments in the lettercol about how
the only comics girls should be reading are romance comics. More Moore
parody.
5) The alliterative style and hype is very reminscient of Stan Lee,
and shows Moore's brilliant dialogue skills. Moore skewers Stan pretty
heavily throughout the series.
6) Alan Moore also hypes lots of real (and very good) comics, but does so in
Marvel/1963 style.
7) The annotations are in order as you flip through the comic and include
ads, text pages and lettercols.
Book 1 : Mystery Inc
by Alan Moore, Rick Veitch, Dave Gibbons.
Mystery Inc are obviously the Fantastic Four homages.
The Cover says "America's most exciting comic book", a variation of the FF's
title "World's Greatest comic magazine", which it actually used to be at one
time.
Planet === Thing, Ben Grimm.
Crystalman === Mr Fantastic, Reed Richards.
Infra Girl === Invisible Girl/Woman, Susan Storm Richards.
Kid Dynamo === Human Torch, Johnny Storm.
The characters behave like their counterparts as well : Crystalman is a
scientist, Kid Dynamo is short tempered. Differences : Kid Dynamo and
the Planet are brothers, and Kid Dynamo is interested romantically in
Infra Girl.
Page 1 : Mystery Mile === Baxter Building, FF HQ. The title "Mayhem on
Mystery Mile" seems to be a play on the marriage of Reed and Sue, which
was labelled "Bedlam at the Baxter Building".
Page 6, panel 1 : "Amazona" === Thundra, an old Marvel character who came
from a world dominated by women.
Page 6-7 : Note the similarities and difference to the FF's origin. The
Planet is referred to as an astronaut (Ben Grimm was a test pilot).
Page 8 : An early FF story had the FF read mail. One topic of the mail
was the uselessness of Sue in the FF. Some of the blatant sexism displayed
here is very similar to that in early FF.
Panel 4 : More on Infra Girl in book 6 annotations.
Page 9, panel 1 : Reverse Magic :-).
Text Page :
Item 1 : Warhol and Dali references are obvious gags.
Blue box : hyping the 80 page annual which ends the series.
Shopping List : Each issue will be covered separately.
Orange box : Chester Brown writes and draws Yummy Fur. All the other comics
mentioned are real.
Yellow box : Stan Lee would sometimes indulge in hype about how comics could
get rid of racial troubles, bring peace etc., although not to this level.
I think Moore's wife is called Phyllis (at least, Big Numbers mentions research
done by Phyllis Moore). No idea where the name Wilma for Affable Al's wife
came from.
Stan used to sign off with Excelsior, Moore does so with Excalibur, which
is also the name of a Marvel title that uses characters that Moore worked
on.
Page 12, panel 1 : Doc Apocalypse === Doc Doom. The reference to Kid Dynamo's
dad disappearing may be a comment about Johnny and Sue's father, who was
jailed as a criminal.
Panel 2 : King Zero may be the Submariner. More on this later.
Page 14, panel 1 : More on the Fury and this plotline in issue #2.
Page 15, panel 1 : N-Man === Hulk.
T-shirt ad : Reminscient of T-shirt ads in 60s Marvel comics. This is proba-
bly a real ad.
Page 21 : There is no real equivalent for the "Maybe Machine" in early FF,
although Reed did build Negative Zone portals and use Doom's time machine.
Page 22 : Crystal Man is as smart as Reed. Although Marvel has parallel Earths,
the use here bears a stronger resemblance to DC's parallel Earth mythos.
Page 23, panel 5 : The early Reed was often jealous when Sue showed attention
to another male like the Submariner.
Letter Page :
Letter 1: More on Sky Solo in book 2. "Dixie's Dates" may be a reference to
Marvel romance and Archie comics like Millie the Model or Hedy and Patsy.
"Tombstone Kid" may be a reference to an old Marvel Western comic called "Two
Gun Kid". N-Man === Hulk. The Hulk and the Thing fought several times. Note
the sexist comments about Neon Queen.
Letter 2 : King Zero is mentioned as having reappeared in an early issue of
Mystery Inc and also as having appeared in the Golden Age. So he's probably
the Submariner, who re-appeared in early FF.
Pink Box : Murphy Anderson is a very respected Silver Age penciller and
inker who now does color production work.
Letter 4 : A gag and a pointed comment about Marvel's work-for-hire practices.
Letter 5 : Anti-award === No Prize.
Letter 6 : More on N-Man, Horus, Infra-Man later.
Yellow box : "Rarebit Fiends" is a Rick Veitch strip which appears in the back
of Maximortal (and in Cerebus). More on this later.
Inside back cover : Moondog's is a comic store chain.
Back Cover : This is a parody of an ad by Don Bolander, Director of Career
Institute, which promised to teach English. The picture, the questions et
al. are similar, although the garbled language is obviously a joke.
Book 2 : No one escapes the Fury.
by Alan Moore, Steve Bissette and Dave Gibbons.
Fury === Spiderman, of course.
Cover : "RoofRunner". Spidey is called the "WallCrawler".
Page 1 : U.S.A = Captain America. More on him later.
LASER = SHIELD, right down to the similar acronym.
Commander Solo = Nick Fury
Note that Spiderman rarely worked with SHIELD in his
early days.
Page 2 : Solo even smokes like Nick. Spiderman's father was not a
superhero, so there's another difference with Marvel.
Page 5 : Fury even talks and swings around like Spidey.
Page 7, panel 1 : Voidoid may be the Green Goblin. More on this later.
Dune === The Sandman, an early Spiderman foe. Pyroman : No real obvious
match. "Threatening Three" : Spidey once fought 6 of his enemies who called
themselves the Sinister Six.
Sub Ad : Derived from old ads for toy subs and a parody of Anti-Sovietism.
Page 9, last panel : "Screaming Skydogs" : Nick Fury used to head a group
called the Howling Commandos in WW-II. More on this later.
Page 13 : The Dinosaur may be a play on old Spidey Foes the Lizard and
Stegron. Stegron even used intelligent dinosaurs in some of his stories.
Page 17 : The Fury's mother is the Aunt May equivalent.
Text Page :
Item 1 in Yellow Box : Both Kim and Gary (unfortunately) are real people. All
the comics mentioned are real as are the people like Bagge, Clowes, Los Bros
Hernandez.
Item 2 : Hyping the annual again.
Yellow Box : "Sky Solo and her Screaming Sky Dogs" = "Sgt. Fury and his Howli-
ng Commandos", an old Marvel war comic. Moore appears to be parodying the
sometimes crude anti-German nature of the comic.
Page 18 : Spidey's parents were killed by the Red Skull, not in the manner
shown here. The Fury's dad is the Golden Age hero known as the Fighting
Fury (more on him in issue #6). "Sinister Squid" may be Dr. Octopus, who
was also a nuclear scientist.
Page 21 : Voidoid's identity is secret.
Page 23, last panel : Dr. Kent Kane === Hank Pym, Ant Man.
Miss Mason === Janet van Dyne, the Wasp.
More on these two in book 6.
