Tag Archives: Walter Simonson

DEATH’S HEAD – THE BODY iN QUESTiON: DADDY iSSUES

27 October 2025 Phil Boyce Leave a comment

This week back in 1990 the editorial in Marvel UK’s Transformers announced the exciting news that Death’s Head was finally back. Not in a reprint of a previous story (something they still liked to hype) but a brand new graphic novel. In reality it collected together his run from Strip comic, and this is the final piece of the jigsaw for the blog’s real time read through of the original incarnation of the character.

Coming in at 68 pages including a card cover, inside is all glossy and beautiful, the paper upgrade allowing artist Geoff Senior (who co-created the character for the Transformers but only drew one of the monthly issues) to return to the character in style and bring us a new level of colouring. Helen Stone (The Sleeze Brothers, The Real Ghostbusters, Knights of Pendragon) joins the team as letterer, Steve White (Xenozoic Tales, Rogue Trooper, The Lost World Jurassic Park) returns to edit and of course it’s all written by co-creator Simon Furman (Transformers, To the Death, Doctor Who), with Geoff (Hell’s Angel, Dragon’s Claws, Judge Dredd) and Walt Simonson (The Star Slammers, Jurassic Park, Thor) teaming up on the cover.

We begin in a strange land that apparently doesn’t adhere to time or meaning, with someone being tracked down and killed, the perpetrator only seen from one angle, their arm looking suspiciously like Death’s Head’s original design from Transformers and Doctor Who. Then it’s back to 2020, where he ended up at the end of his comic’s run and an electrifying chase as the Freelance Peacekeeping Agent hunts down his latest bounty and it’s full of all the usual quips and comedy action.

Rogan accuses Death’s Head of enjoying the chase and this really gets into his head. As he runs he questions himself. Is he really enjoying the hunt more than the profit? At the end he believes Rogan is about to take a woman hostage so he kills him, but he was running to her apartment for safety. She’s his partner and she screams that Death’s Head ran him down like it was sport. He walks away, solemn, trying hard to convince himself that she’s wrong.

Initially I thought this wasn’t going to feature Spratt but suddenly we’re back in 8162 and he’s meeting with his boss’ mysterious love who was hinted at in the monthly. (He doesn’t look like Spratt at all though.) It’s good to see the vulture is still on the team too. So apparently the not-a-bounty hunter is her husband and she has “vengelust” for him. Big Shot is also back and just as angry as ever. Spratt tries to escape, so Nightweaver reads his mind and finds out her love has time travelled. All the while in some void-like world the lookalike looks on. So far, so intriguing.

As in the comic the year 2020 looks just as futuristic as thousands of years into the future and given what actually happened in the world in 2020 maybe this version would’ve been preferred. I don’t want to ruin any possible future you may have in reading this graphic novel, so I must warn you this review will obviously contain spoilers. It should go without saying by this stage, this blog is all about classic comics, but more than any of the monthly stories the shocks and surprises in this are an integral part of the plot and thus the reading experience. To tell you about them would be to ruin the experience for you if you intend to read this one day. So consider yourself warned.

My favourite parts always involve our lead character and his quips, his inner thoughts and biting humour. Such as the moment above. He ends up flashing back and forth between the real world and the void and slowly the identity of the lookalike reveals himself. However, surprisingly this is seen in flashback form inside our anti-hero’s mind. He begins to question his own origin, something he’s never done until now. The same goes for the reader, but I’ll get to that below as it’s the only real bone of contention I have with this.

It doesn’t stop the rest of this graphic novel from being highly enjoyable. For example, despite Death’s Head initially being joyful that Spratt wasn’t there, the banter between the two during action scenes is better than ever. I think he secretly loves it! Or how about another scene when he realises he hadn’t previously defeated Big Shot and he strops like a child, proclaiming it’s unfair while having the huffiest of faces his angular jawline will allow. Then things take a turn when Big Shot says all bounty hunters are the same, that they all enjoy their work. Following up from earlier in the story, this leads us to the main event, the creation of Death’s Head.

Meet Lupex. He’s the fella in the void universe who bares a striking resemblance to the star of the piece and whose catchphrase is also somewhat familiar. He’s a warlord and Nightweaver, known here as Pyra, was his wife; a woman who wanted all the power he had but who was in love with another. Lupex possessed bodies to survive and did so with her lover’s body out of spite. He was also creating a robotic form for himself so he could live forever without the need of new flesh.

But in an act of revenge Pyra finished programming the robot and made him autonomous with a mind and soul of his own. Not just any mind, a business-like mind, a clinical assassin whose only goal was to do the job and get paid. The opposite of Lupex. She thought this would create the only one who could go up against her husband (whose love of killing drove him). It’s a hell of a story but I’m not sure if it fits within the Death’s Head comic for me. It feels too mythical. Then again, he did fight Unicron, the God of Chaos on the astral plane so maybe it’s just that I’m used to the more grounded stories of the monthly by now.

What definitely doesn’t gel for me is the retconning. Don’t get me wrong, I like stories that add to previous ones, that surprise us and take things in new directions or give us previously unknown facts to completely redefine characters and settings. But what I don’t like is when this completely contradicts what went before, and we’d already been told by Death’s Head himself he was created as the plaything of a very rich, very bored individual who he later killed.

However we are told here that his body was subsequently stolen by an unknown party so there’s always a chance the previous origin could be woven in, in the time before his first appearance in Transformers. Did Simon intended to do so or was this was replacing what went before? I’ve convinced myself it’s the former because the rest of this book is so much fun, so full of superb action, great character moments and lots of laugh-out-loud moments that it really is classic Death’s Head.

The story culminates in a chase echoing that from the beginning, only with Death’s Head as the one being chased and taunted. This creature also has control over the land in this realm, which is split into ‘magik’ and ‘techno’ sectors. In each he can realign his powers to shape the ground and use it to attack his victims, and he almost destroys Death’s Head by doing so. However, he cannot control the borders between these sectors or when they change from one to the other independently.

We see Death’s Head almost enjoying each successful escape, leading him to question himself again. That is, until he remembers his one true love. No, not Pyra. He remembers how much he loves money! This is enough to refocus him, and I’ll admit I had a little inward cheer and fist bump when this happened. It’s almost a spoof of scenes in superhero comics when doubts are washed away and the hero emerges ready for battle after thinking about the reasons they’re fighting, their cause for good. Here, the cause is cash.

In the end Death’s Head takes a gamble that Lupex doesn’t know he’d spent so long in 8162 (in his own comic and Dragon’s Claws) and as a result has become much more advanced as he repaired and added to his tech. In the end he’s playing the victim but in reality his computer systems are calculating where a magik zone is about to change into a techno one. We think the final blow is about to fall but Lupex unknowingly tries to use magik as the zone changes and it no longer works. The few seconds it takes him to correct his attack is just enough for our star to use his built-in hidden spike.

It’s a thrilling conclusion. It rockets along but never fails to hit the right character beats as it goes. Lupex feels like a genuine threat for the seemingly indestructible Death’s Head, all the while our hero (I’m just going to call him that from now on, I think he deserves it after all this) quips escalate the more desperate he gets, almost like he’s trying to use humour to keep himself going. After it’s all over he even begins to gloat, but he stops himself. He doesn’t want to end up like his father!

Even the vulture gets a funny moment alongside Spratt before Death’s Head gets to round everything off with his usual blasé attitude, despite the scale of the battle that’s just occurred. While I’m still in two minds over the retconning, the story told here is a fascinating one. If we hadn’t been told something different beforehand this would be faultless. In fact, it near enough is anyway!

What a fantastic send off for one of my very favourite comics characters. Apparently this first incarnation of Death’s Head appeared in Marvel US’ Fantastic Four #338 so I might track that down some day as an extra for the blog, but in the meantime it’s a very, very fond farewell to the greatest Freelance Peacekeeping Agent any world, any time or any universe has ever seen. What an ending! Kudos to all involved.

BACK TO iSSUE TEN

DEATH’S HEAD MENU

Comic Reviews, Death's Head

DEATH’S HEAD #9: HEAD WiTH A HEART

1 July 2024 Phil Boyce Leave a comment

With a cover by none other than the legendary Walt Simonson (Thor, Star Slammers, Jurassic Park) and Mark Farmer, the penultimate issue of Death’s Head contains no official warning that the comic was about to come to an end. There’s a bit of a hint on the editorial page which has a ’Next Issue’ panel in place of the usual subscriptions offers, not that readers at the time would’ve picked up on this as they’d have been too excited at the prospect of our Freelance Peace-Keeping Agent meeting Iron Man next month.

After a price rise last issue we got another one this month too, by 5p again. I remember the second half of 1988 and into 1989 my comics always seemed to be increasing in price, such were the struggles of an industry at a time when readerships were declining in the face of competition from television and computer games while production costs were soaring. Death’s Head would become a casualty of these changes soon enough but let’s enjoy the issue at hand first.

The editorial describes how last month The Doctor dropped off Death’s Head in the middle of Earth’s Dark Ages, which is actually 1989. Given writer Simon Furman‘s Dragon’s Claws took regular swipes at the 80s UK government (in the comic’s future vision of Britain) this could be more about accuracy than a quick joke. Simon is back after a month away from the comic and co-creator Geoff Senior finally makes a very welcome return as artist.

I didn’t even know the big rock guy
is the leader!

As you can see The Fantastic Four are the special guests this month. I’ll admit this is the first comic featuring them that I’ve ever read. I’ve never seen an issue of theirs and never saw the cartoons as a kid or any of the movies, so I really am going into this blind. I didn’t even know the big rock guy is the leader! It starts off very light-hearted with The Thing and The Human Torch bickering in a very superhero way.

Clobberin’ Time continues new editor Steve White’s brief time behind the wheel, with regulars Louise Cassell and Annie Halfacree on colours and letters respectively. That title soon becomes tiresome though. I understand it’s The Thing’s catchphrase but he uses it so frequently I feel like shouting, “Okay, okay, I get it, kids are meant to be copying him!” at the pages. Perhaps this is keeping within character but it’s just so annoying. What is good is the funny moment this sequence ends with, where it looks like they’ve made up.

Meanwhile, up on the roof someone isn’t too happy at being dropped off in the wrong time again, much like how he ended up in 8162 in the first place, even if he did settle in there and made it his (lucrative) home. However, not only is he out of time he’s also in precisely the wrong place as The Fantastic Four’s security system automatically opens fire. I have to say for the good guys their security system is very much shoot-first-and-ask-questions-later. Although it does lead to a laugh or two thanks to Death’s Head quips and his long-running bad luck.

Their building is a bit naff though, as huge holes are blasted open and its roof is destroyed as the automated weapons try and fail to take down Death’s Head. You’d think their HQ’s walls would be a bit more secure, that they’d stand up to their own security. But it’s all a bit of daft fun so we’ll not get caught up in the details (this isn’t Twitter). Using his rocket boots to fly through one of the aforementioned roof holes he finds himself in what could be described as their garage, full of hi-tech gadgets and transport.

Convinced this level of tech on 1980s Earth could mean they’d have access to a time machine, Death’s Head thinks aloud, “Just hope they’re nice, sane, normal people…” when he gets a rock hard tap on the shoulder. Meanwhile, back in the Los Angeles of 8162 Spratt is still fighting with their pet vulture (see #5) and takes another phone call from the mysterious woman in previous issues who’s been proclaiming she’s his business partner’s love. This time we also see part of her attire.

I’m still none the wiser although I’m assuming she must be a known character, given how she’s slowly being introduced. The Evil Dead’s Death Nell? If you remember the identity of the caller please don’t tell me in a comment or on socials; no spoilers! Hopefully I’ll find out in our final issue. As for this special crossover event it boils down to The Fantastic Four’s not-so-fantastic security program going rogue and dispatching a hovering droid to see off everyone.

At the beginning of the issue Reed Richards is working on one of the computer chips powering it and he was interrupted by the infighting, inadvertently making a mistake and corrupting the programming. At least this is the suggestion that’s thrown out by Reed, it’s never actually confirmed. With their bickering and the over-zealous zapping at Death’s Head having destroyed a lot of the building, it goes into full defensive mode.

During a protracted fight between the team and their new visitor it becomes clear that Death’s Head’s supposed fighting back is a case of mistaken identity. It was actually the computer attacking them but they were too busy assuming it was Death’s Head that they didn’t see the obvious. Between these reactions and the way their system was programmed I don’t have much faith in this superhero if my first impressions are anything to go by.

Eventually they calm down and think rationally, realising they need to team up with this comic’s lead character when Reed and The Invisible Woman’s child is put in danger. With Death’s Head being a mechanoid and able to hack the system that’s trying to kill them, soon it comes down to our ruthless hunter of bounties (I didn’t say it), a paid assassin, a mech programmed for self-preservation, to rescue a child.

The droid has handcuffed itself to the young boy in his bedroom, coldly using him as a bargaining chip. Now, our anti-hero isn’t exactly known for being subtle. Clicking a laser cutter onto his arm to snap the connection to the boy he leaps into the room and actually ends up damaging the droid and setting off its self-destruct! For a brief moment we see the Death’s Head we’d expect to see if this were any adult human, but it appears there’s a glimmer of a soul behind the facade.

That third image says it all and with the constant countdown you can feel the palpable sense of desperation in that penultimate panel. Superb, exciting stuff that Geoff’s penmanship is just perfect for. This may be the printed page but somehow he’s always able to make his art feel so animated when the script calls for it. After the umpteen pages of fighting earlier in the comic, after the build up in the story prior to this, this is single-handedly the most dramatic and exciting moment.

