Mavel Advanced Solicitations for September 2010

Here's a rundown of the 1980s goodness:

CAPTAIN AMERICA: WAR & REMEMBRANCE PREMIERE HC
Written by ROGER STERN
Penciled by JOHN BYRNE
Covers by FRANK MILLER & JOHN BYRNE
The people’s choice?! Captain America's endless war on crime and tyranny sets him against new enemies and old, from an army of robot replicas to the black deeds of Baron Blood! Plus: Captain America for president! Guest-starring the Avengers; S.H.I.E.L.D.; and the late, great Union Jack! Featuring Cobra, Mister Hyde and Batroc the Leaper! The complete Stern/Byrne run, culminating with the standard-setting version of Cap's awe-inspiring origin! Collecting CAPTAIN AMERICA #247-255.
224 PGS./Rated A …$29.99

THE 'NAM VOL. 2 TPB
Written by DOUG MURRAY
Penciled by MIKE GOLDEN, JOHN SEVERIN & WAYNE VANSANT
Cover by BOB CAMP
It’s 1967, and you are there—but how long will the men of the 23rd Infantry Division be able to say the same? Marvel’s groundbreaking saga of the Vietnam War continues with flashbacks on the front, worries in the world (a.k.a. back home) and murder in the ranks. Plus: the first appearance of Mike “Ice” Phillips, one of the few soldiers who stayed with the series until nearly its end. Collecting THE 'NAM #11-20.
240 PGS./Rated T+ …$29.99

ACTS OF VENGEANCE OMNIBUS HC DAVIS COVER
Written by MARK GRUENWALD, JOHN BYRNE, DWAYNE MCDUFFIE, HOWARD MACKIE, RON FRENZ, TOM DEFALCO, TERRY AUSTIN, DAVID MICHELINIE & GERRY CONWAY
Penciled by PAUL RYAN, JOHN BYRNE, VINCE MIELCAREK, DWAYNE TURNER, AL MILGROM, KIERON DWYER, RON LIM, HERB TRIMPE, RON FRENZ, MIKE VOSBURG, COLLEEN DORAN, ERIK LARSEN,
TODD MCFARLANE, SAL BUSCEMA, MIKE ESPOSITO & ALEX SAVIUK
Covers by ALAN DAVIS & JOHN BYRNE
Two dozen of Marvel’s top talents set more than 40 super heroes against at least as many super villains in the premier crossover event of the 1990s! Plus: the debut of the New Warriors! The destruction of Avengers Island! Spider-Man’s cosmic power and the madness of the Scarlet Witch! A three-headed monster, a three-faced robot, a trip through the worlds of What If? and more! Special guest-appearance by Abraham Lincoln! Collecting AVENGERS #311-313, AVENGERS ANNUAL #19; AVENGERS SPOTLIGHT #26-29; AVENGERS WEST COAST #53-55; CAPTAIN AMERICA #365-367; IRON MAN #251-252; QUASAR #5-7; Thor #411-413; CLOAK & DAGGER #9; AMAZING SPIDER-MAN #326-329; SPECTACULAR SPIDER-MAN #158-160; WEB OF SPIDER-MAN #59-61.
744 PGS./Rated A …$99.99

1985 - Alpha Flight

Alpha Flight #18-29 (1985)

John Byrne, writer and artist

Unfortunately, the series declined from issue #17 as it seemed Byrne couldn’t keep his interest in the title. However, he did persevere up until issue #28 and moved over to The Incredible Hulk. Interestingly, the creative team on The Incredible Hulk, writer Bill Mantlo and artist Mike Mignola, had swapped places with Byrne. Byrne told Jim Salicrup (Comics Interview #25, 1985) why he left the title:

“There has not been half the fun doing Alpha Flight that there has been doing the Fantastic Four. Number two has been the fact that the general response from the fans and the readers is that I set out to do something different with Alpha Flight and they don’t like it . . .  When Alpha Flight was announced the reaction was,  ‘Oh, Gawd, another group book.’ And I said ‘Okay, we’ll give you something different. This is not going to be a group book, this is going to be individual issues of their own titles.’ And they didn’t want it. The readers didn’t want it. Because of my particular frame of mind on the book, I couldn’t turn it into what they wanted.”

Also, being a Canadian myself, it was nice to see that Byrne was genuinely convincing in his representation of Canada and Canadian culture. He used just enough Canadiana in his stories to be realistic, and I don’t just mean adding an “eh” to the end of each sentence. He provided accurate depictions of Canadian Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau, touched on the French-English language tensions, and used a broad variety of settings like the Parisian streets of Montreal, Toronto’s Ontario Place, and the West Edmonton Mall.

Alpha Flight #19 introduced Elizabeth Twoyoungmen (Shaman’s daughter) as Talisman.

Alpha Flight #24 featured the death of Langowski/Sasquatch, and brought in Box as a legitimate member of the team.

Alpha Flight #25 featured the return of Vindicator. And before you sigh and think: “another dead hero back to life…” you have to remember that heroes returning from the dead wasn’t the revolving door that it is now.