[ This may also be a side reference to Dr. Curt Connors, a scientist
and a friend of Spidey's. ]
Page 24, panel 2 : The Wasp would make comments like that in her early days.
Ad : Moondog's Ad again.
Letter Page :
Letter 1 : The various speculations about the Voidoid's id lead me to believe
he may be a Green Goblin copy. The Green Goblin's id was originally secret and
was revealed in an early Spiderman storyline.
Letter 2 : "Sspral" and "Vapoor" : Marvel used to publish Monster comics
in the 50s. These are probably references to old Marvel monsters, although
I don't have exact names.
"Mut-Ants" : The Hulk fought Mole men in an early issue, but I don't remember
his fighting any intelligent insects till much later.
"Behemoth Bugs from Mystery Inc. " : I don't remember the FF fighting
such bugs or anything similar.
"Journey into Unearthly" : Old Marvel title "Journey Into Mystery", most not-
able for the first appearnce of Thor. The other two titles covered later.
"Rul Rax Rhoom" : Fin Fang Foom, a 50s Marvel monster.
"Yolk" : no reference.
Moore is also parodying Marvel's litigiousness, which caused the change of
the name of Marvelman to Miracleman.
Duane Simpson and the comments about misspelling : Any references ?
Yellow box : Morrie is probably a real guy. But the comment about his being
Al's uncle is meant to parody the fact that Stan Lee got his job at Marvel
only because his uncle was the publisher.
Letter 3 : Either of Sinister Squid or Dr. Centipede is probably Dr. Octopus.
"Art-Boy" : No reference.
Letter 5 : Parodying Stan's hucksterism. "Cosmax" is Galactus (more on this
in issue # 3). "Arcturian Ulti-mind" may be a reference to the Kree Supreme
Intelligence, an adversary of the Fantastic Four. More on Johnny Beyond in
issue #4.
Pink Box : Hyping Stephen Bissette's work in Taboo and his upcoming Tyrant.
Sky Solo pin-up : "Lady from L.A.S.E.R" may be a play on "Man from U.N.C.L.E",
an old TV show.
Ad : Parodying certain artists' tendency to swipe art.
"Ruckler products .. Kirby Street" : Rich Buckler is an artist
known for swiping Jack Kirby's work.
[ Maybe they should have named it Riefeld Products ? ]
Inside Back Cover : Another T-shirt ad.
Back Cover : Looks like a parody of hair loss ads, but I don't have a direct
reference for it.
Book Three : "Tales of the Uncanny"
The title is probably based on old Marvel comic "Tales of Suspense".
Ultimate Special Agent by Alan Moore, Rick Veitch, Don Simpson.
Ultimate Special Agent === Captain America. Also a play on US Agent, which
id Cap took on once when he couldn't become Captain America.
Pages 1-2 : USA is stopping the assasination of JFK.
Page 3, panel 1 : "Leo Harley Osborne" : Lee Harvey Oswald was the name of
JFK's killer.
Panel 2 : Note the grassy knoll reference.
Page 4, panel 2: "Vitamin Omega" : Cap obtained his powers through the Super
Soldier serum.
panel 5 : "Osborne's trip to Russia" : Oswald defected to Russia and then came
back.
Page 4-6 : "Brian Ruby" : In the real word, Jack Ruby was the guy who killed
Lee Harvey Oswald in a manner similar to that shown here.
Page 6 : "Red Brain" === "Red Skull", an old Cap villain. The Red Skull
doesn't have all these powers though.
Page 11-12 : The man from the future ties into the Image 80 pg annual, prob-
ably.
Olfactory fighting Ad : Parody of Karate ads which claimed to make you a mas-
ter of karate. Yuckk...
Text Page :
Item 1 (in Pink Box) : Four Color Images is a real art gallery in New York
which exhibits comics art. I presume the exhibition of Mystery Inc. art
was for real.
Item 2 (in Pink Box) : I believe all the characters mentioned are real.
Yellow Box : Moore is poking fun at the collector mentality.
Item 3 : Hyping the annual. I assume the name change for the VOIDOID
is based on reality. [ Does WILDCATS have a character named the Void ? ]
Hypernaut by Alan Moore, Stephen Bissette, Chester Brown
Hypernaut : There is no direct correspondence to a Marvel character. Instead,
Hypernaut seems to be drawn on Hal (Green Lantern) Jordan and Iron Man but
also has several individual characterstics.
Page 1 : Many of the text panels seem to be about numbers and four in particu-
lar.
Page 2 : Queep : This seems to be a parody of various silly sidekicks that
DC characters like J'onn and the Space Ranger had. Tony Stark never had
such a sidekick, and Hal picked one up only in the 70s (Itty the Starfish).
Queep also bears some resemblance to the Monkey King, a very frightening
demon that Moore and Bissette created in Swamp Thing.
Panel 2 : more on Infra-Man in book #6. "Ammonite" : no reference.
Panel 3 : "Molemoth" : no reference, could be Mole Man.
Last panel : Hal Jordan was a test pilot
Page 3 : The idea that the Hypernaut needs his cybernetic receptacle to surv-
ive is similar to early Iron Man, in which he needed his armor's chest devices
to keep his heart beating. The reference to a guild, though, is very similar
to the Green Lantern mythos (which itself derives from the Lensmen).
Page 7 : The being is a 4-D creature. This may be a parody of a silly 50s
Marvel character called the 3-D man, who returned to fight the Hulk
later.
Page 12 : This switching betwen body suits is very reminscient of LSH member
Wildfire.
Lettercol :
Letter 1 : "NumberJack", "Piface" : no references.
"Chessmen" : Iron Man did fight a Black Knight in his early days. He also
fought some Chessmen, but that was much later, in the 1980s. May also be a
play on old JLA villains called The Royal Flush Gang, who would dress up as
playing cards.
"Achtung Spitfier", "Kid Swastika" : no references.
Moore is also parodying Marvel's refusal to let Cap age.
Letter 2 : "Cosmax" eats suns. He must be hungrier than Galactus, who eats
planets.
USA may have a thing for Sky Solo : Cap had one for a Shield agent called
Sharon.
Letter 3 : Both DC and Marvel were known to be careless about their artists
original artwork back in the 1960s. Joe Kubert once came in to find DC
staffers about to shred his artwork. Jack Kirby had a very hard time getting
Marvel to give some of his art back.
Letter 4 : Ed "Emperor" Evans === Jack "King" Kirby. Jack Kirby co-created
Captain America, as Evans did with USA. Much of this letter and the response
is a fairly obvious indictment of Marvel's and Stan's treatment of Jack.
The "sold rights .. for thirty-eight dollars" comment, though is closer
to the story of Jerry Siegel and Joe Schuster, who sold Superman to DC for
a very small sum.
Letter 5 : "Amputo" : Could be the Mandarin, although he fought Iron Man,
not the Hulk.
"Professor Scwheppes" : no reference.
Inside Back Cover : Another T-shirt ad.
Back Cover : Another anti-communist parody, as well as a parody of ads in
comics which sold lifesize monsters and skeletons.
Blue Box : All the comics mentioned are for real.