The panic it sets off is key to what’s next,
the story for our final issue

Yes, Death’s Head had to save the kid in order to gain access to their time machine but you can tell that’s not the reason he put his own life at risk. Ultimately though, this brave and heroic moment earns him the trust of The Fantastic Four and they set up their machine to take him back to 8162, a device that transports him in a green bar of energy from the feet up.

As he disappears, The Thing tells him that he had him all wrong, that the mech must be “what passes as a superhero in 8162”, to which Death’s Head tells him no, he was right all along. He then finally introduces himself by name and tells them what he does for a living…

This was a suitably funny final line for the character and the panic it sets off is key to what’s next, the story for our final issue. Back in the earlier days of reading Marvel UK’s Transformers for the blog’s Instagram the Machine Man of 2020 back up strip introduced a future-version of a certain main character in the publisher’s lineup. The hero’s identity had been completely taken over by another person. In the year 2020 Iron Man was no longer Tony Stark, he was Arno Stark.

No longer a hero, the Iron Man of 2020 was a mercenary-for-hire (which should make things interesting next month) and after being defeated by Machine Man he reappeared in a Spider-Man comic (also published in Transformers) when his family were held hostage by a killer and he had to travel back in time for the story’s resolution. The story ended in disaster, with Arno losing and seeing his city of the then-far future destroyed. His next appearance after that was in #10 of Death’s Head.

I knew Iron Man was to be the special guest star in the final issue but I had no idea it was this version and I’m super excited to see what happens. I really loved his two stories in Transformers. He was clearly the bad guy in his first appearance and for all intents and purposes was exactly the same when he returned. He was forced into a position of doing the right thing but in doing so went up against an actual hero, so young readers’ loyalties were tested. It made for fascinating reading.

I’m hoping for more of that kind of storytelling in Death’s Head next month. The pieces are certainly in place for an explosive finale and a suitably powerful send off for what has been a brilliant comic series. If it’s as good as it has been so far, and as good as those Iron Man of 2020 appearances were, then it’ll certainly take the edge off having to say goodbye. The final contract is on Monday 5th August 2024, right here.

iSSUE EiGHT < > iSSUE TEN

DEATH’S HEAD MENU

Comic Reviews, Jurassic Park

THE LOST WORLD JURASSiC PARK #4: THE END?

21 August 2023 Phil Boyce Leave a comment

Well here we are at the final issue already of Titan Magazine’s The Lost World Jurassic Park comic. In the States, just as with the original movie, Topps Comics released its adaptation as a four-part mini-series. When the original adaptation proved popular further stories were told as the first official sequel to the film, however in 1997 no further adventures after the sequel movie were forthcoming. In the UK, instead of simply having a one-off special consisting of all four chapters as had happened with other adaptations at the time Titan decided to also do a mini-series, with exclusive extras for UK readers of course.

Unfortunately #2 remains the only issue to feature one of the gorgeous animatronic animals from the movie on the front but I do like this final cover by original adaptation writer Walter Simonson and Richard Ory, complete with an exceptionally cute little baby Tyrannosaurus rex. It also gets across the exciting moment from the movie a lot better than the strip. Inside we go and we kick things off with our heroes arriving at the workers’ village in a suitably eerie scene.

Once again the narration sets the scene, most likely taken directly from the script and unlike in previous issues it doesn’t feel like it’s trying too hard, writer Don McGregor’s captions perfectly balanced with the more subdued art on these first pages from penciller Jeff Butler, inker Armando Gil, colourist (and editor) Renée Witterstaetter, alongside the lettering by Ken Lopez. Even the lack of detail in the buildings adds a feeling of things being shrouded in mystery and shadows, capturing the feeling of this moment in the movie really well.

Nick Van Owen arrives alongside the rest of the characters, Ian Malcom, Sarah Harding and Ian’s daughter Kelly and I’m fine with this change, it helps get the same story beats across in a shorter time frame, one of the better decisions made in this adaptation. Then on the very next page my hopes for a better comic book climax than the original movie received are dashed when another brilliant part of the movie is hacked down to an unrecognisable state.

So much happens here in the movie and it’s all just excised including, yet again, anything to do with Vanessa Lee Chester’s character, Kelly. In the original film’s comic adaptation Samuel L Jackson’s Ray Arnold suddenly disappeared without explanation. Now we also have this movie’s sole black character unceremoniously edited out of all of their scenes.

There’s an overall feeling of this chapter being rushed

Yes, Ian’s moments being chased around here are nowhere to be seen but at least he’s still front and centre elsewhere, whereas Kelly is basically ignored throughout all the chapters, and to have her most important moment not even referred to is criminal. I’m also personally unhappy they removed the moment that in the cinema made me jump out of my seat, which in turn made my friend jump, which in turn made me jump again! (The bit with the ‘raptor under the wooden wall.) But hey, that’s just me.

Almost as annoying as all of this is the fact Roland Tempo is somehow still alive and well without a single scratch just like in the film, even though we blatantly saw him get killed off two weeks ago, something I was happy the movie didn’t do. Did Don forget this had happened in his version? There’s an overall feeling of this chapter being rushed and the art suffers just as much as the script. There’s an overall lack of detail and finesse throughout. Here are some key examples.

That scene of the Velociraptors in the long grass would make no sense if you hadn’t seen the film, characters no longer look like their onscreen counterparts and the gloriously detailed dinosaurs from the first couple of chapters give way to cartoonish monsters. The final chapter of Jurassic Park’s adaptation suffered the same fate and it would seem no one learned any lessons from it in the three years since.

I know I’m coming across as very negative and usually I only include comics on the blog that I enjoy; I like to keep this as a positive reading experience. The original Jurassic Park comic was awesome, I loved it and it holds a special place in my heart. It’s the whole reason there’s a section for JP on the blog in the first place. This mini-series is very much an extra aside to that, I don’t think I would’ve included this on its own. It’s a crying shame because I love the movie so much.

Towards the end of the story 11 pages are given over to the San Diego scenes, albeit a bare bones version of them. The panel above of the S.S. Venture crashing into the docks is about as detailed a panel as you’ll find in this final chunk of story. You wouldn’t even know any of this was taking place in a city because the backgrounds just don’t exist beyond one panel. Other than there being a sporty car involved this could all be happening back on Isla Sorna.

Below you’ll see the one and only panel that shows some hurriedly drawn buildings and the word “cinema” visible behind the T-rex’s tail. Next to it is a panel I’ll use to sum up these eleven pages. Look at the panel with the car. There are no backgrounds, not even a road! Storywise, we get the ‘rex leaving the ship, discovering Ian and Sarah have his baby, then we’re back at the dock. That’s it.

Thinking back to when I first saw this film in the theatre, the moment we saw the InGen helicopter and the camera panned down to show it was flying over a city was a real shock to the system. It was so unexpected from a Jurassic Park film (I hadn’t watched any trailers before seeing it) and as surprise endings go it’s right up there for me. There was so much to enjoy about it which is why its treatment here is so underwhelming.

“This is a parent teaching its young to feed on its own”
Narrative caption, Don McGregor

Surprisingly Peter Ludlow’s final scene gets three pages to play out fully. One of the most satisfying endings for a villain character, it pretty much happens as it does in the movie, even if the backgrounds are still conspicuously absent. To anyone unfamiliar, this is back on the boat now, Ian and Sarah having lured the adult back into the cargo hold by placing the baby there and then jumping overboard themselves, before climbing back on from the other side of the ship, ready to close the bay doors when the T-rex enters.

From Ian and Kelly to the adult and baby Tyrannosaurs, the theme of The Lost World Jurassic Park movie was one of family and parental instincts. Sarah is even an expert on archeological parental behaviours just to hammer the point home. Personally, more than any other film in the series this one showed the dinosaurs as complex characters in their own right, a far cry from how they’d been described before this franchise. But anyway, Ludlow is about to get eaten.

I’m glad this moment wasn’t cut because it shows the adult teaching the baby and it’s a particularly chilling moment in the film, even if it elicits a dark grin from the audience. Given how much has been left out these past two months it might seem like an odd moment for anyone reading who hadn’t seen the film and all of its moments between the Tyrannosaur family members, but for those reading this as a way of filling the gap before the home video release it would bring back memories of that scene really well.

After all of my complaints about the lacklustre art in this final issue we finally get a moment that matches the potential those first couple of chapters had. As the InGen helicopter circles overhead trying to get a good shot to kill the ‘rex, Sarah shoots the tranquilliser dart first and we get this page with a particularly fantastic, expressive, dramatic panel when the dart strikes.

I look back at those first two chapters and the gloriously detailed scenes in the jungle with the Stegosaurus family and I can’t help but wonder what this series could’ve at least looked like, even if the script was still a shadow of the film. What if we’d had that early level of detail coupled with the dynamism of the page above? What an impact it could’ve made. The art team was definitely up to the task but it seems deadlines and a rushed story hindered them in the end.

Don’t get me wrong, I understand the task of taming a beast of a movie script down to four comics was monumental and I found Don’s explanations in a previous issue fascinating but in the end I think he boiled it down too much to the maths. I’ll get back to that in a little bit further down this review but let’s finish things off with the final page of the strip. Happily, Richard Attenborough’s beautiful John Hammond speech remains mostly intact, as does that famous Jurassic Park line first uttered by Jeff Goldblum’s Ian.

As you can see detail in anything other than the few dinosaurs in the immediate foreground is minimal and when you contrast this with #1 the difference is stark. My final thoughts on the comic strip itself in just a moment. First up though are the extras editor John Freeman and his team assembled, some of which have definitely been the highlights in previous issues.

First up is a competition to win a mug with the logo of the film on it. Not the most exciting of prizes, you’d expect this to be a runner up prize, but then again the original comic gave away a large variety of swag, everything from a simple set of glow-in-the-dark stickers to actual Sega Mega CD systems. So if this had been an ongoing comic I’m sure the same would’ve applied to future competitions, and at the end of the day I’d still like that mug!

The competition itself is somewhat easy though, right? Upon first glance I thought it’d be a case of naming the dinosaurs, with the ones in silhouette form being the trickier ones, but actually it’s just a matter of matching them to the pictures in the next row. I remember competitions and quiz pages like that in my old Thomas the Tank Engine & Friends comics as a child and it seems very out of place for the target audience of a Jurassic Park title.

There are a wonderful couple of pages detailing a selection of the merchandise released to tie in with the hottest film of the summer of 1997. There are some action figures of the dinosaurs shown, including a T-rex apparently engaging in a spot of S&M and mention of a figure of Ian with a jet pack! Really? Sadly no pictures of that one. Of more interest to this retro gamer are screenshots of some of the videogame releases of that year.

My friends laughed as I jumped and slid about the seat in reaction to the dinosaurs

The first image shown is from the arcade game, where players would sit inside a mock jeep with tranquilliser guns and on the screen was a fast-moving on-rails shooter with graphics that were mind-blowing for the time. I’ve played this one. A local ten-pin bowling alley had it for a few years in the late 90s and early 00s, and I have distinct memories of my friends laughing as I jumped and slid about the seat in reaction to what was happening while another friend sat quietly shooting at the dinosaurs.

There are also screenshots from the platform game available on the Sega Mega Drive and the 3D game (that was a new thing at the time) for the Sega Saturn and the new Sony Playstation. Sadly there’s no mention of the Nintendo GameBoy Lost World game. I had a GameBoy in the 90s and adored the game of the first film which was also a competition prize in the original comic. (There just might be more about that on the blog later this year.)

The Script to Strip article from #2 gets a second part here, although it’s a lot smaller and features less information. It would also have been a lot more interesting if the correct page of the movie script had been used in the comparison on the left. It does give a decent insight into the ‘Roar’ page from #3 though. It even mentions in Don’s original pages how the characters were meant to react to the sound, but in the finished page they did not.

A quick personal note: That T-rex in the bottom-right is actually a version of the cover from my very first Jurassic Park comic as a teen.

This is the perfect point to reflect on the entire strip. I’ve said all along there have been moments of potential; the early art was fantastic and #2 was a vast improvement over #1 in terms of adapting the film to the medium. However, towards the end the art definitely suffered. I’m making an assumption here, I know, but it could’ve been due to tight deadlines towards the end to ensure it was released in America at the same time as the film. I also think Don’s articles have unintentionally summed up what went wrong, for me anyway.

Some lovely art and some fun extras have made this comic mini-series worth reading and the completist will definitely find those elements enjoyable

In part one of Script to Strip Don talked about the amount of pages David Koepp’s movie script had compared to how many the comic would have in total to tell the same story, and he explained how many pages of it he’d have to squeeze into each comic page. Now, after reading the whole story it feels like it was more about solving the problem by logic rather than creatively. The first chapter in particular of the original Jurassic Park adaptation showed how to include as much of the movie as possible while being very aware it’s a different medium, using imaginative ways to swap scenes or retell them in a new way. It felt like the film but it was different. A bit like adapting a novel into a movie you could say.

Towards the end though it felt like a checklist was being ticked off as it rushed from one scene to the next, paying lip service to moments the reader would remember from the film. With the sequel, in breaking everything down mathematically as Don did it’s felt like that throughout all four chapters, with some glimmers of the (that word again) potential here and there, which just made it all the more frustrating, knowing this team was capable of so much more.

