$24.99 Marvel Comics
Credits:
Various teams from
the earliest Marvel days to the present
Overview:
A grab-bag assortment
of origins of the greatest villains of the Marvel Universe.
Review
For years, Marvel
Comics have been putting out trade paperbacks using the same extremely
enjoyable gimmick: the books include the origin stories of a handful of
time-honored Marvel characters. Each Character gets two stories, one from the
swingin’ sixties, usually by Stan Lee and either Steve Ditko or Jack Kirby, and
one fairly modern. The result is an interesting read for a comics fan, giving
insight into the magic of those early pieces and the sophistication of recent
years. Having run out of titles (thankfully) along the lines of “Origins,” “Son
of Origins,” and “Grandson of Origins,” the latest such collection to come
along is BRING BACK THE BAD GUYS.
For me, it’s the
classic stuff that makes it worthwhile. Here’s the very first appearance of
Kang, the Time Lord, in The Avengers #8. It’s easy to forget how vibrant and
gee-whiz the sixties comics from Marvel could be, but all you have to do is se
the way Jack Kirby drew Thor, Iron Man and Captain America to be sucked into
the presentation.
There’s also a lesson
in how a not-so-thrilling villain moves front and center under the right
creative team, as evidenced by Kingpin’s first appearance in Spider-Man #190,
and then fleshed out and chilled by Frank Miller in Daredevil #172. For X-Men
fans, there’s the origin of Magneto from X-Men #161. Ever wonder what Professor
X would look like in a Hydra uniform? The origin of the sinister Mandarin is
here, as well as those of Galactus and the oddest footnote of all Marveldom,
Fin Fang Foom.
A word on
Presentation: every story is reprinted in it’s entirety, with a brief essay
explaining the context of the story with a bit of background, and - - the
coolest part - - the original cover. This is the sort of collection to be picked
up and put down at leisure. It’s a curio, really, or a collection of curios,
allowing the reader to look at how far comics have come in thirty years, and
perhaps, how much they’ve lost. In the early days, there was a small cast of
characters, a very small creative team, and seemingly endless possibilities.
Thence came an empire.