Book Four : "Tales from Beyond"
The Hulk appeared for a brief while in an old Marvel comic called
Tales To Astonish.
N-Man by Alan Moore, Steve Bissette, John Totleben.
N-Man === Hulk, obviously.
Page #2 : The N-Man only rates a Colonel, while the Hulk gets General Ross.
Tsk. Tsk.
Page #5 : Kokarovitch may be a play on old Hulk villain the Abomination.
The Abomination was also a Soviet spy who exposed himself to gamma rays
and became a monster with Hulk level powers.
Ad for US Government Surplus : Parodying catalogue ads seen in Marvel comics.
The ad is full of gags like "Senators : 5 for 99 cents", "VD training film".
Page 12 : Sally Stevens === Betty Ross. Betty was never Bruce Banner's assist-
ant in the early Marvel Universe.
Panel 6 : more on Infra-Man in book #6.
Monster Ad : More anti-communist parodies.
Johnny Beyond by Alan Moore, Jim Valentino, Stephen Bissette.
Johnny Beyond === Dr. Strange. However, the dialogue used here is more
reminscient of the dialogue used in some late 60s DC comics (most notably
the Teen Titans) to attract teenagers because it was "hip".
Page 5 : The house bears a resemblance to Dr. Strange's abode.
Page 6 : "Garab Dorje" is an equivalent of the Ancient One, Dr. Strange's tea-
cher.
Text Page :
Item 1 : A very funny Alice Cooper gag.
Pink Box : Moore is obviously working in some jokes about Stan's past.
Stan did indeed get the job at Marvel/Timely only because his uncle
was the publisher. [ Did he really marry a heiress ? ].
The relationship between Stan and Jack as collaborators is also parodied.
This seems to be saying that Jack Kirby did most of the work on the comics
the two collaborated on.
Item 2 : I assume the reference to the auction of 1963 art at Christies is
accurate.
Page 9 : In his early stories, Dr. Strange would separate his astral body
from his physical one often.
Page 10 : The comments about reversed molecules are accurate.
Page 11, panel 1 : A very Steve Ditkoish landscape.
Lettercol
Letter 1 : "Warsaw Pack" : No obvious match. The Soviets had several super-
villains in early Marvel comics, but no supervillain group.
"Moscow Dynamo" : Crimson Dynamo, an old armored Soviet supervillain.
"Komissar Kremlin" : no reference
"Diabolical Dugpa" : may be Baron Mordo, old Dr. Strange enemy.
"Cubist Creature" : no reference. Could be Man Thing, although he first appea-
red later.
"Weirdo", "Beastnik" : no reference.
Moore is also making a pointed comment about the Comics Code authority's ref-
usal to allow zombies in comics in the 1960s, as well as their banning the
showing of gay relationships.
Letter 2 : A gag about the ad on the back of issue 1.
Letter 4 : Yeah, the lettercols are fiction (Surprise, Surprise).
Blue box : Murphy Anderson won an award at Ithacon. Note the comments about
the lawsuit if the Planet were orange (like the Thing) or N-Man were green
(like the Hulk, sometimes).
Letter 5 : Parodying sexism at Marvel as well as the fact that some female
fans are worried about getting junk mail if their full addresses are printed
in comic books.
Letter 6 : Part of this is obviously a parody on Marvel UK, for which Moore
worked at one time. I believe Marvel comics used to be reprinted in black
and white weekly magazines prior to the coming of Marvel UK.
[ Exact references, anyone ? Is the writer a real person ? ]
Yellow Box : Hyping Bissette's Tyrant.
Blue Box : Hyping Valentino's Shadowhawk.
Inside Back Cover : Another T-shirt ad.
Back Cover : Parodying the Sea Monkeys ads in old comics.
Book Five : Horus, Lord of Light
by Alan Moore, Rick Veitch, John Totleben
Horus === Thor, obviously. This replaces Norse myths with Egyptian
myths. But the correspondence to actual myths here is much stronger than
in Thor.
Page 1 : "Termagant", and his brother "Typhon" : Thor used to fight giants
quite often in his early days. These two could be the equivalent of Ymir
and Surtur, two regular opponents of Thor and Odin or they could be
Frost Giants.
Page 3 : Thor's human id used to be Dr. Don Blake. He had a nurse called
Jane Foster. Janet is a Jane Foster copy.
Page 7 : Thor's adversary was his half brother Loki. Horus's adversary is the
Egyptian god Seth.
Ad : more anti-communism parody.
Text Page :
Item 1 : John Totleben is an artist who's done lots of work with Alan Moore.
He's been known to have problems with his eyesight recently. "Hellhead" is
a project he's doing with Rick Veitch.
Item 2 : ANIA is a comic book publisher. Heru is presumably a real comic.
Green Box : This is a fairly obvious attack on Stan Lee.
"Origins of Sixty Three part two : how I created everything all by myself .."
is probably meant to be a parody of Stan Lee's Origins of the Marvel superher-
oes, which says basically that he created Marvel all by himself. Its also
true that most Stan Lee collaborators such as Kirby and Ditko were later to
fall-out with him. Kirby even created a character (for DC) called Funky Flas-
hman, the ultimate con man, as a Stan Lee parody.
Page 9 : The mythological references to the death of Osiris are accurate.
Ad Page : Parodies of old Sea Monkeys ads again. Note the reference to
"Yummy Fur".
Decals : "King Hell" is the imprint under which Veitch publishes some of
is work. "Mad Love" is the imprint under which Alan Moore's Big Numbers
was being published. "Spiderbaby Grafix" is the imprint under which Steve
Bissette publishes some of his work.
Page 16 : Astarte is an Egyptian mythical character : using her may also
be a tip of the hat to the use of Hela, Norse Goddess of Death as a
Thor and Odin adversary.
Page 23 : The whole storyline bears a minor resemblance to a pivotal
Thor storyline which culminated in Thor #137. In that story, Thor took
Jane Foster to Asgard and asked to marry her. Odin tested her and found
her unworthy to be a goddess and sent her back to Earth.
Letter Page :
Letter 1 : "Crisis in Cloudland" : no reference to any early Thor,
although DC used to label their annual JLA/JSA team-ups as "Crisis .."
as well.
"Tales of Heliopolis" : Marvel used to run "Tales of Asgard strips as
a backup to Thor.
"Alligator" : No Thor reference, but there is an Egyptian connection.
"Brothers Grim" : Termagant and Typhon from page 1-2.
Letter 3 : Neil Gaiman is a real person :-).
"Delerium, duke of dreadful dreams", foe of Johnny Beyond is probably a
reference to Dr. Strange foe Nightmare. There is actually a strong surface
similarity between Nightmare and Gaiman's Dream : they look somewhat alike,
and their powers are dream-based. More parody of poor writing of Brits by
American authors and of Marvel's litigiousness.
Inside Back Cover : Another T-shirt ad.
Back Cover : Parodying ads which claim to get rid of zits and pimples.
Letter 5 : A real letter ? Halluejelah !!
Book Six : Tomorrow Syndicate
Tomorrow Syndicate === Avengers.