So here we are at the final page of the final issue of The Lost World Jurassic Park which mentions a third novel by Michael Crichton. While there’s the occasional mention of such a thing on fan sites there’s nothing official anywhere to state he actually started it. Instead, Jurassic Park III and specifically Jurassic World would pull a lot from the two released novels. The rest of this page takes me back to all of the discussions at the time about DNA cloning and I can remember teenage me being very excited by documentaries and such on the subject.

So that’s us. Some lovely art in the earlier issues and some fun extras have made this mini-series worth reading and the completist will definitely find those elements enjoyable, just don’t expect anything ground breaking from yet another movie-to-comic adaptation. I do want to go and watch the movie again though! Remember, all 16 issues of the original comic, including the first official Jurassic Park sequel, have been reviewed and I’ll be returning to that series with the graphic novel collections of the rest of that story, which we never saw printed in the UK at the time, so I’ve never read them!

Definitely something to look forward to there. In the meantime, remember… “don’t go into the long grass”.

BACK TO iSSUE THREE

JURASSiC PARK MENU

Comic Reviews, Jurassic Park

THE LOST WORLD JURASSiC PARK #3: TRiMMiNG DOWN THE T-REX

7 August 2023 Phil Boyce Leave a comment

We’re already at the halfway point in this little mini-series adaptation of The Lost World Jurassic Park. The first issue fell into the traps of many a movie adaptation but part two improved things somewhat. It wasn’t perfect, but those improvements and the article from writer Don McGregor about the size of the task at hand gave me high hopes for what was to come. So how has our third edition panned out? Ignoring that annoying “Free” poster bit on the cover (see last issue for more on that) let’s get stuck in and find out.

We left things a fortnight ago with the Triceratops smashing its way through Peter Ludlow’s presentation tent after Nick Van Owen had freed the dinosaurs, and right at the beginning of this chapter we see a spectacular scene of them all running from the camp back into the wild. In the movie we saw this from the perspective of the humans as the animals fled all around them, but here I particularly like the grander scale this first panel brings, and that’s not something you can often say about a comic adaptation.

Upon further inspection though, how on Earth did the Ingen hunters possibly capture and contain that giant dinosaur on the left? If we go by the previous movie this would have to be a Brachiosaurus. I’d love to have seen the cage they kept that in! The rest of the page instantly contradicts not only the film but even its own previous issue, where it had correctly shown the baby Tyrannosaurus rex captured by Roland and Ajay tied up away from the camp. Here, miraculously he’s now right where the chaos is, ready for Nick to easily rescue.

The next page is printed in landscape format and once you realise what’s going on it makes for a wonderful idea

In fact, the page before this spread showed Roland and Ajay’s last second escape as a fiery jeep flew through the air and crashed onto the tree they were hiding in awaiting the adult Tyrannosaur, so really this is contradicting the very same issue! I’ve no idea why Don felt the need to do this. In the film we didn’t see Nick grab the baby, he appeared a little while later from a river nearby holding him in his arms.

The next page is printed in landscape format and once you realise what’s going on it makes for a wonderful idea and is brought to the page brilliantly by penciller Jeff Butler, inker Armando Gil, letterer Ken Lopez and editor and colourist Renée Witterstaetter. I know this film like the back of my hand so I know that while Dr Ian Malcolm, Eddie Carr and Ian’s daughter Kelly are in the High Hide at the upper tree level there’s a distant roar, the trees below shake and the stomps of both T-rex adults can be heard moving beneath them. However, despite this dramatic page, none of that is clear.

While it’s unlikely many would be reading this before watching the film (although I do recall my friends and I reading the adaptation for one of the Turtles films before we saw it), most readers will have only seen it once in the cinema by this stage. It would actually have still been playing in theatres when this was out. They’d be reading this to relive the story and as dramatic as that ‘ROAR!’ is on the page I’m not sure readers would’ve noticed it, instead possibly thinking it was just a unique set of panels to reinforce the moment. The characters not acknowledging the roar or any movement below doesn’t help either, making Ian’s decision feel decidedly random.

This of course leads to arguably the most terrifying sequence in the whole movie and one that had us on the edge of our seats in the cinema. Here it’s cut down, as it needs to be for reasons Don laid out last time, but the scale of the scaling back is quite shocking. When the adults arrive Ian simply danders out with the baby into the middle of the clearing instead of the tense moment by the door. He’s completely vulnerable but there’s no tension in his action. He’s even singing!

The next part of this scene is of course the moment when the two-part research vehicle is partly pushed over the cliff by the dinosaurs and while Eddie struggles to stop it from falling by winching it with his car he’s also trying to pull his friends up with a hand rope at the same time, and Dr Sarah Harding is on that slowly cracking pane of glass at the rear of the dangling half, looking right down the cliff towards the crashing waves far below. It’s all wonderfully tense.

Unfortunately one of the very best scenes in the film is reduced to a couple of pages. I did understand where Don was coming from in his article last issue but as I said in that review I don’t think he’s got the balance right; you’d think one of the biggest, most memorable moments would get a lot more space to breathe. Take the most basic key points of these ten minutes in the film (Sarah on glass, Eddie’s death, characters clinging to ropes as the transport falls) and eliminate everything else, that seems to be what the plan was.

There’s some fun art though.

I’m not sure if the narration is taken from the book or the draft script but it feels like it’s trying too hard, as if it’s attempting to make up for all of the missing bits. Not only is most of the action just not here anymore but the characters have absolutely no sense of fear about them, like they’re just going from one inconvenience to the next. Some lip service is played to Sarah’s fear of heights (something the film left out) but it’s not built upon.

I do love the art in the scene though, especially how it perfectly captures the invisible sheet of glass beneath Sarah. However the spider veins mentioned are conspicuously missing, and this won’t be the last time something like this happens which I’ll get to in a bit. Eddie’s whole ordeal trying to survive the T-rex attack is just not here but at least his end isn’t censored like the original movie’s adaptation would do. The final moment of the scene is also captured well here. The art is definitely the main thing driving me forward at this point. That and the great photography and extras.

The poster is a wonderful photo of one of the Velociraptors and I’m positive it would’ve been on my wall if I’d known about this comic at the time, showing off the gorgeous yet terrifying animatronic and the darker tone of this sequel. On the back of this is another dinosaur fact file with its terrible design once more not doing justice to Steve White’s interesting writing.

Back to the final pages of the strip which cover two large parts of the story and unfortunately after the promise of last issue it seems we’re back to rushing through the movie again just to get it over and done with. Dieter Stark is Roland’s second-in-command and his death in the film by the cute little Compsognathus pack may be rushed (with a sequence that’s just confusing for anyone not that familiar with the film) but I’m including it to show the two extremes of this strip; the rushed nature but the potential in the art (especially when you see the panel of his actual death).

I feel the beginning of that sequence can only really be followed if you’ve seen the movie and are familiar with the individual elements of how this transpired. Elsewhere we get some added character moments which again may have originally been in the earlier script, like some tender moments between Ian, Sarah and Kelly before we get to the T-rex pair catching up with our sleeping group. There’s a particular moment here in the movie which truly frightened me with its slow build up and drawn out danger for two of our characters. The suspense was a killer! Here it’s all reduced to one single, solitary panel that completely changes this to a game of peekaboo.

Something else missing is Ian’s moustache! From comments on social media after I posted the first two reviews this apparent inconsistency seems to have particularly irked some people when they read the comic, but for me it’s not really a big deal. It’s still kind of there, it’s now just part of a rough unshaven goatee area like Jeff Goldblum sported in the film. It could be it was decided Jeff wouldn’t sport a moustache after the first two parts of the comic were already drawn. Story wise, I’m happy enough to think that it’s all started to grow out again while he’s been stuck on the island for a few days. Either way, it looks much better now.

After the small additional character scene I mentioned we get a huge change from the film a few pages later when Roland Tempo, played brilliantly by Pete Postlethwaite in the film, is killed by the huge Tyrannosaurus buck! After finding his shotgun has been filled with blanks by Nick he reaches for the tranquillisers. So far, so familiar. But unlike in the film when the T-rex succumbs to it just in the knick of time, here he grabs Roland and throws him towards Carter, the man who gets trampled to death in the film.

This is one change I really don’t like. Roland was one of the best characters in the film and since he’s now dead we no longer get to see his solemn redemption later after Ajay’s death, when he tells Ludlow he’s seen quite enough death instead of accepting a job at InGen. The hunter became rather Ian-like in the end and accepting of his part in the inevitable chaos. This will all now be missing. If this was in the script Don was working from then I’m very, very glad screenwriter David Koepp and Steven Spielberg changed this character’s arc.

The penultimate chapter of the adaptation ends with our main characters trapped behind the waterfall (in a scene from the first Jurassic Park novel and depicted by Walter Simonson and Richard Cry on the cover) as Roland’s palaeontologist Dr. Robert Burke is grabbed by one of the T-rexes and dragged out. Just like the spider veins mentioned when Sarah was in danger, the curtain of blood described here is nowhere to be seen, somewhat dampening the moment.

Chapter three has certainly been a mixed bag then. I liked some of the extra character scenes but hated the death of another, although to be fair to Don that wasn’t his fault. Some of the very best moments of the film, (some of my favourite moments in cinema, period) were so rushed here they were barely recognisable, and the fun art has been on top form at times with some great images but plagued by inconsistencies elsewhere. I come away frustrated more than anything because of what this talented team could’ve created.

There’s no character mini-poster this time, instead we get five pages of a welcome pack for new employees to InGen and it contains a lot of photographs of model dinosaurs used in the pre-production of the first two films. I thought there was something strange about the little pictures of the animals in circles throughout #1 but now I know what they are they’re a delight to look at up close like this. All the main dinosaurs are covered, including this film’s Parasaurolophus Walkeri and the sick Triceratops from Jurassic Park.

There are also some funny moments such as the exceptions to staff’s apparently comprehensive insurance policies, which absolve InGen of any responsibility whatsoever if Chaos Theory rears its head. As with the previous two issues I’ve found the extras more enjoyable than the strip, so kudos to editor John Freeman and his team, these pages add a lot to the overall package.

We’ve only one chapter of the story to go and I feel just like I did when the first film’s adaptation finished its penultimate chapter; there’s just no way they could possibly cover everything still to happen in 22 pages. It’ll be interesting if nothing else! We’ll find out what survives in #4 of The Lost World Jurassic Park on Monday 7th August 2023.

iSSUE TWO < > iSSUE FOUR

JURASSiC PARK MENU

Comic Reviews, Jurassic Park

THE LOST WORLD JURASSiC PARK #1: LiP SERViCE

10 July 2023 Phil Boyce Leave a comment

Well isn’t this a pleasant surprise? We thought we’d seen everything the UK comics scene had to offer for Jurassic Park fans back when Dark Horse International’s excellent comic came to an end with #16 in November 1994. While it was a suitably open-ended finish to the first official sequel it had actually been cancelled with several more chapters of the American comic to go. Not that we knew this.

Three years later in the summer of 1997 Steven Spielberg’s The Lost World Jurassic Park appeared in cinemas and I have very fond memories of going to see it, at one point jumping out of my skin so much (when one of the Velociraptors poked its head beneath a door, if you’ve seen it you’ll know the moment I’m referring to) that I made my friend beside me jump, which in turn made me jump again! Cue nervous laughter while our hearts came back down to a normal rate. I loved that film. I didn’t know there was a comic to match though, something I’m making up for now. Here is #1, edited by Down the Tubes‘ John Freeman, no less.

Despite this being from a completely different UK publisher (Titan Magazines) the US strip is once again from Topps Comics. Their continuation had come to an end and now their adaptation of this movie would contradict everything they’d previously created. Obviously this couldn’t be avoided, Michael Crichton’s second novel and the sequel movie were never going to follow what the comics had done. That ‘What Has Gone Before’ is lifted straight from those Dark Horse issues which is a nice touch.

However, the opening editorial seemingly makes some early errors straight out of the gate. Already established is how John Hammond spent many, many years with his dinosaurs before inviting Dr. Alan Grant and Dr. Ellie Satler to the island, it wasn’t something he threw together in a few years. More glaring for us with hindsight is the suggestion the dinosaurs were destroyed. We know they weren’t but only from later films and to be fair the sequel novel also said they were all destroyed, so that’s lifted from the book rather than the film.

“All along we have held significant product assets that we have attempted to hide, when we could have safely harvested them for enormous profit!”
Peter Ludlow

I should mention I haven’t read Michael Crichton’s second Jurassic Park book, in fact I was surprised to find out recently Dr. Ian Malcolm was the main character in it after he died at the end of the first book. (That’s properly explained, apparently.) Of course in the movie he didn’t die so we don’t need to worry about that here. The opening scene is from The Lost World movie but was actually based upon a story point from the first novel that didn’t make it into the original film. The differences between the second book and movie is something this issue will touch upon later. For now, let’s see how that story translates to comic form.

After the opening comes the first of two deleted scenes which were filmed but never made it into the final cut, although they can be viewed as extras on DVD, Blu Ray and digital. It involves the loathsome, slimy character of Peter Ludlow, nephew to John Hammond, perfectly portrayed by Arliss Howard in the movie. Cut by Spielberg because he felt it slowed the pace of the film, I initially thought it should’ve been included. While it’s particularly pertinent today when certain politicians seem more determined than ever to rape the natural world (as Ian Malcolm put it) for profit, now I agree it was right to cut it, although for different reasons.

It mentions the destruction of all the animals and the park after the first film and buying media and political silence, as well as paying out millions of dollars in wrongful death settlements to the families of the characters who perished. Just as a side note, for the first time John Arnold’s death is mentioned in comic form after he just disappeared in the first adaptation. As such, this scene’s inclusion means the editorial was actually correct for this version, but it’s good it was deleted from the movie so that the animals survived.