1985 – Longshot miniseries

Longshot #1-6 

September 1985 - February 1986

Writer: Ann Nocenti

Artist(s): Art Adams/While Portacio

An alien, with no memories of who he is, escapes from a group of mysterious captors and finds himself on Earth. He can't escape his past and learns that he's actually a synthetic human created as part of a slave race for an evil tyrant, Mojo. He recalls memories of his creator and how he was meant to help his fellow slaves rebel against Mojo. With the help of his human allies, Longshot drives Mojo from Earth and then returns to the Mojoverse to continue the struggle against Mojo.

Ann Nocenti juggles a few well-worn story ideas and manages to pull it all off in a refreshing fashion. Issues #1 through 4 seem abruptly different from issues 5 and 6. The early issues are written in a less traditional fashion and focuses on Longshot's exposure to a variety of different examples of humanity. He meets and learns from a paranoid survivalist, a glamorous movie stunt woman, and from a down and out husband who is ready to commit suicide. In the last couple of issues, the story line takes on a more traditional comic book form featuring a climatic battle between Longshot and his nemesis Mojo.

If you enjoy Nocenti's writing in this series, check out her run on Daredevil where her writing is better developed and she takes a more serious look at a variety of social issues.

Oh, yeah, I almost forgot the art. :)

There's no much to say about the art except for wow! This series was Art Adams' first mainstream work and his art just got better and better with each issue. His intricate pencilled art really shined through in this series and set him up for work on a couple of the X-Men annuals as well as the New Mutants Special. Unfortunately, since Adams' style is so labour intensive, he could never keep up with the schedule that a monthly book would require.

Longshot's storyline would become intertwined with the X-Men as he would join the mutant team for awhile before returning to the Mojoverse and renewing his struggle against Mojo.

The group of kids Longshot befriended in issue #4 returned in the pages of Nocent’s Daredevil run.

1981 - Bill Sienkiewicz Moon Knight Portfolio

Found these lovely pages as I was searching around the web for the John Byrne Portfolio... Enjoy.

John Byrne's X-Men portfolio

I came across these scans of the 1993 X-Men portfolio by John Byrne. Byrne recreated some of the more classic scenes from his run during the late 70s and early 80s. They're absolutely beautiful. If I'm not mistaken, the original portfolio was in black and white while these images were obviously coloured...

Storm, Wolverine, and Nightcrawler facing off against Proteus circa Uncanny X-Men #127.

Cyclops battling Shaman's magic box conjurations with Sasquatch, Northstar, and Aurora waiting in the wings, circa Uncanny X-Men #121.

Kitty Pryde on her own trying to stay alive as a N'gari demon tears the mansion apart, 

Uncanny X-Men #143.

Jean Grey's death scene with a horrified Cyclops helplessly witnessing, Uncanny X-Men #137.

1983 - Comics Collector magazine

The Comics Collector magazine launched in the spring of 1983 and was published by Kruse Publications which had recently aquired The Comics Buyer's Guide. It was edited by legendary comic book columnists, Don and Maggie Simpson who had made their reputation writing for the Comic Buyer's Guide weekly magazine.


Comics Collector focused on the world of comics from a character and creator point of view, but as well as a collector's point of view. It not only provided a great price guide (not as bulky as the Overstree Guide), it also included a  Photo Grading Guide, which was my first exposure to grading comic books.

From what I could find, Comics Collector ended with its 10th issue in the winter of 1986.

1984 – Avengers #250

Avengers Volume 1 #250

December 1984

Artists: Al Milgrom/Joe Sinnott/Ian Akin/Brian Garvey

I recently received the Avengers: West Coast Avengers Assemble Premiere Hardcover and forgot how much fun Roger Stern and Al Milgrom’s run on the Avengers was. Stern’s run on the Avengers was obviously defined by his collaboration with John Buscema and Tom Palmer, but you can’t discount his early run. The issues are tightly plotted weaving multiple character storylines back and forth. Material from Avengers #239, #243-244, and #246 were pulled into this volume and even with these bits, you can an idea of what Stern was trying to accomplish.

Avengers #250 (included in complete form in this hardcover) was a prime example of Stern and Milgrom’s collaboration. Milgrom’s penciled art is tightly defined by veteran Joe Sinnott’s inks. About halfway through the issue, Ian Akin and Brian Garvey jumped in to ink a dozen or so pages. Their efforts give Milgrom’s art a soft, polish feel and is a treat for the eyes.

This issue takes place shortly after the West Coast Avengers miniseries and has them team-up with the East Coast branch to take on the threat of Maelstrom. In one double-sized issue, this team-up puts most of today’s “events” to shame in how well the characters are handled and how you can have a great, exciting story in 40 pages.

In an interview with George Khoury for MarvelMasterworks.com, Stern looked back on this run:

The trick was in figuring out which Avengers I could use. Three of them – Cap, Iron Man, and Thor – had their own books and would be unavailable for long stretches of time. Others would be pulled away for months at a time into miniseries. Keeping the right mix of characters was the biggest challenge, but after a while I managed to develop a pretty good working repertory company of heroes.

Al [Milgrom] was always a great idea man, but he was often drawing another book, as well as pulling down a day job as an editor. Because of time constraints, we never got to really collaborate as much as I would have liked.

The West Coast Avengers miniseries was a roaring success and spawned a regular, monthly series. Milgrom moved over from the Mighty Avengers and took on this spin-off title.