Cover : "Earth's mightiest heroes" is a tag used for the Avengers as well.
Page 1 : Duty Roster : The Avengers' original membership was a match
with this, i.e. Thor, Iron Man, Hulk, Ant-Man and Wasp as members. Cap
joined in Avengers #4, but by that time the Hulk had left, and Ant-man
was Giant Man. Infra Man === Ant Man, Infra Girl === Wasp.
Page 2, panel 3 : The Hulk would often argue with Thor or Iron Man.
Panel 4 : The Wasp would often comment on how dreamy Thor looked.
Page 3, panel 5 : "Tomorrobile" === Quinjet, which the Avengers used for
travelling.
Page 4, panel 3 : More Wasp airheadedness parodied.
Page 5, last panel : "Underman" : might be an old underground villain called
Tyrannus or even the Mole Man. "Brothers of the Kraken" may be a reference to
racist Avengers foes called "The Sons of the Serpent".
Page 6, panel 5 : "FBI surveillance photographs" : may be a veiled comment
by Moore about J. Edgar Hoover's penchant for surveillance.
Ad : This is a parody of an ad which used to say "We're looking for people
who like to draw". The layout and the use of the artistic image is similar
(the original ad would use Normal Rockwell). This is also an ad for Rick
Veitch's RareBit Fiends comic. As the ad says, this is a tribute to the
great comic strip artist Winsor McKay, who used to do a strip about dreams
called Rarebit Fiends and later did the famous Little Nemo in Slumberland
strips.
Page 9 : 1963's Golden Age heroes appear. They bear a resemblance to
Marvel's Invaders and also to some other Golden Age heroes.
Frosty Guy : King Zero. As mentioned in the annotation for book 1, this may
be the Submariner.
Hero with Blue Mask and Horns : The Fighting Fury, the Fury's father.
American Beauty : No real match at Marvel, but might be Phantom Lady, Wonder
Woman, Miss America or Liberty Belle.
Also, a younger version of USA and the original Hypernaut.
Page 10, last panel : Note the comment by the original Hypernaut that he had
never heard of the guild of Hypernauts. The Golden Age Green Lantern was not
originally empowered by the Guardians as the Silver Age Green Lantern was,
although his history has changed many times since then.
Page 11, panel 3 : "Blur of Earth-Alpha" === Flash of Earth-2.
"Blur and Blur Boy of Earth-Beta" === Flash and Kid Flash of Earth-1.
The use of the Flashes is significant, since it was the Flash of Earth-1 who
first met the Flash of Earth-2 in the classic "Flash of two Earth's" story.
Panel 4 : The JLA and JSA used to hold annual team-ups at one time, before
DC, in their infinite wisdom, decided to get rid of them.
Panel 5 : Superman in front, with his death certificate (round about the
time of the Return of Superman storyline). Swamp Thing in back, a character
Alan Moore and Rick Veitch have more than a passing familiarity with.
Page 12, panel 2 : "Infinite Crisis" : Clearly a reference to the Crisis on
Infinite Earths at DC.
Panel 4 : The guy sitting on the sofa next to the Blur of Earth-Alpha is the
character he was based on : Jay Garrick, the Golden Age Flash. The guy with
the pointy ears with his back to us is the Batman and the character next
to him is probably the Catwoman. These may be the Earth-2 versions of Batman
and Catwoman, who were married and were wiped out of existence by the Crisis
on Infinite Earths. [ An outside chance is that it could be the male Wildcat,
character who was involved in some hard to place Brave and Bold Team-ups
with Batman : but the Batman wouldn't have his arm around Wildcat.]
Page 13-14 : A parallel Earth inhabited by villainous doubles of superheroes.
This bears a resemblance to Earth-3, an old DC Earth which had exactly the
same situation, i.e. villainous doubles of the Justice League called the
Crime Syndicate.
Text :
Item 1 : More sexism parody.
Item 2 : All of these are real comics. Look at pages 21-22 to get a glimpse
at their characters, or better still, look at their comics.
Yellow Box : So Moore "got a couple of big ones" out of this. Good.
Moore seems to be saying that if the demand is strong enough, he'll do more
of this beyond the Image annual.
Item 3 (blue box) : Hype for 1963 1/2 and there's more in the comic later.
Item 4 : Almost all of these are real folk.
Page 18 : Moore seems to think that the most likely consequence of the Cuban
Missiles Crisis would have been nuclear war.
Page 18-19 : The world of 1963 1/2.
Page 20-21 : Text page covers all these characters pretty thoroughly.
Page 22 : Note how the coloring is changing as the heroes enter the future.
Page 23 : The guy from book 1
Page 24 : The background screens contain a number of both 1963 characters
such as N-Man, Fury, Mystery Inc. members, Johnny Beyond, the Tomorrow Syn-
dicate as well as other Image characters such as Shadowhawk, the Savage Drag-
on, Supreme, WildC.A.T.S and Spawn.
[ Any reference on the red and white costumed archer ? ]
Letters Page :
Letter 1 : "Ammonite", "Iron Curtain", "Berlin Wally", "Amputo" : no immediate
reference. Iron Curtain may be the Titanium Man, an old communist villain.
The other characters mentioned have already been covered before.
Letter 3:
"Indian Rubber Sam" and all the mathematical villains mentioned : no reference
" a whole guild of heroes, each from a different world ..." is not an
original concept, of course.
"mans a lens " : a reference to EE "Doc" Smith's Lensmen, which also had the
same idea.
"colors his lantern green" : sound familiar ?
"gets drunk on a Black Planet Cocktail ... " : Only reference I can think
of for this one is in an old SF story called QUR by Anthony
Boucher. Much of the plot of the story revolves around getting
a certain type of cocktail (Three Planets Cocktail).
"Warps into a smithy" : [ I'm positive I've heard this before, but the exact
reference is eluding me.]
Green Box : Hyping Miller and Gibbons' Give Me Liberty as well as Gibbons'
Aliens work.
Letter 5 :
Doc Apocalypse, as mentioned before, is a Dr Doom equivalent.
"Doc A can switch shapes with someone .. a trick he learned from the
Eg'eads". Dr. Doom learned this ability from aliens called the Ovoids
in an early FF story. He used it in the mid-80s in Byrne's FF stories.
The letter asks if "Doc Apoc" and the "freaky Pharaoh Tutses" are the same.
The reference here is to an old Dr. Doom storyline in which he met the
villainous Egyptian Pharaon Rama Tut. Rama Tut hinted in one of his early
appearances that he may be the same person as Doom.
"comic based on numbers" : A reference to Alan Moore's comic Big Numbers which
is only up to #2 so far. Moore is pretty open about why he's doing this.
Letter 6 : Ho'd Win is a constant matter of debate.
Letter 7 : Doug Winter : any reference ? Is he just imaginary ?
"Havana Tim" : no reference
"Red Flag, Hammer and Sickle" : could be a Soviet character called the Vin-
dicator, but he appeared much later.
Letter 8: Moore is parodying some of the titles that Marvel handed out
like Marvel Zombie, or FOOM.