The other deleted scene involves Pete Postlethwaite’s animal hunter Roland Tempo. I’m still sad about this being cut from the film because it adds some more depth to his character. While a person who hunts animals for sport and money is always going to be loathsome, at the end of the film after he’s helped capture the Tyrannosaurus rex alive for InGen he’s mournful for what he’s done. Through his experience in the story he changes and realises the devastating consequences his actions have had.

A perfect balancing job of having a clear likeness without sacrificing what makes a good comic book character

This scene sees him standing up for the honour of a lady some American tourists are hassling and he does it in a rather funny way, playing on the fact he knows they’ll assume he’s a fragile old man. He has no interest in further game hunting until his friend and assistant Ajay tells him what it is InGen want him to hunt! Again cut for pace, when viewed the scenery and setting do feel a bit too similar to the scene setting up the character of Denis Nedry in the original, even though it plays out very differently.

This is about as in-depth as I’ll go into the story of The Lost World during these reviews, after all it’s the movie’s story so I don’t really need to. Just as I did with the first five issues of the original Jurassic Park I’ll be assuming you know it already and I’ll be concentrating on the adaptation itself. The next big difference I notice is one I’m not sure I can come to terms with. Maybe it’ll grow on me as I read the series, but it’s an addition I just feel isn’t needed. I mean, just look at Jeff Goldblum’s moustache!

Maybe Dr. Ian Malcolm has one in the novel. Apart from that I am taken with the likenesses here. A lot of times in comics based on TV shows or movies the characters either look nothing like the actors or the artists concentrate so much on making them look identical that they lose all ability to emote. Here penciller Jeff Butler (Godzilla, The Green Hornet and TSR’s Dungeons & Dragons games) and inker Armando Gil (who brought a scratchy realism to the previous sequel strip) do a perfect balancing job of having a clear likeness without sacrificing what makes a good comic book character.

For most of this opening chapter it feels very much like your typical comics adaptation, writer Don McGregor (James Bond 007, Black Panther, Killraven) taking the main beats of the script and moving between them with as little fuss as possible, cutting and trimming a lot as he goes. Funny moments are pretty much eliminated too which is a shame because the movie was full of them. A particularly memorable scene when Ian, Eddie Carr (Richard Schiff) and Nick Van Owen (Vince Vaughn) are calling out for Sarah Harding (Julianne Moore) when they land on Isla Sorna is conspicuous by its absence.

The scenes with Ian’s daughter Kelly (Vanessa Lee Chester) are there but again have been chopped down to their bare minimum which is a real shame as they felt really genuine on the screen. The chapter ends with the Stegosaurus scene although the grandeur of their entrance is lost when our characters are just miling about among them. Also the baby, key to what happened next, isn’t involved and it all feels rather rushed to get to some form of cliffhanger. But what is quite wonderful is the depiction of the Stegosauruses. It’s certainly more detailed than the previous adaptation and a lot more so than Armando’s sequel art.

Ken Lopez is our letterer for this story and returning story editor Renée Witterstaetter’s colours are a particular highlight, especially on these final pages in the jungle. In fact I’d say in the three short years between the comics there’s been a marked improvement across the board in terms of looks, even with a team made up of some very familiar names. Speaking of familiar names, that cover (taken from #3 of the American comic) is by original adaptation writer Walter Simonson and Richard Ory (Cloak and Dagger, Marvel Fanfare, Doctor Fate).

Regular blog readers will know I’m not usually a fan of movie adaptations but that the original Jurassic Park one had me thinking differently. At least for the first three chapters anyway, with their added information from an earlier script draft, passages from the book and interesting ways in which it shook up and changed key parts of the movie in order to make it work in a new medium. I enjoyed that. But the final two chapters became what I abhor about all other adaptations I’ve read.

Instead of being a considered reworking for the comic, the finale just jumped from one key scene to the next as quickly as it could to get to the end of the story, excising whole chunks of it in the process (including just suddenly forgetting about the only black character mid-story), eliminating anything that wasn’t basic plot, combined with what felt like rushed artwork to meet the deadline of the movie’s release. While the art is a big step up in my books, The Lost World Jurassic Park seems to be more along the lines of those final chapters, unfortunately. But it has time to improve and it’d be a shame if it didn’t, what with that lovely art.

This being a UK comic there are of course extras. The four middle pages are made up of a poster of one of the film’s best scenes, a profile of the more rugged (but still sans moustache) Ian and a page about the T-rex written by Steve White. There’s a lot of information here but for some reason it doesn’t mention their visual acuity, the whole “it can’t see us if we don’t move” thing which was so important in these first two movies. The page actually looks messy and unfinished, with what seems to be a placeholder rectangle, a clip art frame and an image sitting waiting to be edited together, with text over the top that’s difficult to read as a result . Strange.

Towards the back is Something Has Survived by Jim Swallow (who’d go on to write Marc Dane, Sundowners and Warhammer 40,000 novels), a text article which basically reiterates what we know already from the strip, although it does give an interesting nugget of information about the film’s ending. There’s also an advert for the graphic novel of the comic which is a bit weird to include when you want people to buy it in individual chapters instead (although the original comic did run a competition for its graphic novel after it had printed the whole story already) and the Next Issue page is rather basic with two different versions of “buy it or else”, the second of which just feels wrong!

The most exciting extra for me is actually an advertisement for a completely different magazine.

I loved Babylon 5 from the moment I decided to tune in to the first episode broadcast on Channel Four. I was completely hooked and I remember the magazine fondly, placing a regular order before the first issue appeared if memory serves me right, so I must’ve seen an advert for it somewhere else. I remember being particularly fond of show creator J. Michael Straczynski’s column and his brutal honesty when discussing working in the television industry and how hard it is to make a living as a writer. I’d no idea John Freeman edited it until just recently. I’m beginning to think he and Steve White (colourist and editor at Marvel UK and who did exceptional colouring work for Xenozoic Tales in the original Jurassic Park comic) are a bit like Lew Stringer in that there seem to be very few publications from my youth they weren’t involved in!

Unlike most comics at the time The Lost World Jurassic Park was fortnightly rather than monthly. With no further strips coming from the States there was never any intention of continuing it beyond the adaptation so, just like over there, it was a mini-series of four. The artwork has saved this opening chapter, will the writing catch up? You can find out in two weeks on Monday 24th July 2023.

GO TO iSSUE TWO

JURASSiC PARK MENU

Comic Reviews, Havoc

HAVOC #9: LAST RiTES

31 August 2022 Phil Boyce Leave a comment

This just isn’t fair. That’s how I felt during September 1991 when #10 of Havoc failed to appear, the comic unceremoniously cancelled without so much as a note to the readers. This issue continues on as normal with cliffhangers and ‘Next Issue’ promos as well as hints of what was yet to come. Clearly pulled after it went to print, Havoc was the latest in what felt like a long line of comics I’d committed to which ended up the same way. Now having enjoyed the series 31 years later in real time I’m left with that same feeling of unfairness as I finish off #9.

If you look at the cover date you’ll see the next issue was due 7th September 1991. With #1 arriving as soon as the school summer holidays had begun, #10 would’ve been the first after the next school year began, Havoc’s brief run perfectly wrapped up in the holidays. When I returned to school I found out several of my friends had also been excitedly collecting it and we ended up sharing our disappointment in its disappearance.

Goodbye Havoc, it’s been a blast and you deserved better

None of the included strips saw a conclusion and two new stories actually begin here, such as the first for Deathlok after Michael Collins’ origin story. Even though it’s the beginning of a new tale we still got a catch up banner to bring new readers up to speed, something no other ‘Part One’ received. Jesus Saves adds new talent with Scott Williams (New Mutants, Superman Unchained, Batman: Hush) joining as inker with Gregory Wright now only writing, and Paul Mounts (Fantastic Four, Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man, Ultimates) as colourist, although he goes uncredited here. Joining Gregory on writing duties is co-creator Dwayne McDuffie, pencils are by Jackson Guise and lettering by Richard Starkings.

Nice use of the Daily Bugle there, as ever doing what any tabloid does and using exaggerations and shock journalism to strike fears into its readers, with the almost mythical rumours of Deathlok reported as fact on the front page, something Spider-Man fans will be all too familiar with. I’d never read a Spider-Man comic at this point in my life so was completely unaware of the Bugle being a part of the Marvel universe. Through this the strip also establishes our setting as Coney Island.

The Jesus the title refers to is Jesus Badalmente, a homeless man who would end up becoming a roommate and companion to Michael as he battled against Cybertek and tried to find a way back to his body, which he would find out was being kept alive. These are points I only found out in researching who this person was because the way he’s presented here I had a hunch he was being introduced as a regular. Jesus makes robots and is a bit of a cybernetics whiz, which I’m sure will come in handy at some point.

These first five pages of the story basically see Deathlok rescue Jesus from a mugging and in return he’s taken somewhere safe as the police arrive. Jesus’ first reaction is one of fear and revulsion, as will probably become the default as Michael encounters people. But just as he thinks Deathlok has only seen off the muggers so he can kill him, he is then saved by the cyborg from one of the muggers trying to run them down in a car. That’s enough for him to take a chance on this strange individual.

I’ve really enjoyed Deathlok. He was my favourite as a teen and it’s been brilliant to catch up with him again. The origin story was full of character and Dwayne McDuffie and Gregory Wright strike me as writers who’d make sure character development was key to the strip’s success. The action has been great, the interactions between Michael and the computer genuinely funny and I find myself really caring about what happens to them. One to track down for sure.

Before Murphy’s strip are two RoboCop features, with a third later in the comic. The first one concentrates on the franchise itself, in particular the in-progress RoboCop 3. The second movie had been released the year before and while it had proved to be a moderate financial success it was generally panned for not living up to the original. I remember being disappointed by it because Robo himself felt flat and boring.

What’s strange here is that Dave Hughes‘s feature describes the franchise as a “fatigued product” in a comic printing strips based on that product! How did that make it past the editor? He also criticises Robocop 2 but praises the fact that its head writer Frank Miller would be returning for the third film. Yes, I’m aware Miller’s screenplay went through various rewrites by other writers but it’s still a strange thing to be thankful for after not enjoying his first RoboCop sequel.

This second feature is meant to be all about the comic strip, a major selling point of Havoc’s anthology. Unfortunately, Mike Conroy really does take his sweet time getting to the stage of discussing them. It’s not really until the third column that he gets into the meat of it all and then it’s over. There really wasn’t a need to reiterate so much of the lore and background to RoboCop for people who would already have been up to speed on all of that.

Let’s move on to the strip itself, part two of Vigilante by Alan Grant (with pencils by Lee Sullivan, inks by Kim DeMulder, colours by Steve White, letters by Richard Starkings) and it kicks off with muggers on hover bikes, showing how the comic would go all-in on the future setting, taking the strip more into the sci-fi fantastical than the original movie, which was more grounded. But this is a different medium and it works well to get across the setting and how dangerous Old Detroit really is. After this, the father of the victim complains about how the police are locking up people like General Power from last issue when the city needs them more than ever.

These masked vigilantes’ reputation is a lot better than the reality of the people behind the costumes. Take General Power for example. After frazzling the man he was trying to save last issue he’s brought to the desk of Metro West by Murphy and told to give his name. After declaring himself as ‘General Power’ he’s ordered to give his real name which he hilariously admits is Jim-Bob Smith.

With a precinct full of wannabe superheroes, one of them has had enough and what comes next is a bit of a shock when read today.

RoboCop was set in the not-too-distant future and the first movie and the TV show were, in hindsight, really rather prescient. So much so its surprising at times watching the series to see how well they predicted our world thirty years in the then-future, providing a scary insight into where we could be going. Bear this in mind when you see this next panel of that wannabe you saw in the final panel above, going by the name ‘Doc Chainsaw’.

He says it’s not against the law to “put on a suit an’ prowl the night” (which itself sounds more creepy than I think he intended) right in front of RoboCop. As if his red hat wasn’t enough, his general attire and his choice of words when confronted by Alex would be a bit on the nose if written today!

I don’t think I need to make any more comment on that one. Soon the sarge barks an order; all the vigilantes are to be charged with misdemeanours and set free. This happens much to the chagrin of the officers but has come down from the “very top” and thus the main mystery of the new story begins. Robo leaves to see if there’s something he can do (but we’re not given any more hints as to what this could be) and then we see former mugging victim Dink and his dad settling down to watch the city’s latest reality show, ‘The Detroit Vigilante‘ and that’s where it ends.

Deathlok and RoboCop have similar set ups but they’re handled in such unique ways you wouldn’t think they were unless you stopped to break down what’s at the core of their main protagonists. I was never a fan of the movie sequels to RoboCop so initially had some trepidation about these strips since they were also direct sequels, released before the TV show. But I’ve been pleasantly surprised to find a nice halfway point between the original film and the show, with Alan Grant grasping the character much better than the movie studio did around the same time.

“Pain is inflicted quickly and harshly upon those who would harm innocent children.”
Ghost Rider

It’s hard to judge a comic strip series based on only the first couple of stories but I’ve been impressed with this version of Murphy so far. The first story brought the action, the second concentrated more on the characters and this one feels like it’s settled in more to the episodic nature of the storytelling, this first part setting things up nicely. Normally I’d be eager to see the next chunk but it’s just not forthcoming right now. Sadly, it’s goodbye to another favourite for the time being.

