Human Torch: Alas, gone are the creatively-shaped odd panels of the first issue, over to mostly a boring grid (though pp. 5, 9 and 15 offer an interesting use of circular or semicircular inlays that at least give a little variety). The first page is a good if dense recap of the first issue's important points, through the mechanism of Horton's journals. The story is a little peculiar, and it seems hardly credible that no one would notice a plane swooping down on race cars just before they burst into flame, but the theme of fire at least lets us get a better grasp of what the Torch's powers are. I definitely like the Torch's cockiness in dealing with things; like Namor he's got attitude to spare, which makes it all the more inevitable that they'll have to come into conflict. p. 8 The burning footprints are a nice, if slightly macabre, touch. The Torch's lack of awareness of himself leads to threatening people in the stands as he ignites the building unintentionally--but now we find his "weird yell" extinguishes the flames, which recognize "their master's voice." A lot of that will find its way into Johnny Storm, though his control of his flames is always much greater than the GA Torch's starts off as.

The Angel: This peculiar hero somehow nabs the cover spot this issue and next, over the Torch and Subby, both of whom seem like they'd be more cover-worthy. p. 1 "Gruely looking"? Surely the writer didn't mean this definition. But that's the only one I can find....what on earth did Gustafson intend to say here? p.5 Yep, Jane's first instinct is to assume that the treasure map is cursed when people try to kill her and steal it, instead of plain old human greed. At least she's resourceful, crashing her car near a policeman. After the rickshaw early on, there's really nothing about this story to indicate it's set in Hong Kong; I wonder if it was reworked hastily to give it an exotic setting?

Sewage-Mariner: The water is just as brown and murky in issue 2. Poor Bill Everett....he must have owed money to the bozos at Jerron Quality Color, because they've certainly disgraced his memory:
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I will be so glad when I don't have to look at this hideous volume again. On to the story, as well as I can make it out through the muck. p. 3: I like how a live wire just irritates Namor. And of course, his first reaction is to hurl steel girders at whoever happens to be nearby. His volatile temper and penchant for not thinking are quite evident here; he's downright violent and nasty. At the same time, his curiosity over the "little lead pellets" is naive and downright touching. He's a complicated and fascinating character. p. 8: He can be a sprinkler system from his pores?!? There's a power that never reared its head in his silver age appearances! I love the dialogue at the top of p. 10....
Namor: "Stand quietly or I shall kill you all."
Orderly: "Hey"
Namor: "I said quietly, you fool!"
Nothing works like directness. The last panel is intriguing as well: "Will he continue his evil deeds?" So far, he's mostly acted as a flat-out villain, with moments of naivete, childish temper and innocence, in a super-powered body with a family that holds grudges like a bunch of Sicilians. Yeah, I want more.

Masked Raider: Wow, a whole town full of outlaws? That's pretty ambitious. p.3: the graphic of the marshall is still pretty shocking even today:

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The reproduction is so bad here that it's not until p. 4 that it's clear how Hook Tebbs got his moniker. At p. 6 we find out the Raider is (or at least is pretending to be) something of a racist, as he gratuitously hurls an ethnic slur to Miguel. The last page is a total mess of story-telling. All the action happens off-panel, including the big fight and Hook getting his just rewards? Go back and try again, Al. This story is about 2 pages too short, and your sense of the dramatic is woefully lacking.

American Ace: From the peculiar headers on every page, I have the sense that this was a tryout for a newspaper strip that no one wanted to pick up. But it has a lot of interesting things going on, starting primarily with the villain, Queen Ursula, a demented and megalomaniacal shrew in exile, looking for any excuse to start a war and reclaim power, to the extent of assassinating one of her own countrymen and then blaming it on another country as a pretext to invade. Politically, she's as manipulative as they come, and is like a female Hitler in the guise of Napoleon. She would have no compunctions about burning the Reichstag and blaming the communists, and she's definitely in touch with Hitler and Goebbels' philosophies about the Big Lie being the most credible to the masses. The imagery of the children being mercilessly bombed has a flavor to me of the experiences of the Spanish Civil War (Picasso's Guernica comes to mind, though obviously in more realistic form). It's an intentionally brutal depiction of war, and very effective indeed. The American Ace (remember him? me neither) hardly appears, but Ursula is so fascinating it's just as well. Alas, this one doesn't last long, with only one more installment.

The Angel text story is interesting mainly because it indicates just how timely (HA!) the comics were; according to Mike's Amazing World of Marvel Comics, this issue, cover-dated December 1939, streeted on October 13, 1939, or a scant six weeks after Germany invaded Poland on September 1, and here we have the Angel already in Poland, fighting the Axis. Alas, they couldn't have known when they went to press that Poland would already be utterly defeated by October 6. Although Germany is never identified by name, the pilot that the Angel defeats speaks German to him. The anti-Nazi sentiments that will drive the Timely books for the next six years are in place here in the second issue, without the obscurantism of American Ace and long before Captain America ever sees the light of day. Oddly, the Angel seems to have picked up superhero powers from somewhere, since his stunts (grabbing a plane in midair?) seem a bit beyond the abilities he's demonstrated in the illustrated stories, in any event (though he does apparently have the ability to bound to the top of buildings).

Ka-Zar: due to the poor (okay, miserable.....oh, all right, godawful and vomitous) reproduction, it's awfully hard to follow this story, and the order of panels is quite unclear at times; on close inspection some of the panels are numbered, but they're hard to make out. There's an awful lot of talking to animals and the animals answering back here, way beyond what was demonstrated in the first issue, making Ka-Zar's Tarzanic heritage even more blatant. The story is a bit of a jumble, with the segment about the rogue mad elephant seemingly coming out of nowhere and having little to do with the main tale about Bardak and his fascination with the mirror. At least the business about Zar's cubs does tie into that pretty well. Life in the jungle is clearly nasty, brutish and short, though, and there's not much sentimentality evident here. But clearly there are some interesting ideas about what to do with the jungle hero, and there's a mention of De Kraft to remind the reader that there's still revenge to be taken (not to mention the potential threat that he poses to Ka-Zar).



Last Edited By: gardibolt Dec 11 09 12:06 AM. Edited 2 times.