Letter 9 : More anti-communist parody. The reference is to the CIA's
attempted assasinations of Fidel Castro back in the 60s ... with poison cigars
no less !!
Yellow Box : "All this and Earth Two" : a pun and a reference to DC's Earth-2.
Modern Mystery comics cover : no reference. Probably a Golden Age comic cover.
Tomorrow Syndicate cover : A copy of the cover of FF #1, which is itself a
copy of the cover of Brave and Bold #28 (First Justice League).
Inside Back Cover : Ad for Tyrant
Back Cover : Ad for 1963 1/2 ... again.
Ken Arromdee
<Abhiji...@transarc.com> wrote:
>Ad : Parodying certain artists' tendency to swipe art.
> "Ruckler products .. Kirby Street" : Rich Buckler is an artist
> known for swiping Jack Kirby's work.
> [ Maybe they should have named it Riefeld Products ? ]
I don't have my 1963 issues with me, but I think this is the ad which has a
reference to the Dr. Strange cover swiping an Amy Grant photo.
>Item 3 : Hyping the annual. I assume the name change for the VOIDOID
>is based on reality. [ Does WILDCATS have a character named the Void ? ]
Yes.
>Queep also bears some resemblance to the Monkey King, a very frightening
>demon that Moore and Bissette created in Swamp Thing.
I think the Monkey King was from previous Demon stories and wasn't created by
Moore and Bissette.
>Yellow Box : "All this and Earth Two" : a pun and a reference to DC's Earth-2.
I think there was a movie or book or something named "All This and World War
II". I believe Roy Thomas mentioned (probably in an All-Star Squadron letter
column) wanting to use "All This and Earth Two" as a title. I don't think he
ever did. (How's that for sentences containing disclaimers? But it's
something for you to look up, anyway....)
--
Ken Arromdee (email: arro...@jyusenkyou.cs.jhu.edu)
ObYouKnowWho Bait: Stuffed Turkey with Gravy and Mashed Potatoes
"You, a Decider?" --Romana "I decided not to." --The Doctor
Mean Mister Mustard
> -------------------
>Book 2 : No one escapes the Fury.
> by Alan Moore, Steve Bissette and Dave Gibbons.
>
>Letter 1 : The various speculations about the Voidoid's id lead me to believe
>he may be a Green Goblin copy. The Green Goblin's id was originally secret and
>was revealed in an early Spiderman storyline.
However, as the letter-writer speculates, the Voidoid may be "Bash
Brannigan," the Fury's high school football coach, and the shot of an
unmasked Voidoid on page 21, panel 7 may support this. Bash Brannigan
seems to be the counterpart of Flash Thompson, the athlete who harrassed
Peter Parker (although Flash was a fellow student, not a coach). However,
Flash was Spider-Man's #1 fan, not his archenemy; though years later he
was framed for being the Hobgoblin.
>Book Three : "Tales of the Uncanny"
>The title is probably based on old Marvel comic "Tales of Suspense".
>
>Ultimate Special Agent by Alan Moore, Rick Veitch, Don Simpson.
>
>Pages 1-2 : USA is stopping the assasination of JFK.
Moore knows his JFK assassination lore. Observe...
Page 1: In the background, you can see two bystanders: a man holding
an umbrella, and a man with a movie camera. They
correspond to the real-life "Black Umbrella Man," and to Abraham Zapruder.
The Umbrella Man opened a black umbrella shortly
before Kennedy was shot; some speculate that he was part of a conspiracy.
Abe Zapruder recorded the whole shooting on his home movie camera. The
woman standing next to them, holding a baby, seems significant but I'm not
sure if she corresponds to any particular onlooker.
Other details are accurate: the gunshot has driven a flock of birds to
flight; a Jackie Kennedy lookalike sits next to USA while a John Connolly
lookalike sits in front; and while the gunman is behind USA, the shots
came from the *front.* :-)
One wrong detail: the gunman is on the fourth floor, not the sixth. But
hey, it's only a comic. :)
Page 3, panel 2: Yup, the real shooters were on the Grassy Knoll. :-)
Panel 4: JFK mentions that his father saw USA in action in the 1920s.
In the 1920s, Joseph Kennedy was a bootlegger, so if he saw USA in action,
he may well have been on or near the receiving end of USA's action!
Page 4, panel 7: The Carousel Club was Jack Ruby's nightclub.
>Book Six : Tomorrow Syndicate
Page 12, panel 5: The maintenance staff, who are referred to as "omniscient,"
bear a slight resemblance to the Watchers.
>Page 24 : The background screens contain a number of both 1963 characters
>[ Any reference on the red and white costumed archer ? ]
Shaft, the leader of Rob Liefield's New Tee-- er, Youngblood.
>Letters Page :
>
>Letter 1 : "Ammonite", "Iron Curtain", "Berlin Wally", "Amputo" : no immediate
>reference. Iron Curtain may be the Titanium Man, an old communist villain.
>The other characters mentioned have already been covered before.
"Ammonite" sounds like he may be a Rama-Tut type figure. He's referred to
as a "fossilized fiend," and Ammon was another name for the Egyptian god
Amen-Ra. "Ammonite" also refers to a kind of fossil. (The Ammonite could
also be a takeoff of Avengers foe Kang, who I believe *is* Rama-Tut.)
>Letter 3:
>" a whole guild of heroes, each from a different world ..." is not an
>original concept, of course.
>"mans a lens " : a reference to EE "Doc" Smith's Lensmen, which also had the
> same idea.
>"colors his lantern green" : sound familiar ?
>"gets drunk on a Black Planet Cocktail ... " : Only reference I can think
> of for this one is in an old SF story called QUR by Anthony
Black Sun cocktail... and, of course, a Black Sun would be a Darkstar...
another comic using the "original" idea of an interstellar corps.
>"Warps into a smithy" : [ I'm positive I've heard this before, but the exact
>reference is eluding me.]
The Warpsmiths?
Nice work, Abhijit!
Marc
Lance Visser
+>Page 21 : There is no real equivalent for the "Maybe Machine" in early FF,
+>although Reed did build Negative Zone portals and use Doom's time machine.
The Maybe machine is used in the same way the negative zone
portal was used in numerous Fantastic Four stories. They have done
several stories over the years where someone falls into the negative
zone and has to be rescued....or something dangerous comes out of the
zone.
+>Page 1 : U.S.A = Captain America. More on him later.
+> LASER = SHIELD, right down to the similar acronym.
+> Commander Solo = Nick Fury
And the "solo" is a sinde reference that Nick Fury is a man from
uncle swipe.
+>Page 7, panel 1 : Voidoid may be the Green Goblin. More on this later.
+>Dune === The Sandman, an early Spiderman foe. Pyroman : No real obvious
+>match. "Threatening Three" : Spidey once fought 6 of his enemies who called
+>themselves the Sinister Six.
Pyroman could well be electo which would be consistant with the
"sinister six" idea.
There is also the distict possiblity that Fury is a spider-man
and Human Torch (from Strange Tales) mix. There was a terrible trio
that showed up in Strage tales fighting the Torch. I dont remember
them being important characters though.