To soften the blow (although this wasn’t the original intention) we get a third feature for our part man, part machine, all cop hero, billed on the contents page as an interview with Marvel UK artist Lee Sullivan who did superb work on RoboCop for the American arm of the publisher. Calling it this is a bit of a stretch though. It reads as if two quotes by Lee were pulled from a general career interview, with one answer about RoboCop and the other about Doctor Who, filled out with information about the artist.

“…and because we know where everything is, we methodically begin to eliminate anything that ought not to be there!”
Star Slammers

Don’t get me wrong, it’s interesting information and a good article but I was looking forward to an actual interview about Lee’s work on this particular strip. That’s two of the three features about this character that feel like they included an awful lot of padding to make up the page count. Such a shame because I do enjoy Havoc’s extras but I’d have preferred those two to have been combined into one and another Eye Level included instead.

There’s mention here of Marvel no longer having the RoboCop licence which again is a strange thing to include when you’re trying to entice readers back for more. About a year before this, Marvel UK’s Transformers announced the forthcoming release of a new RoboCop fortnightly comic. It was never released, with Robo appearing the next summer in Havoc instead.

Danny Ketch and his Spirit of Vengeance get the bulk of pages this issue with part one of Do Be Afraid of the Dark (written by Howard Mackie, pencils by Javier Saltares, inks by Mark Taxeira, colours by Gregory Wright, letters by Michael Heisler) which begins with the gang of kids from previous issues, now referred to as the Cypress Pool Jokers, hunted down by who we assume are Deathwatch’s minions. Demanding to know where the canisters are, they’re threatening the lives of the kids at gunpoint when a bright light and roar of a motorbike from a nearby hedge halt proceedings.

Out zooms the Ghost Rider, glowing against the night sky, only to be met by a hail of bullets. What’s interesting is that everyone knows his name already, his presence in the city plastered all over the newspapers and of course the criminal underworld would be all too aware of him after he took some of them out. Falling off the bike and back into the hedge, the night goes dark again, the Ghost Rider’s flame apparently extinguished. Until the next page that is.

Scenes involving the Ghost Rider when apparently surrounded and outnumbered are always great fun but I can only imagine how awesome these would’ve seemed to a teenage me. (I’m sure they were but my memory has let me down.) I can confidentially say this was unlike anything I’d ever seen before. Brutal but thrilling in equal measure, this first part of the new story really hits the ground running. Essentially a direct follow up to the origin story, it’s unfortunately not clear in these first seven pages whether any other main plot would be introduced.

On the next page it’s stated how Ghost Rider would normally take his time, ensuring to inflict the most pain possible on these men, equal to the pain of each individual’s past offences. But this night he needs answers and so he lashes his magical chain around one of them and drags them away off the back of his bike, the criminal’s body bouncing up and down on the road over the ghostly flames.

Hung over the side of a very tall building Eldon finally admits he’s not part of either criminal enterprise. Instead, he’d heard about Kingpin looking for the mysterious canisters and so he thought he’d take his gang out to find them, present them to the criminal mastermind and get in his good books. Ghost Rider gets no answers but that image of him, followed by the fate of Eldon have me gagging for more.

The kids see him drive off, recognising him now as one of the good guys. “Man, he’s hot!”, exclaims one as he disappears from their sight, and from mine. This appears to be the most serialised of Havoc’s strips rather than individual stories, at least for the time being and I’m gutted this is my cut off point again. As my introduction to Ghost Rider he’s been a brilliant character in a very well written strip illustrated in a scratchy, mature fashion that perfectly suits him. Defintley my favourite part of Havoc and the one I’ll miss the most.

Part two of Conan’s Barbarian Death Song (written by Michael Fleischer, pencils by John Buscema, inks by Armando Gil, letters by Janice Chiang) sees our female guest character finally named (Tasmara) and she explains the cloud from last time was actually some random god who bestowed the jewel upon her neck because he was so enraptured by her beauty. She’s now being chased down by Baron Gerdeg and his Falcon Brotherhood because it gives her the ability to see the future, something she realised through tragedy as you can see above.

This gives this fantastical element a sense of foreboding right from the start; it’s a curse rather than the gift it was intended as. As they chat she sees something else shocking, Conan’s death! Her vision includes his funeral procession, accompanied on either side of his coffin by both allies and foes he’s previously fought alongside and against, taken directly from the poem this story uses as inspiration. For more on that check out last week’s review which explains Conan’s last ever story.

Conan and Tasmara head into the local town to eat and drink before making their way elsewhere, hoping to beat death by getting far away from danger. But the Brotherhood, who also have history of being defeated by Conan, have bribed a dancer in the tavern to dance for Conan using birds they supply her with, their talons tipped with a deadly poison.

Conan collapses and his last view before he blacks out is of Tasmara being taken. We then see his consciousness slip into another realm, a realm of death and decay by the looks of it. You can see the Next Issue caption at the bottom of this next page. Yes, this is how Conan ends!

It would have been a great cliffhanger normally, but this was where we were left hanging as we desperately waited for #10 to appear. Now knowing it never would makes this all the more frustrating of course. Conan’s first story may have been somewhat outdated and out of place in Havoc, but the second story made up for that somewhat with its humour despite its underwhelming ending. This story seemed to have more going for it and, knowing the poem it was based on, I was eager to see how it turned out. Alas, for now I can’t.

I’ll admit this issue’s Star Slammers (written and drawn by Walt Simonson, colours by Louise Simonson and Deborah Pedler, letters by John Workman) is eye catching, I’ll give it that. Each of its five pages are split up into these smaller panels, carrying on the theme of the Silvermind from last time. In fact, this penultimate part of the story kicks off with Jalaia finally reaching that near death point and activating the hive mind of the Slammers. Suddenly every single one of them can see, sense and hear everyone else, turning the tide of the battle against the Orions. So naturally Admiral Krellik cuts the televised feed to his home world in an attempt to control the narrative.

The way this is depicted, how they’re able to instantly react to the enemy from anywhere in the battle, how it turns on a dime from a slaughter to potential victory much to the shock of the enemy, is really very good. Alien Legion was due to replace Star Slammers in #11, so one week before its conclusion this strip finally became something of interest. It’s a cool few pages but with the lack of characterisation or storytelling in many previous parts it’s just too late to save it.

Our last Cry Havoc finishes things off and once more it’s got that exciting fan club feel to it which just makes it all the more heart wrenching that this is the end. But before we go there’s just time for a few more letters and typical Marvel UK-style replies which I loved so much as a kid. Highlights include some dismay at Gary Oldman’s casting in Dracula (oh, how he’d prove the naysayers wrong) and word of an upcoming Ghost Rider movie which wouldn’t actually become a reality for another 16 years.

There are some cheeky answers here too (“How about you being grateful for what you’ve got so far?”) which is very Marvel UK indeed, instructions to invest in the future of Havoc for new Deathlok (oh deary me, you’ll start me off again) and a funny final answer which refers to the fact RoboCop was coincidentally coloured by Havoc’s editor. Then just to rub salt in the wound is the Next Issue box and a reservation coupon. This is not the end this comic deserved.

It took a couple of weeks to realise Havoc wasn’t just running late. With this I became so fed up of fantastic comics with a potentially very bright future being cancelled early that I swore off trying new ones after Havoc, solely collecting Transformers which I’d begun buying years before. I’ll admit this changed when Thunderbirds The Comic appeared in October 1991 but I stuck with it for only about a year before Commodore Format enticed me to the way of magazines. Even Transformers was cancelled just five months after Havoc!

It feels like no time since I took this photo for Havoc’s introductory post and given the potential here it really was no time at all. Havoc deserved to run and run. My school friends who had collected 2000AD for a few years already loved it even more than Tharg’s mighty organ. From the first issue I loved three of the strips and over the course of these nine short weeks I’ve come to enjoy a fourth. The final one was to be replaced soon so I could have been a fan of everything in the end.

As it stands it’s still a remarkable little collection of top quality characters. I think that sums it up best for me. It’s not just a random selection of strips, the stories I’ve enjoyed have all been about remarkable characters. Characters I want to read more of. Look out for a special blog post soon when I chat with freelance designer Paul Chamberlain who worked on several Marvel UK comics and created Havoc’s logo. Until then, it’s goodbye Havoc, it’s been a blast and you deserved better.

BACK TO iSSUE EiGHT

HAVOC MENU

Comic Reviews, Havoc

HAVOC #8: ENDiNGS & (LATE) BEGiNNiNGS

24 August 2022 Phil Boyce 3 Comments

Conan the Barbarian was back in style. After taking a one issue break not only did a new story begin for the Cimmerian inside Havoc #8, he also got this glorious piece of cover art to announce his return. Although, ‘Beauty and the Beast’ could be the tagline for any of the Conan stories featured so far to be honest. It’s a nice cover nonetheless and it may only have been a week but I’ve missed having all five strips included.

Beginning again with Deathlok (written by Dwayne McDuffie and Gregory Wright, art by Gregory and Jackson Guise, letters by Richard Starkings) we finally get to the end of his origin story after seven hugely entertaining weeks, with the finale to Brains of the Outfit. It’s all wrapped up brilliantly well. After last issue I wouldn’t have been able to guess how they’d conclude Michael Collins’ first outing after that action packed strip. Now that I’ve read these final seven pages there was simply no other way they could’ve done it. It’s great.

That panel above is the beginning of an incredibly dark moment as Michael/Deathlok takes to a roof above the city and contemplates ending it, even placing his high powered gun into his mouth. But he knows the Deathlok machine would just be found, he’d be stripped out and some other poor soul would be forced inside instead. Nothing would be stopped, nothing solved. He hooks himself up to electrical wires on the building to overload and explode instead, but decides he needs to call his son first to say goodbye and uses the phone lines instead.

The Deathlok computer detects a ‘HeroQuest’ program running at the number given to it (how topical for 1991) and it creates an avatar for itself to interact with the player, young Nick, who knows his dad has died. This is the game we saw him play previously, when Michael tried to explain to him how bigger and better weapons don’t make the hero, it’s about being brave against the odds and, telling him that he’s a friend of his dad’s he reminds him of this in a touching scene.

In fact this scene takes up the main bulk of this final part and I think it’s just perfect. Nick tells the character on the screen that his dad isn’t there anymore and in response he’s told this doesn’t matter, it doesn’t make it any less true: “You want to win at this game, you’ve gotta learn how to be a hero.” With a few tears running down his face, Nick promises he will and turns the computer off, unaware of who he made that promise to.

Disconnected from the call, the Deathlok computer asks if it should continue with the self-destruct and as you’ll see below Michael looks to the sky as a new day dawns and thinks about the advice he’s just given his son. This feels like the perfect ending to such a character driven story, one that I’ve been really invested in for the whole summer. I love this final page, especially that last panel with the hint of a smile on our true hero’s face.

What a brilliant origin and I’m already a fan of the character. I could see his family being involved in future stories very much in the same way Alex Murphy’s were in some episodes of the RoboCop TV series, although the difference here is that Michael has already tried to tell his wife who Deathlok really is. That could lead to some great moments. To say I’m eager to read more is an understatement so, although the next issue is the last I’ll look forward to its small chunk of storyline to get an idea of what the future could’ve held.

Next up we take a break from the strips for Eye Level, the news page compiled by Dave Hughes this issue. It may be back to one page after the larger spread it had a week ago for the cinema releases of Terminator 2: Judgement Day and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles II: The Secret of the Ooze, but a quick glance down the article at all those movies and TV shows in bold and it was quite the busy release schedule wasn’t it?

There are a few I’d never heard of (Miami Blues, Only the Lonely and Trust), a couple of childhood favourites (Bill and Ted’s Bogus Journey and The Witches) and a cartoon series that completely passed me by because I never saw the film it was based on until much later in life. Even the references to the films recently released remind me of why I loved the 80s so much! Speaking of 80s movies, the official RoboCop continuation is up next and venturing into the world of superheroes.

Well, wannabe superheroes anyway. As you can see from this opening splash page it certainly looks like Old Detroit has a new warrior in the fight against a seemingly insurmountable level of crime and violence in the forgotten city. I like how the story starts off with that famous RoboCop quote about a crime happening somewhere and how we’re led to believe it’s in reference to the mugging happening on the ground. A clever piece of misdirection by writer Alan Grant.

The next page plays out like an old-fashioned, clichéd superhero comic with ‘General Power’ using his ‘Electro Gauntlets’ to incapacitate the muggers, complete with corny one-liners such as, “General Power: The shock that crime needs!” It’s an exaggerated, almost spoof-like homage and it’s all going swimmingly for the masked crime fighter until he tries to help the victim to his feet but forgets to turn off his gauntlets, frying the person he was trying to save!

Cue sirens and a police car pulls up. Our panicked wannabe begins to scale the wall in a bid to fade back into the night like any good vigilante but he hadn’t bet on two things, his own incompetence and the officer being Alex Murphy aka RoboCop, who makes his entrance into the story in this glorious drawing by penciller Lee Sullivan and inker Kim DeMulder (colours by Steve White, letters by Richard Starkings). A great page, this.

A quick shot through the wire General Power was using sees him fall to the ground but the victim, all charred from the accidental electrocution, pleads with Alex to let the man go. They try to convince him that he’s on the same side as the police but Robo stands firm, no one can take the law into their own hands and when Power tries to use his gauntlets on the metal cop it backfires big time. The story ends with Murphy radioing into HQ that he’s picked up “another vigilante”.