+>Letter 2 : "Sspral" and "Vapoor" : Marvel used to publish Monster comics
+>in the 50s. These are probably references to old Marvel monsters, although
+>I don't have exact names.
There were so many of this monster books put out that mapping to
real names is pretty meaningless.
+>"Mut-Ants" : The Hulk fought Mole men in an early issue, but I don't remember
+>his fighting any intelligent insects till much later.
Not the mole man. It would be the Toad men or Tyrannus.
+>"Behemoth Bugs from Mystery Inc. " : I don't remember the FF fighting
+>such bugs or anything similar.
Anyway, the point of that comment was that marvel stories in the
very early days were sometimes using duplicate villians and stories.
+>"Journey into Unearthly" : Old Marvel title "Journey Into Mystery", most not-
+>able for the first appearnce of Thor. The other two titles covered later.
+>"Rul Rax Rhoom" : Fin Fang Foom, a 50s Marvel monster.
Fin Fang Foom appeared in Strange Tales 89(?) which was in the early
1960's I believe. Thor today still has the numbering from Journey into
Mystery....just as Hulk and Captain America continue the numbering from
Tales to Astonish and Tales of Suspense.
+>Yellow box : Morrie is probably a real guy. But the comment about his being
+>Al's uncle is meant to parody the fact that Stan Lee got his job at Marvel
+>only because his uncle was the publisher.
The actual relationship was that Stan Lee is Martin Goodman's
wife's nephew.
+>Letter 3 : Either of Sinister Squid or Dr. Centipede is probably Dr. Octopus.
+>"Art-Boy" : No reference.
There were several early marvel stories that involved painters
bringing images to life. Strage Tales 109 (Human Torch) features a
painter character that might have been art boy. The painter would
paint things that came to life.
+>Page 4, panel 2: "Vitamin Omega" : Cap obtained his powers through the Super
+>Soldier serum.
After he took the Serum, he was bathed in "vita-rays" which could
give a hint on the name.
+>Panel 3 : "Molemoth" : no reference, could be Mole Man.
No. Probably a Green Lanturn reference. The Mole man would
not be chewing through the side of a space ship.
+>Page 7 : The being is a 4-D creature. This may be a parody of a silly 50s
+>Marvel character called the 3-D man, who returned to fight the Hulk
+>later.
Marvel has a 4-D man. He is some sort of alien that had one side
of his body on fire and the other side frozen. The general comment is
probably on the tendency of comics to invent n-dimensional characters
and concepts. "the creature from the 7th diminsion" and the like.
+>Page 12 : This switching betwen body suits is very reminscient of LSH member
+>Wildfire.
The face on the chest has been done by Kirby on a couple of
occasions. Once in Thor (for the Enchanters) and for Arem(sp) Zola
from his '77 run on captain america.
+>Letter 3 : Both DC and Marvel were known to be careless about their artists
+>original artwork back in the 1960s. Joe Kubert once came in to find DC
+>staffers about to shred his artwork. Jack Kirby had a very hard time getting
+>Marvel to give some of his art back.
It was marvel and DC policy to take posession of the phyiscal art
done for them and dispose of it as they pleased. DC used to routinely
shread art. Marvel dumped it all in a dusty old warehouse in a really
bad neighborhood. Sometimes in the case of marvel, the art was given
away to people who visited the office.
Marvel kept the art because of the ambigious status of people
working on comics. For benifit purposes, marvel wanted employees to
be considered "freelancers". For copyright purposes, they wanted everyone
to be considered "direct employees". The 1978 copyright laws created
work-for-hire as a solid concept.....and marvel therefore really had
no legal right to keep the art. I dont remember when they started
giving it back, but Marvel went through the vault and handed physical
posession of all the art (except kirbys) back to the artists.
They kept Kirby's art because marvel was in a difficult
legal situation as far as Kirby challenging their copyrights.
Joe Simon came close to taking Captain america away from Marvel in 1969
based on the legal ambiguities of the comic creation process.
+>Letter 4 : Ed "Emperor" Evans === Jack "King" Kirby. Jack Kirby co-created
+>Captain America, as Evans did with USA. Much of this letter and the response
+>is a fairly obvious indictment of Marvel's and Stan's treatment of Jack.
+>The "sold rights .. for thirty-eight dollars" comment, though is closer
+>to the story of Jerry Siegel and Joe Schuster, who sold Superman to DC for
+>a very small sum.
Kirby sold any potential rights to Captain america he may have had
to marvel "in perpetuity" for a small amount of money in 1969. He
cooperated with Goodman fully in fighting Joe Simon's attempt to claim
the copyright on captain america. Goodman
cheated Kirby out of much of the money he was supposed to get for signing
over the rights in the end anyway.
Stan Lee is a bubbleheaded moron. The villians at marvel have
always been the faceless people behind the scenes like Jim Galton
or Martin Goodman. Stan Lee or Jim Shooter are put up for the fans
as having a greater role in the company than they ever did.
+>The Hulk appeared for a brief while in an old Marvel comic called
+>Tales To Astonish.
He was in TTA for 40 issues and Hulk has the numbering of
TTA. Not a brief run.
********
The bad ad "must I lose my mind" is a parody of a "must I lose
my hair" ad that ran at some point in marvel books.
+>Letter 1 : "Warsaw Pack" : No obvious match. The Soviets had several super-
+>villains in early Marvel comics, but no supervillain group.
If you go foward far enough, there was the Titanic three
(Radioactive man, Titanium Man, Crimson Dynamo) and later the
Soviet Super Soldiers.
+>Letter 4 : Yeah, the lettercols are fiction (Surprise, Surprise).
There is bitter irony here in that many early marvel letters
were fiction as well. Generated inside marvel.
+>Page 23 : The whole storyline bears a minor resemblance to a pivotal
+>Thor storyline which culminated in Thor #137. In that story, Thor took
+>Jane Foster to Asgard and asked to marry her. Odin tested her and found
+>her unworthy to be a goddess and sent her back to Earth.
Thor 136 actually.
+>Page 5, last panel : "Underman" : might be an old underground villain called
+>Tyrannus or even the Mole Man. "Brothers of the Kraken" may be a reference to
+>racist Avengers foes called "The Sons of the Serpent".
In the case of Avengers, it would be Mole Man.
+>Page 9 : 1963's Golden Age heroes appear. They bear a resemblance to
+>Marvel's Invaders and also to some other Golden Age heroes.
+>Frosty Guy : King Zero. As mentioned in the annotation for book 1, this may
+> be the Submariner.
+>Hero with Blue Mask and Horns : The Fighting Fury, the Fury's father.
+>American Beauty : No real match at Marvel, but might be Phantom Lady, Wonder
+> Woman, Miss America or Liberty Belle.
Marvel had its own Miss America who was married to the Whizzer
and in 1970's continuty was the Scarlet Witch's mother.
David Goldfarb
)Fury === Spiderman, of course.
He seems to have some Daredevil elements too: the way he
throws those discs around is very reminiscent of Daredevil's billy club.