This third RoboCop story shows the creative team have well and truly settled into the character

“Another”? Intriguing. Has there been a rash of such people trying to fight crime recently? I’m going to guess it can’t be a coincidence, that there must be some nefarious reason behind it all, so I’m interested to see how much of the mystery is revealed in our final issue next week. There’s definitely a confidence in this third RoboCop story that shows the creative team have well and truly settled into the character, especially in the art. Lots of potential here for future stories. I’m going to miss them.

Alongside Deathlok, Ghost Rider’s origin story also ends this issue, with part eight of Life’s Blood ((written by Howard Mackie, pencilled by Javier Saltares, inked by Mark Texeira, coloured by Gregory Wright, lettered by Michael Heisler)) which acts as a kind of epilogue. In his demonic form Danny Ketch bursts into the local hospital to deliver the young gang member who initially scared him back in #1, injured in the battle between Kingpin’s and Deathwatch’s cronies over the mysterious suitcase and its canisters. After this first page he reverts back to human form for the rest of the story.

But as I’ve said before the strip has always been about more than just the Ghost Rider himself, I’ve enjoyed the character of Danny and the building blocks being put in place for future stories. For example, we get the obligatory conflict character, someone in Danny’s life who thinks his alter ego is a menace to society and this comes in the shape of Captain Dolan, the father of a friend of his and his sister Barb. The Ghost Rider is all over the press and Dolan has made his mind up.

Danny tries to reason with him but we know already this won’t help, this is a character who’ll go up against the Spirit of Vengeance in future issues without knowing who it really is. It’s a bit of a cliché but Danny is such a sympathetic character and the Ghost Rider such a fascinating idea that I’d love to see where this relationship goes. For now though, Danny concentrates on his sister who remains in her comatose state as the story ends.

After this scene we get two large panels showing Kingpin shouting at his men that his entire operation is in jeopardy if those canisters aren’t found, and one in which new villain Deathwatch has killed one of his men for losing the suitcase and declares all witnesses are to be eliminated. But this scene in the hospital is the more dramatic ending for me, with Danny struggling to understand what’s happened to him, scared for his sister’s life.

It leaves me thinking is there something his Ghost Rider form can do for Barb? Having this scary, demonic, vengeance-fuelled being caring for his host’s sister could make for interesting storylines in the future. This may be the first series I want to try to collect in graphic novel form after Havoc finishes in just seven days. Watch this space. On the next page we’ve got a special feature about the Star Slammers, or at least that’s how it was described on the contents page.

It’s actually an article about the creator of the Star Slammers, Walter Simonson and his illustrious career. I’ll admit as I read it I was a bit miffed it didn’t mention Walt’s adaptation of Jurassic Park, which featured in the first five issues of the UK’s comic based on that original movie and covered on the blog. Then I had a bit of a moment when I realised Havoc was published two years before the movie was even released. Whoops.

I certainly didn’t think I’d see Death’s Head in Havoc though, there’s always that.

Before we move on to Walt’s strip we have the return of Conan the Barbarian after his one-week hiatus and his next story is entitled Barbarian Death Song. The credits box has been accidentally left blank. Michael Fleisher, who provided the dialogue to the previous story has written this one, with pencils by John Buscema, inks by Armando Gil (Jurassic Park, What If…?, Ka-Zar the Savage), colours by George Roussos (G.I. Joe, Fantastic Four, The Avengers) and letters by Janice Chiang.

In 1972 writer Lin Carter wrote a poem called Death-Song of Conan the Barbarian which is the last story for the character, chronologically speaking. Written for a Robert E. Howard (Conan’s original creator) fanzine and later reprinted in Marvel’s Savage Sword of Conan, in it Conan reflects on his life, those he’s met, those he’s fought and the people he’s killed. Themes include the inevitability of death and living a fulfilling life and crossing over to the other side, which he does travelling alongside those he knew in life.

Is this going to be reflected in this comic strip with a similar name? So far the answer is no but remember this would’ve been cut into at least four smaller parts for Havoc. Originally published by Marvel US in 1985 the story begins with Conan turning down the offer of the Nemedian King to take up a ranking position in his army. He then stumbles upon an assassins league called The Falcon Brotherhood (who he has dealt with before) and rescues a damsel in distress who I initially thought was Nateesa from the previous story.

Nope, this is meant to be a completely different character even though she is identical to the damsel from last time, giving me the impression female characters are somewhat interchangeable in these stories (which isn’t a good impression to have). Her name isn’t given yet and she has just about enough time to start telling us her story before she’s unceremoniously cut off for seven days. The jewel around her neck is what the Brotherhood sought and she tells Conan that while tending to her father’s goats a few days previous a cloud “which was not a cloud” appeared before her.

The best bit is the opening page with its fierce battle but it’s immediately forgotten

That’s it, we’ll have to wait until next week to see what that’s all about. A strange place to stop the tale but sometimes it’s inevitable that sometimes the forced cliffhangers won’t quite hit. However, as a result there’s not much to say about these first five pages. The best bit is the opening page with its fierce battle but even it is immediately forgotten as the story jumps forward to a few days later. Hopefully the story begun here will be elaborated upon lots more next week.

Between Conan and the final strip is an advert for a Marvel UK comic I never bought as a kid. This is actually the first time I’ve even seen a colour advertisement for it as it always appeared in black and white in Transformers. I’ve heard nothing but good things about The Knights of Pendragon so it could be something for me to look into at a later date when I’ve covered all the comics I did buy back then.

So, we finish our penultimate issue with the Star Slammers (written and drawn by Walt Simonson, colours by Louise Simonson and Deborah Pedler, letters by John Workman) and if I thought Conan’s strip didn’t have much going on then this one has absolutely nothing. At first glance it all looks very exciting, with a unique layout to the battle scenes and it entices the reader in, only to find not much there upon closer inspection.

We begin seeing their home world which the Orions use as their hunting grounds being devastated from above, the cowardly hunters staying out of harm’s way for now. The pages have that aforementioned uniqueness about them. They’re made up of lots of small squares in apparently random fashion, meant to represent the Silvermind, the ability of their race to share all their thoughts as one. Knowing everything that everyone else is doing all at once could turn the tide of the battle.

But Jalaia realises Ethon was only able to heighten his own telepathic powers to the Silvermind when he knew he was about to die.

In that moment Ethon let all his defences down, even the ones he didn’t know his mind had put up. Jalaia decides to put herself in harm’s way so she can be the trigger. I do like how over a few pages the many squares holding faces of Slammers start to go blank one by one, as more lose their psychic connection with their comrades. But it’s not enough. Even with Jalaia making what could be the ultimate sacrifice, I still found myself struggling to care for any of the characters.

There really hasn’t been the character development necessary for something trying to be so epic. I should be on the edge of my seat with this story but I just haven’t been able to connect with anyone involved, despite the earlier issues having some interesting world building. That’s it in a nutshell really; the story has concerned itself with the big scale events at the expense of the small scale moments and characters. As it stands, I find myself rushing though it to get to the letters page!

I always liked how Marvel’s comics wouldn’t hold back on printing criticism received, with the first letter really not holding back on their opinion of my least favourite strip. That being said, these letters were sent in by readers after #2, so opinions expressed are still limited to those first two issues. I laughed when Deathlok was described as “a RoboCop for the present”. Robo was only released upon the public in 1987! The same letter even praises the Slammers. There’s just no accounting for taste I suppose.

Interestingly the reply states Conan is the strip receiving the most negative feedback. Given how these letters were written after only his first adventure I can understand that though. It also appears that back in 1991 the UK didn’t have the same appetite for spandex as it does now. How times have changed. The next time we read Cry Havoc will be the last so none of the proposed changes would get the chance to take effect. But I’m still looking forward to it. Each issue was growing in confidence and with the origin stories out of the way the future looked brighter than ever.

The suddenly cancelled Havoc’s swansong review will be right here from Wednesday 31st August 2022.

iSSUE SEVEN < > iSSUE NiNE

HAVOC MENU

Comic Reviews, Havoc

HAVOC #7: MAN DOWN (CYBORGS UP)

17 August 2022 Phil Boyce Leave a comment

Alex Murphy returns to the cover once more as Havoc #7 hit newsagent shelves back in 1991. There’s something missing from this wonderful looking cover though and that’s any mention of Conan the Barbarian. As stated in the previous issue the Cimmerian would be taking a break for one week and on the contents page under his banner are simply the words “Back next week”. So why has he been forced out of the issue?

Two of the strips here, namely our title star RoboCop and Star Slammers get more pages apiece, particularly Robo who ends up with more than any strip has been given in any issue so far and this brings his current story to an end after three issues instead of the usual four. Each character would get a different number of pages every issue depending on what was happening in their individual stories, while also taking into account the following chapters, cliffhangers, endings etc.

For example, on the letters page this week the replacement for Star Slammers in #11 is mentioned. Swapping out finished strips, working out suitable lengths for each chunk of story and planning for each issue to have as much content as possible would require some flexibility, especially as they were dealing with strips not written for this anthology format. To get the best out of each strip, including Conan, they may have to drop one for an issue to ensure things run smoothly in the long run.

Speaking of the editorial team, there’s been a bit of a shake up. Launch editors John Freeman and Harry Papadopooulos have jumped ship already, leaving the tiller in the capable hands of Jacqui Papp (editor for titles such as Motormouth, Die Cut and Battle Tide, all comics from the Marvel UK Genesis Project) and Steve White (colourist for Transformers, Jurassic Park’s Xenzoic Tales and editor on Visionaries). Their first issue is a doozy, so let’s get started with Deathlok: Brains of the Outfit written by Dwayne McDuffie and Gregory Wright, drawn by Gregory and Jackson Guise and lettered by Richard Starkings.

Up to this point Deathlok has been full of action, strong character development and some rather terrifying moments when Michael Collins awoke. I’ve previously mentioned how I remembered there being a lot of humour too, particularly between Michael and the monotone computer operating the Deathlok cyborg. We get to see quite a bit of this in part six of Brains of the Outfit, such as the computer’s recalculating moment and when they finally destroy the massive tank and it looks like the killer cyborg is about to see off its driver Ben, a former colleague of Michael’s, only for his head to be squished inside Deathlok’s helmet instead.

“Who asked you?”
“You did.”
*sigh*
Exchange between Michael Collins and the Deathlok computer

It shows how Michael has successfully reprogrammed the machine and the humiliation of Ryker is probably all the worse for the head of Cybertek; not only is he spectacularly defeated, but his cyborg war machine has avoided murdering someone again and it’s had a laugh at his expense in the process. Brilliant stuff! In the sewers we get more of this sort of thing as Michael forgets his thoughts are now part of the machine.

However, as you can see the strip can flip in an instant, from genuinely funny moments to those of heartache. Michael arrives home and obviously Tracy isn’t going to believe him when he tries to tell her who he is. Already devastated by the news of his death, this is almost too much to bare. That final moment when he repeats his funny comment about their son from #3 before running off is a much more perfect cliffhanger than any action scene could be. For all its bravado, Dwayne and Gregory’s story has a human heart running through it that’s just as compelling.

For only being seven pages, this really had it all. What a superb story and he’s definitely a Marvel character that deserves much more exposure today. It’s a crying shame he hasn’t had his own movie or TV show by now. Speaking of movies, Eye Level doubles in size this issue thanks to two of the most hotly anticipated movie sequels of the 90s. One would go down as an absolute classic, the other not so much.

On first reading I don’t think the writer was too enamoured with Terminator 2: Judgement Day, although they were right in that the film did end up as one of the most successful of all time. Personally I loved it and remember watching it on VHS in school on the last day of term after it came out in the home market. Not the best way to watch it first time around but it still made an impact and I enjoy it to this day. All of the things about Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles II: The Secret of the Ooze meant to improve upon the original are the reasons why my friends and I never liked it, so these were massive misjudgements on the part of the director and studio.

That competition at the end though: “No captions complimentary to Mr. Ice will be accepted.” How very Havoc.

RoboCop uses his hand spike to take control of the ED-209’s weaponry

RoboCop: Murphy’s Law Part Three (written by Alan Grant, pencilled by Lee Sullivan, inked by Kim DeMulder, coloured by Steve White, lettered by Richard) takes up the centre of the comic with a large nine page chapter this issue, ending the story earlier than expected. OCP’s Laszlo has ordered his criminal contacts to kidnap a police officer so that his reprogrammed ED-209s can rescue them and prove their superiority over RoboCop while Murphy’s brain (distraught from losing a civilian) has shut his systems down. But Nixco have also sent their new Nixcops to do the same. RoboCop awakens when he learns that his partner Lewis is the officer in question, snapping him back to life. It’s all set for an explosive climax.

But first, either the ED-209s have shrunk since the movie or that’s one hell of a big van. I’m nitpicking, so I’ll just ignore this and get on with the main bulk of the story. The two sets of rogue robots start to take each other out, both believing they have the proper authority to rescue Lewis and that the other is breaking the law. An ED-209 even attempts to kill Alex because it deduces he’s trying to stop it rescuing her.

Pinned down on all sides, his car trashed and time running out for Lewis, Robo’s solution is one that I wish we could’ve seen in a movie or the show. Using his spike (a way of interfacing with other computer system ports) he accesses the ED-209 that tried to shoot him and takes command of its weaponry, eliminating all of the Nixcops in a few seconds flat.

Lewis may be tied at the wrists but she isn’t a damsel in distress. The commotion outside distracts her kidnappers enough for them to be lined up at the first storey window, so she rushes them and pushes two of them out to their death. But the final one slaps her to the ground and takes aim at her head just as Alex enters the building downstairs. Knowing he won’t reach her in time he scans up through the ceiling and I just wanted to let you see how another of his well known abilities is represented in comic form, thanks to (new editor) Steve’s colour work in particular.