David Goldfarb |
gold...@ocf.berkeley.edu | "Typos in _Finnegans Wake_? How could you tell?"
gold...@UCBOCF.BITNET | -- Kim Stanley Robinson
gold...@soda.berkeley.edu |
Rich Johnston
when I have the comics:
The Fury is also a name of a character created by Alan Moore in the
Captain Britain strip. Marvel aren't allowed to use the character
because of copyright reasons. Alan Davis used the visual likeness of
Fury in Excalibur however. Alan Moore seems to have used the name in
return. In Captain Britain, the Fury's slogan was "No one escapes the
Fury".
In 1963 Fury has similarities to Daredevil as well as Spider-man
Whatever happened to Stegron anyway?
WildCATS did indeed have a character called Void.
Hypernaut is very Silver Surfery don't you think?
The 4d-3d-2d draws heavily on Rudy's Flatland series and is an
example of Stan Lee using a sci-fi or just a sci idea very badly
and incorrectly indeed.
Johnny Beyond... Its a sixties comic using 50s dialogue and culture
to attract a "youth" audience mistakenly. A great example of this is
the early X-Men by Lee and Kirby.
Stan Lee married a local Newcastle girl who was modelling in America.
Marvel Comics were reprinted in black and white considerably when
Marvel UK set up, although a company had reprinted some Spidey and FF
before. I'm actually thankful for this cos I grew up reading Lee and
Kirby and Ditko comics, as opposed to most other 21 year old comic
readers in America.
The Neil Gaiman letter is also one which I thought about sending to
various Marvel titles when they set their stories in "Merrie
Englande" when I was about 8, and I bet Neil did too.
..................................
Rich Johnston- r.j.jo...@ncl.ac.uk
National Student Cartoonist of the Year 1994.
Dirtbag #1 can now be ordered in next month's Previews
and Advance Comics, under Twist and Shout Comics. I hope.
Jerry Franke
: I've written up some annotations for 1963. Originally I was going to
: wait to finish the series up till the Image annual came out. But since
: it keeps on getting delayed, here are the annotations as is :
: Post comments or send them to me directly. Enjoy !!
: Abhijit
Great job, Abhilit! Just a couple comments:
:
: Panel 2 : King Zero may be the Submariner. More on this later.
He was most likely Subbie. Notice the eyebrows in ish #6...
: Fury === Spiderman, of course.
As previously noted, he does have a lot of Daredevil in him (disk === billy
club). Also, the fact that there was a golden age Fury parallels the fact
that there was a golden age daredevil -- of course, he was not Matt
Murdock's father...
: Page 7, panel 1 : Voidoid may be the Green Goblin. More on this later.
When I first read it, my first thought was "Chameleon"..
: Page 3, panel 5 : "Tomorrobile" === Quinjet, which the Avengers used for
: travelling.
It is also highly reminescent of the second edition Fantasti-car (not the
flying batchtub, but the one where everyone rode in separate sections of the
ship).
Again, good work! Thanks for your effort!
jlf
Womble with Attitude
David> <Abhiji...@transarc.com> wrote: )Fury === Spiderman,
David> of course.
David> He seems to have some Daredevil elements too: the way
David> he throws those discs around is very reminiscent of
David> Daredevil's billy club.
For extra bonus points: ``No one escapes the Fury'' - where have we
heard this before?
--
* mjcu...@maths-and-cs.dundee.ac.uk (internet) *
* or mjcu...@uk.ac.dund.maths-and-cs (JANet) *
* *
* People! Can't live with 'em, can't trade them in for spares... *
James Langdell
> <Abhiji...@transarc.com> wrote:
>>Yellow Box : "All this and Earth Two" : a pun and a reference to DC's Earth-2.
>
>I think there was a movie or book or something named "All This and World War
>II". I believe Roy Thomas mentioned (probably in an All-Star Squadron letter
>column) wanting to use "All This and Earth Two" as a title. I don't think he
>ever did. (How's that for sentences containing disclaimers? But it's
>something for you to look up, anyway....)
If I remember right, in the 1970s there was a film called "All This and
World War II" which consisted of wartime clips accompanied by cover versions
of Beatles songs. This was done a few years before the more-successful
"Sgt. Peppers Lonely Hearts Club Band" movie that had all sorts of
then-popular groups recording Beatles cover songs.
Can anyone confirm this source of the title?
--James Langdell jam...@eng.sun.com
Sun Microsystems Mountain View, Calif.
JonKnutson
jam...@bassclar.Eng.Sun.COM (James Langdell) writes:
(about All This and World War Too)
You remember correctly about the movie. I've never seen it, but Roy
Thomas said in the letter column of "All Star Squadron" that it
combined two of his favorite interests: WWII and the Beatles.
Jon Knutson
Still missing the All Star Squad after all these years...
00td...@bsuvc.bsu.edu
> Abhiji...@transarc.com wrote:
>
> :
> : Panel 2 : King Zero may be the Submariner. More on this later.
>
> He was most likely Subbie. Notice the eyebrows in ish #6...
Roy Thomas also had a character called Jack Frost as a member of the
Liberty Legion. Jack bore a more than passing resemblance to King Zero,
so it's possible there's a blending there.
Tom Galloway
<00td...@bsuvc.bsu.edu> wrote:
> Roy Thomas also had a character called Jack Frost as a member of the
>Liberty Legion. Jack bore a more than passing resemblance to King Zero,
>so it's possible there's a blending there.
Perhaps more relevantly, I have a recollection that a Jack Frost story
was the first comics story written by Stan Lee. If so, that'd make even
more sense for Moore to use a similar character.
"Yeah, there are statements which are pretty close to Truth for the critical
and/or the popular community, and I'd say that Sim being a better writer than
Byrne would certainly comes about as close to "subjective fact" as you'll find
in comix field. (Overshadowed only by "Alan Moore is a better writer than Stan
Lee", which was discovered etched in marble tablets next to the Dead Sea
scrolls.)" --Jeff Meyer
tyg t...@hq.ileaf.com
Six Flags Over Glenn
>In article <8hwXpR6SM...@transarc.com>,<Abhiji...@transarc.com> wrote:
>>Letter 1 : "Ammonite", ... : no immediate
>>reference.
According to the OT, Moab and Ammon were the sons of Lot via incest
with his daughters after the pillar of Salt thing. Their descendants,
the Ammonites, lived in Transjordan. Well, that's the story, anyway,
but there was a group called the Ammonites that at various and sundrie
times gave the Israelites a hard time in the Iron Age. Probably,
Amman, the modern capital of the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan, is named
after them. They got whacked real hard by the Assyrian king Sargon
the Great in 713 BC and then pretty much got wiped out by Ashurbanipal
around 650 BC. You knew you were close to Ninevah when you passed the
immense mounds of skulls on either side of the road, to which the
Ammonites had contributed a great many. >B^) But apparently, they made
a come-back, 'cuz Babylonian Bad Boy Nebudchadnezzar also says he beat
up on 'em, in uh, 594 BC, I think. But the Assyrians were pretty
thorough, so we don't really believe him all that much. :-) I did an
archaeological map of the main Ammonite sites in the mid-80's, and my
dad worked there for many years, so I'm full of this stuff. >B^)
>"Ammonite" sounds like he may be a Rama-Tut type figure. He's referred to
>as a "fossilized fiend," and Ammon was another name for the Egyptian god
>Amen-Ra.