You can see what’s going to happen here and after the kidnapper crashes through the floor, landing at his feet, RoboCop appears to be back to normal again. It’s been a more action-packed story than that from the first four issues, but taken together they work really well to bring us both sides of the character: the logical and the human. You’d think having both this and Deathlok together in one comic would feel repetitive but they work really well together as two completely different takes on the same basic idea. I’m looking forward to seeing what’s next for Murphy.

Part seven of Ghost Rider: Life’s Blood (written by Howard Mackie, pencilled by Javier Saltares, inked by Mark Texeira, coloured by Gregory Wright, lettered by Michael Heisler) is up next as the lengthy origin story continues and it feels like it’s wrapping up the action quotient of the tale here, so I can only guess that perhaps next week’s part will feel like an epilogue and deal with the aftermath for the characters involved. If I’m right I’m all for that, the variety in these little weekly chunks heightening the tight scripting by Howard Mackie.

The gangs fighting over the suitcase are destroying whole city blocks in their war for the canisters, with the kids who stole it in the first place caught in the middle. No longer the cocky street gang of earlier issues, now they’re cowering for their lives after seeing one of their own killed. But one roar of a motorbike engine later and things take a decidedly different turn. Danny Ketch has transformed again into the Spirit of Vengeance and I love this particular page above, introducing another skill of the flamed rider’s.

This is just the kind of thing teenage me would’ve lapped up. Oh, who am I kidding? I’m lapping it up right now at the ripe old age of 44. Ghost Rider approaches the kids, the same gang that terrified Danny in the first issue and reaches out his hand, telling them he means them no harm. I was surprised at this because I just didn’t expect it from the character and it’s a nice touch. However, he’s soon involved in the fight again and one of Kingpin’s men has had enough, pulling out what looks like a rocket launcher from the boot of his car!

With the demon rider (the gangs may have named him this but they still believe he’s just a person wearing a flaming helmet) the gangs are down to their last two survivors. Joining together to force a confession out of the girl who took the suitcase, while ready to double-cross each other at the same, the tension builds until a sudden chain flick from behind knocks them both out and in their place stands that flaming skull, with his hand outstretched once again to help her to her feet.

Again, this proves what I said earlier about the cliffhangers Havoc’s editors would choose, not always relying on the shocking action scenes. For example, it would’ve been easy to end Ghost Rider with the rocket scene above but instead we get a further couple of pages and this ending of the terrifying demon reaching out his hand to help the innocent. It’s just as much of a surprise as the explosion and it works so much better in my opinion as a moment to end on. I want to see more of this character, much more.

If you’re only coming to these reviews now let me explain that this was my introduction to the character back in the early 90s and in the intervening years I haven’t read any Ghost Rider comics or even seen the movies. This is pretty much introducing me to him all over again, so it’s basically all new. As with some of the other Havoc stars there’s a lot more beneath the surface to discover and I for one find him a fascinating creation so far. I’m eager to learn more, so little moments like this are huge to me.

Less fascinating are the Star Slammers (written and drawn by Walt Simonson, coloured by Louise Simonson and Deborah Pedler, lettered by John Workman). Also getting a good portion of the comic we see how Grandfather and Sphere first met, the former as a senator bringing a warning of a future planet wipeout, the other the leader of the people on the planet used for sport. As the Slammers prepare for the war at last they reminisce about that first meeting, how the elder had to prove himself and how he engineered the Mindbridge.

Able to communicate psychically already, his equipment and injections were to lead them to a point when they could all communicate as one, the whole race combined as one unstoppable force. Only then could they face their hunters, the Orions. The name ‘Star Slammers’ is taken from one of their weapons and name they use as they fight for others to make money and collect the weapons and ships they need. There’s also a hint about the exiled humans being closer to their ancestors than the ones consumed by hatred (the ones who hunt them for sport because they’re different).

It’s here the main problem with pacing rears its ugly head. At some points in previous issues nothing much has happened at all, in others we’ve been treated to some nice action or background details. But more often than not it’s felt a bit muddled, as if it was just buying time until the next issue. As we all know by now, Star Slammers wasn’t written as a monthly comic, instead it was a complete story in #6 of Marvel Graphic Novel. I’ve said previously how it maybe wouldn’t have these problems if read in one go as originally intended. I’m not so sure anymore.

Even here, with the flashback to those early meetings it just reads like forced exposition, a far cry from similar scenes in #4 when we got the background to the animosity between Grandfather and Kryllik. Now it seems any interesting story sections are being rushed through, like space is running out and writer Walt Simonson has to suddenly squeeze everything in. This is the same feeling I got when reading the final chapter of the Jurassic Park movie adaptation, also written by Walt.

What could’ve been a fascinating origin story isn’t helped with pretty bad dialogue either, combining to give an impression of everything being forced just to get the story to the actual battle it’s been predicting since the beginning. Could Simonson’s galaxy-spanning tale full of relevant social commentary simply have been too ambitious for the page count in Marvel Graphic Novel? Perhaps. But at least we get an inkling some excitement could finally be on the cards next issue.

With the war about to begin we close off all of our strips for this week with Cry Havoc and the second instalment of readers’ letters. Kicking things off with the promise of t-shirt prizes for star letters, ironically the start issue given for this would actually be the first to never appear. Then it seems the issue after that was to be the first with a new strip since #1. Intriguing little hints about a future that was not to be.

That’s us at the end of another issue and, despite it being one character short and extra pages given to my least favourite strip, it was another goodie. I look forward to a full deck of anti-heroes next week though. Speaking of which, that’ll be the penultimate one already! Where has this summer gone? Join me again soon. Havoc #8’s review will be here from Wednesday 24th August 2022.

iSSUE SiX < > iSSUE EiGHT

HAVOC MENU

Comic Reviews, Havoc

HAVOC #6: CRYiNG HAVOC AT LAST!

10 August 2022 Phil Boyce Leave a comment

This is a wonderful original Marvel UK cover by Liam Sharp (a first for the title) showing Deathlok breaking free just as he finally does inside, with Michael Collins’ mind now fully aware and communicating with the military computer inside the cyborg. It really kicks off this issue. That headline about the Star Slammers is obviously meant to shock, but given my love-hate relationship with that particular story and its characters I’m really not feeling bothered either way. But that doesn’t detract from how excited I am to read another issue of Havoc!

I can’t believe I’m already at the sixth issue and I really, honestly do look forward to this day every week, but of course the more we fly through this on a weekly basis the closer we get to its premature end. Still, it’s clear from this issue the intention was originally to have this as a long running title, what with the inclusion of the first letters page and some of the answers given. We’ll get to that in due course. First up is the cover star and as you can see the strip now has a traditional Marvel UK border to the first page to bring us up to date. In fact, every strip has one now and I’ll show you each one.

You’ll see on these first pages that every one has the credits star inside something unique to that strip. For example, you’ll see it inside Robocop’s gun barrel, a monitor on the Star Slammers’ ship or an animal skin drum for Conan. Dwayne McDuffie and Gregory Wright’s (re)creation of Deathlok really does show off this time what the whole remit is about with an all-action entry in his origin story, with art by Gregory and Jackson Guise and letters by Richard Starkings.

This issue’s chunk of story really highlights how Collins and the computer will interact and work together. Now recognised as its new programmer, he’s able to give the cyborg new instructions on the fly. The first thing is to tell it that killing enemies is off the table. After trying and failing to stop it previously in the jungle (apart from just about stopping it from killing a small child), now recognised as the authorised input a simple command changes all of that. The computer must now be smarter and work around this new parameter, which it does with aplomb as the story continues.

Ryker watches on and tries to stop them with every security measure possible and the straight-laced, logical computer and the flying-by-the-seat-of-his-pants Michael make a great team. Even though the computer is just a machine, it almost comes across as banter between the two thanks to Michael’s very human reactions to its very logical statements, and vice versa. Ryker is having way too much fun though in trying to kill his former friend and colleague!

Remember that huge tank thing a few of issues ago? I knew it wasn’t for nothing and as Deathlok crashes through another wall to get around the force shield they come across the tank and suddenly it whirrs into life. They scan it and find another former workmate at the wheel. Questioning how he could possibly have gotten there so quickly when no one would’ve known which route they were taking, the computer informs Michael of the trackers in the helmet. There’s only one option, to remove it and take on the tank with Deathlok vulnerable for the first time.

This is the penultimate panel of the strip and is a great summary of the action we’ve been treated to in these wonderful five pages. This is just our main character trying to escape the compound of Cybertek, never mind the adventures that could come next. This lone cyborg going up against impossible odds, the computer’s monotone (in my head anyway) voice and Collins’ interactions could make for great fun. What’s interesting is how Collins isn’t in control of the cyborg’s body. Instead, it’s moving autonomously with instruction from Michael. An interesting dynamic I’m looking forward to the writers exploring more of.

Our second strip this time is part two of RoboCop’s Murphy’s Law, written by Alan Grant with pencils by Lee Sullivan, inks by Kim DeMulder, colours by Steve White and letters by Richard. At the end of last week’s episode, in the midst of his own mental breakdown, RoboCop let go of the hovering garbage droid to land on top of a car being stolen by a gang of thieves. Causing the car to crash with Murphy between it and a lamppost, it’s almost too much for his systems which were already under stress from the Nixcops attack and then watching a member of the public die because he couldn’t protect them, breaking one of his Prime Directives.

At Nixco, Dek Kyng is now in their hands so they immediately set to work making sure he won’t be causing any more problems, setting an automated surgical system on him to hack into his brain and turning him into another one of their robots. Meanwhile, Alex lays dormant on a table in his police district. A tough job lies ahead for the engineers but they see this as an opportunity to install some amendments and they’re given the go ahead to proceed, much to the chagrin of a new character called Laszlo.

Laszlo’s plan involves having a police officer kidnapped who the ED-209s will rescue

You see, Laszlo was in charge of the ED-209 programme which RoboCop fans will know looked cool but were pretty awful at law enforcement. Believing the problems to have been fixed (yet the EDs are still the big, lumbering robots of the movie) Laszlo sets about making sure OCP have no choice but to terminate RoboCop and choose his path instead. His plan involves contacting a street gang and arranging to have a police officer kidnapped, who the ED-209s will rescue.

First up though it’s time for a commercial and some news updates from Media Break. I loved these in the first film and in particular in every episode of the TV series. I’d completely forgotten Delta City didn’t actually exist yet in the movie, I’m so used to seeing it complete (or at least in a more advanced state) in the series complete with its self-aware central intelligence, that reading this feels like a prequel to the RoboCop I grew up with.

Eventually his engineers realise it’s the human part of RoboCop that’s not operating correctly (for want of a better phrase) but they can only speculate on what’s going on inside his mind. They put out a call for his partner Lewis to return to HQ and help, and in the meantime we get one of those trademark RoboCop memory scenes. While all of this is going on the various strands of the story come together before we leave things for another week.

Lewis is currently in the middle of an arrest which in reality is a set up by Scarface’s men, the gang Laszlo contacted to kidnap a random officer. When news of her disappearance reaches Media Break the bosses at Nixco see an opportunity to send in their own Nixcops to rescue her and prove their cyborgs are the future of law enforcement. What a mess this could be! Great stuff. Writer Alan Grant feels much more comfortable with this second story and is really getting stuck into the lore and the action, one never at the expense of the other. Perfect.

Next up is Star Slammers, created, written and drawn by Walt Simonson, with colours by his wife Louise Simonson and Deborah Pedler, with John Workman‘s trademark lettering. So, with Ethon being tortured in last week’s strip it’s no surprise to find out he’s the one who bites the dust. There’s a quick bit of mourning from Jailaia and Sphere before they decide to use the body of their fallen comrade to help them escape. Wow, that’s pretty cold. They don their gear and before boarding their own ship moored outside they tie Ethon into the pilot’s chair of the prison ship and set the controls.

I have to say this next part is really rather good. The main ship of the fleet is watching on and receives a distress call from the prison ship after someone on board discovers what’s happened. The huge vessel getting silently and ominously closer and closer is a truly terrifying sight for those watching and I think Walt has done a superb job with this particular sequence, which culminates on the next page.

Of course the escape is immediately covered up (as an unwarranted attack) by Krellik, who is no longer a senator but an all-powerful Admiral. Declaring the hunt on and how much the television networks will love it, he alerts the entire fleet to set out after the escaped Slammers. It feels like we’re finally getting somewhere, so adding this to the fascinating (and very relevant today) background politics from #4 we could be in for a treat in coming issues.

One film that stood out above all others in the summer of 1991 was Terminator 2: Judgement Day

I’m still not sure if it’s really working being split up into chunks though. Maybe the coming issues will prove me wrong, but at the moment it may have worked better in its original form. Two out of the these first six chapters held real promise, so if the remaining parts of the story build on those and we get a nice mix of story and action in the limited space afforded here, it may prove to have been worth the wait to get to this point.

This issue’s Eye Level is a particularly interesting one. During the summer of 1991 cinema goers were treated to a vast array of blockbusters with everything from City Slickers and The Naked Gun 2 1/2: The Smell of Fear, to The Rocketeer and Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves. But one film that stood out above all others was Terminator 2: Judgement Day and it’s the impending release of this movie that takes up the whole page, with 20 facts about the film and its star.