Not really, unless someone *really* misspelled it. :-) Way back when
it occasionally got spelled Amon or rarely Amun (the ancient Egyptians
didn't write shorts vowels, we get them via the semitic inscriptions,
but they would've written the double consonant), the French still
spell it Amoun. Amen and Re were originally distinct deities, Amen
was the sun god of Thebes, and Re was the sun god of Heliopolis/On.
They got syncretized when the capital moved to Thebes in the 18th
Dynasty. An "Amenite" in Egypt was someone in Thebes who opposed the
Atenism of Akhenaten in Amarna. They won, sent them nasty heretics
packin'. :-) Thebes, incidentally, got sacked by Ashurbanipal in
667/666 BC, and Egypt lost it's independence for the first time ever.
It's basically the end of classical Egypt and is pretty much a whole
chapter of my dissertation, 'cuz the pharaoh was Nubian. (Didn't think I
could connect all that, now didja? :) Not that anyone but me cares
about *any* of this. But, hey, I spent a lot of money learning this,
it's an obscure job, but somebody's gotta do it. :-)
>Nice work, Abhijit!
Definitely!
Pax ex machina,
Glenn
......................................................................
"Gee, Horus! Your Pop is swell!"
--- 1963
"Well here we are in Ancient Egypt!"
"Sensitively rendered only after painstaking research, no doubt."
--- Sam & Max
g-car...@uchicago.edu, if you must know
.......................................................................
Six Flags Over Glenn
>>>>>> "David" == David Goldfarb <gold...@ocf.berkeley.edu> writes:
>
> David> <Abhiji...@transarc.com> wrote: )Fury === Spiderman,
> David> of course.
>
> David> He seems to have some Daredevil elements too: the way
> David> he throws those discs around is very reminiscent of
> David> Daredevil's billy club.
>
>For extra bonus points: ``No one escapes the Fury'' - where have we
>heard this before?
Stephen King?
Pax ex machina,
Glenn
......................................................................
"It was a very small subpoena"
--- Harley Quinn
Mean Mister Mustard
Six Flags Over Glenn <lf...@midway.uchicago.edu> wrote:
>In article <2stk97$2...@cville-srv.wam.umd.edu> ma...@wam.umd.edu (Mean Mister Mustard) writes:
>
>>"Ammonite" sounds like he may be a Rama-Tut type figure. He's referred to
>>as a "fossilized fiend," and Ammon was another name for the Egyptian god
>>Amen-Ra.
>
>Not really, unless someone *really* misspelled it. :-)
Well, my _Who's Who in Egyptian Mythology_ lists it as a variant, probably
a variant made by one or more of the numerous cultures to invade Egypt.
Nice info about Amen/Amun and Ammon, though!
Btw, Websters lists "ammonite" as a kind of fossil (sort of a fossilized
trilobite), so Moore's naming may have nothing to to with Egypt or the
Bible!
Marc
NOR...@vax.lse.ac.uk
out whether Doctor Apocalypse is really the "freaky pharoah, Tutses." Doc Apoc,
Mystery Inc's arch-enemy, is an obvious counterpart to Doc Doom; the latter was
a reference to an old story where it was suggested that Doom and Rama-Tut may
be the same person (later revealed to have been a bluff on the part of Rama-Tut
in order to gain Doom's confidence).
By the way, "Indian Rubber Sam" is a reference to "Indian Rubber Man",
which was Jack Cole's original name for Plastic Man, and "Plastic Sam", which
was the MAD COMICS parody of Plastic Man.
-Mikel
NOR...@vax.lse.ac.uk
a reference to an old story where it was suggested that Doom and Rama-Tut may
be the same person (later revealed to have been a bluff on the part of Rama-Tut
in order to gain Doom's confidence).
-Mikel
Jim Murdoch
>
> I've written up some annotations for 1963. Originally I was going to
> wait to finish the series up till the Image annual came out. But since
> it keeps on getting delayed, here are the annotations as is :
>
> Post comments or send them to me directly. Enjoy !!
>
> Abhijit
>
>
> Page 21 : There is no real equivalent for the "Maybe Machine" in early FF,
> although Reed did build Negative Zone portals and use Doom's time machine.
Possibly the Legion's Miracle Machine?
> Letter 1: More on Sky Solo in book 2. "Dixie's Dates" may be a reference to
> Marvel romance and Archie comics like Millie the Model or Hedy and Patsy.
Yes. Marvel had 5 or 6 Millie titles in the '60's.
> Page 2 : Queep : This seems to be a parody of various silly sidekicks that
> DC characters like J'onn and the Space Ranger had. Tony Stark never had
> such a sidekick, and Hal picked one up only in the 70s (Itty the Starfish).
> Queep also bears some resemblance to the Monkey King, a very frightening
> demon that Moore and Bissette created in Swamp Thing.
> Panel 2 : more on Infra-Man in book #6. "Ammonite" : no reference.
> Panel 3 : "Molemoth" : no reference, could be Mole Man.
Reference to Dave Sim's "Melmoth" in Cerebus?
> Page 12 : This switching betwen body suits is very reminscient of LSH member
> Wildfire.
How about NoMan from T.H.U.N.D.E.R. Agents?
> Letter 1 : "NumberJack", "Piface" : no references.
Tom "Pieface" Kalmaku was Green Lantern's sidekick.
> "Moscow Dynamo" : Crimson Dynamo, an old armored Soviet supervillain.
Moscow Dynamo is also one of the top Russian ice hockey teams.
> "Diabolical Dugpa" : may be Baron Mordo, old Dr. Strange enemy.
Or the Dread Dormammu.
> [ Any reference on the red and white costumed archer ? ]
That's Shaft from Youngblood.
> "Warps into a smithy" : [ I'm positive I've heard this before, but the exact
> reference is eluding me.]
WARPs into a SMITHy. A very sharp jab at some of the problems surrounding
Marvelman/Miracleman.
> Modern Mystery comics cover : no reference. Probably a Golden Age comic cover.
Probably Marvel Mystery #1. Don't have it out for reference right now.
Very good. You put a lot of work into this.
Jim
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Don Porges
an earlier title, "All This and Heaven Too." I don't know what
that earlier one was about.
Carl Muckenhoupt
Elrod shows up at the Temple of the Black Sun, under the mistaken
impression that the unholy rite about to be performed there is a
festival devoted to Black Sun Cocktails (one of his favorite drinks).
I don't know how this relates to the Hypernaut; probably there's some
other Black Sun that's the direct reference, and the Cocktail was just
an obscure way to get into the sentence.
Warping into a smithy is definitely a reference to the Warpsmiths from
Alan Moore's Marvelman/Miracleman. Like the Hypernaut, they had some
kind of secret satellite up at one point.
Carl Muckenhoupt