While I can’t find any evidence that the so-called ‘Jung and Freud’ film was ever made, there are other tidbits here which I never knew about, such as the fact Arnold Schwarzenegger was originally intended to be Kyle Reese in the first film, and before Robert Patrick was cast as the new T-1000 Billy Idol was hired for the role. I’m a fan of the series (the first four films anyway) so it’s interesting to see the contemporary coverage the best one received at the time, and it’s a clear indication this was a Marvel UK comic aimed at the older teen audience.

Conan the Barbarian’s Cauldron of Doom (plot and art by John Buscema, dialogue by Michael Fleischer, letters by Janice Chiang) comes to its conclusion this issue and as feared it basically boils down to Conan coming out of his hypnotised state and punching a few people. How this happens is rather good though, with slave girl Nateesa coming to his rescue. Terrified of her mistress Marielle, Nateesa can’t get close to Conan so she resorts to desperate measures and throws a stolen knife at him. She’s a very good shot from so far away!

Once returned to his senses Conan easily disposes of the two men guarding the cauldron filled with whatever liquid would’ve killed him and seized his body into a solid statue for Marielle’s collection. (The opening dialogue box refers to her as a witch for the first time.) As for the villainess herself, she chases after Nateesa who punches her out cold and… that’s it. It’s all neatly tied up in a big bow as Conan and Nateesa ride off into the sunset together. After the intriguing build up, the interesting Marielle in the first chapters and the very funny moments in previous weeks, it’s such a shame it has such a clichéd ending.

Robert E. Howard died only four years after creating Conan so he never got to see his meteoric rise

At the end a caption states Conan won’t return until #8. No idea why he won’t be in #7 yet. Is one of the other strips due to get extra room for some reason? Are special features planned? Who knows, we’ll find out in seven days.

As if to soften the blow of the longer than normal wait for the next Conan story we get a two-page feature about the history of the character written by comics historian Mike Conroy. Coming from a position of knowing nothing about Conan this was all brand new information to me. Most surprising was how young Robert E. Howard was when he died, and only four years after creating the character so he never got to see his meteoric rise. That’s such a shame.

Other surprises for me are that the original Red Sonja was much different than the one in the movies, that she wasn’t part of Conan’s stories and the Conan movie was written by Roy Thomas (who adapted Havoc’s first story from Howard’s books) and Gerry Conway who blog readers may remember was the head writer on Marvel’s fantastic Visionaries comic. The feature does raise a couple of questions though, namely if the US comic was still in print why was Havoc using such early stories rather than the latest ones, which surely would’ve been a better fit? Also, what on Earth is Captain Carrot and his Amazing Zoo?!

The final strip this week is Ghost Rider (written by Howard Mackie, pencilled by Javier Saltares, inked by Mark Taxeira, coloured by Gregory Wright, lettered by Michael Heisler) and it’s all about that mysterious suitcase and the young gang of kids who stole it. Kingpin’s men have tracked them down and sent in that well worn stereotype, the bad guy who is so overly polite you just know he means the exact opposite of what’s coming out of his mouth. We must remember these stories are nearly 30 years old. His hints soon turn to actual threats until one of the kids is stabbed by a flying knife.

New Marvel bad guy Deathwatch has sent his ninja-like minions for the same purpose, to retrieve the briefcase that kicked all of this off in #1 and all hell breaks out in the streets of the city. It’s clear this version of Ghost Rider is going to make for a very violent strip, much like the rest of Havoc really, and despite the central character being of supernatural origin it all comes across gritty and serious. I like this juxtaposition.

Our reluctant hero Danny Ketch is driving about on his apparently completely normal motorbike and beginning to wonder if he imagined the whole thing from the night before. He’s trying to determine whether he wants to coax out whatever it was he turned into, thinking it might have some knowledge to help his hospitalised sister Barb. However he’s terrified of doing so, but once he hears the gunfire and commotion the petrol cap on the bike starts to glow. He doesn’t want to touch it, but feels compelled to. He instantly regrets it.

I love this transformation scene, Danny’s skin engulfed in fumes and then lit up, you can feel the heat radiating off the page in that close up of his face, followed by the exciting panel of him and the bike becoming one. Depending on how each individual story in Havoc is chopped up into various lengths, each issue we could get a lot of plot or a more character-focussed bit of the tale, and sometimes we get a quick shot of excitement which keeps us hanging on for more the following week.

This week’s Ghost Rider definitely falls into the latter category and I’m not complaining one bit, especially when the next page ends this week’s strip with this image.

The gang war over the briefcase has escalated to murderous levels, endangering innocent lives and the Spirit of Vengeance is having none of it. There’s a lot of mystery still around the main flaming character and Danny is only slowly beginning to realise this could be his life now. It’s building momentum, it’s pace is quickening but it’s also taking time to establish its characters. As a result this feels like the most bedded in strip in Havoc. Plus, that’s just a really cool image to end the issue on.

We come to the end of another brilliant edition but instead of the usual full-page Next Issue promo we’ve got our first letters page in the shape of Cry Havoc. At last! I’d forgotten all about the fact we even had one. I don’t recall ever writing in, but given the short life of the comic I probably never got around to it. The letters here are all very positive and that’s the feeling I come away with; if this was the summer of ’91 I’d be thinking this appears to be a very successful new comic, such is the reception on display here.

There are definitely a couple of recurring themes on this page, for example a few mentions of The Punisher (and more received according to an answer) and his cancelled comic, which leads on to the other theme of hoping Havoc isn’t another short-lived Marvel weekly. Sadly at the time it did seem like every decent new comic didn’t last long. Unbeknownst to us Havoc was to be yet another casualty. But I’m enjoying it while it’s here.

One final note, Jim Black’s letter mentions the five-pointed star motif and I asked Paul Chamberlain (who designed it) if this was related to the fact there were five strips. It was actually just a happy coincidence. Watch out for a chat with Paul here on the blog soon! There are more Havoc comics to review first though, so join me again in one week. The review of #7 will be here on the OiNK Blog from Wednesday 17th August 2022.

iSSUE FiVE < > iSSUE SEVEN

HAVOC MENU

Comic Reviews, Havoc

HAVOC #5: DAMAGED PSYCHES

3 August 2022 Phil Boyce Leave a comment

With this, only the fifth edition of the superb Havoc weekly we’re already halfway through its run. Not that we knew this as readers of course. So let’s concentrate on the issue at hand and Ghost Rider makes his second appearance on the cover after #2, leaving the Star Slammers as the only characters not to grace the front page. That’s because these covers are reprints of Marvel US ones and the ‘Slammers never had their own title, appearing in an anthology series instead.

So Danny Ketch and the flaming skull are the main draw for new readers and as you can see the title logo not only changes colour each issue but the headline strip does as well. This issue Danny’s hellfire alter ego also has a special one-page feature, replacing Eye Level for one week. But let’s kick things off with the first story and it’s Alex Murphy inside RoboCop in the first part of his second story, which takes pole position just as Conan did when he began a new tale in #3. It’s still written by Alan Grant with pencils by Lee Sullivan, inks by Kim DeMulder, colours by Steve White and letters by Richard Starkings.

Murphy’s Law (nice) begins with Robo battling a group of new Nixcops. Programmed as his replacements they believe our hero is now impersonating an officer and must be destroyed, and his prisoner taken into custody. In reality his prisoner, Dek Kyng, could expose the corruption at Nixco and so the bosses are using their new cops to put an end to Robo’s investigation. His internal thoughts alongside the readouts of his systems are very similar to Deathlok’s but this isn’t a complaint. Alex is much more in control of his systems, they are him, so it’s different to the other cyborg strip.

It’s nice to see his Prime Directives come into play here when he ends up putting himself in even more danger to protect innocent passersby. But the Nixcops have no such qualms and one of the citizens is killed. As Alex makes a run for it his head is filled with doubt. He keeps playing the word “failed” over and over, his computerised half seeking cover while his human half thinks there’s no point anymore, he should just give up, he’s failed his third directive and broken his own laws. This shows how how binary his thoughts can still be despite his human side.

In the original film and TV show his outward speech wasn’t as free-flowing and natural as it reads here, which of course was very deliberate. It made his internal thoughts, memories and the times he’d act with surprising humanity all the more important to the character because they were so jarring with the machine cop he was presented as. It’s what made him unique. I’m glad to say, while the strip has him speaking more like a regular human, these moments filled with doubt are superb and somehow still maintain that jarring feel.

The weight of breaking one of his Prime Directives is almost too much for him. These are core to his very existence and because of this it’s almost too much to bear for his human brain. Most action heroes would shrug it off until later when they’d manage to get revenge for the killing, but RoboCop struggles straight away. He’s just about able to commandeer a flying garbage droid and make his escape but I’m really interested in seeing where this goes next week.

The whole Spirit of Vengeance thing was brand new at the time

Next up is that Ghost Rider feature. It’s rather strangely designed with a huge title and just a teeny tiny picture of the character almost cropped off the bottom of the page, but it reads very well. I’d always assumed the original version of the character had the same modus operandi as this 90s reboot but it appears I was wrong, the whole Spirit of Vengeance thing was brand new at the time. My knowledge of the character is very limited, but with the movie sequel having this title while being based on the original character I had just assumed.

I’m sure reading this feature excited me as a teenager, with how it hypes the strip as a new Ghost Rider for the 90s. It certainly reads like the kind of page that would’ve pumped me up even further for the character and the future of the comic. I was so sure this was just the beginning of a long and happy journey with Danny Ketch and his spirit.

On to the story itself and reading this now I’m reminded of just how much I preferred reading the American strips on these larger Marvel UK pages (not just Marvel but also things like DC’s Batman in their larger UK editions) and I have to say I’m loving it.

Ghost Rider: Life’s Blood is written by Howard Mackie with pencils by Javier Saltares, inks by Mark Texeira, colours by Gregory Wright and letters by Michael Heisler. We begin this issue by catching up with Marvel villain Wilson Fisk, aka Kingpin as he trains, his large size certainly not slowing him down.

The mysterious briefcase apparently contains something which poses a great danger to Kingpin’s organisation but we’re not told what it is, not even when we see the gang of kids open it in their cemetery hideaway, just that it contains little canisters. The main thing to happen here though is Danny finally arriving at the hospital to check in on his sister, Barb. Greeted by his mum, a friend and her dad, Captain Dolan, the events of the night finally prove too much.

The story picks up later and after Danny tells the police captain he can’t remember much of the monstrous man who the police think was responsible (we can see how they’re being positioned for future conflict with each other) we get a tender scene of Danny watching over his unconscious sister, the bleeping of the machines the only response he gets as he opens up about what had really happened.

Previously having discarded the bike in fear of his life, on the last page Danny actually makes his way back to where he left it, it sitting in its regular motorbike form. He needs answers, so following previous advice from his far more adventurous sister (we saw this dynamic back in #1) he sets off in the desperate hope that he’ll be able to help her recover, thinking the bike has some magical powers to it. Little does he know!

Ghost Rider gets the star treatment this issue with the most pages of any of our stories and even though none of the eight pages actually feature the Spirit of Vengeance itself it certainly isn’t any less compelling. In fact, quite a lot of ground is covered here between Kingpin, the gang, the briefcase and the introduction of important new characters. Most of all though it’s about Danny. He’s not an infallible hero, he’s just a regular guy caught up in something beyond his understanding. This is the kind of hero I enjoy.

Passing out, lying to police, crying by his sister’s bedside and then finally using some of her strength to go back to the bike in some belief that, despite how terrifying the experience was for him, somehow it might help Barb. The Spirit of Vengeance residing within the bike is silent for now but I wonder what they make of Danny at this point. I’m finding the story really interesting and that’s been the biggest surprise for me. I just hope we can get far enough along in the set up of everything before Havoc comes to its early close.

Star Slammers is written and drawn by Walt Simonson, coloured by Louise Simonson and Deborah Pedler and lettered by John Workman, and our main characters leave hyperspace to find themselves immediately surrounded by enemy craft and captured. They’re soon knocked out and Ethon is taken off to be questioned, seemingly an easy target as he’s the youngest. The mind link they share shocks Sphere and Jalaia as it suddenly hits them that Ethon is being tortured. Not by humans like the senator from previous issues though, instead by an alien creature we haven’t seen before, although the people working for him are humans.

This alien could be an inquisitor for hire, or the true leader of Orion, we just don’t know and this is a bit frustrating if I’m honest. Because the strip was created as a lengthy one-off it continues to stutter and jerk about from week-to-week. Last time we got a nice, decent chunk of background and the story was beginning to gel, but now we’re back where we were with what feels like hastily written dialogue and bad pacing. For example, the guards say out loud they’re meant to be watching the prisoners but want to watch the torture instead, and in the next panel Sphere mentions the guards have gone and that he and Jalaia should “Shift to extreme combat regime”, whatever that means. It’s not exactly subtle.

It leads on to this final page and it seems Sphere and Jalaia have easily escaped off-page. It just seems too handy, that the plot is being forced along rather than any attention being paid to how these things happen or any thought given to the characters. At least we get a bit of context at last, adding a bit more information to last week’s info dump, but overall it comes across as rather amateur, like a fan strip, which is shocking when you remember this was written by Walt Simonson. Last week’s chunk still gives me hope for future instalments, let’s hope it reads better as a whole when it’s all over.

Moving on to Conan: Cauldron of the Doomed which is plotted and drawn by John Buscema, with dialogue by Michael Fleischer and letters by Janice Chiang. Last week’s Conan the Barbarian ended with the caption, ‘Next Week: Conan is made ready for the cauldron!” Well, it’s only in the final panels here that the sinister Marielle tells her servants to prepare Conan for said cauldron, so the editor seems to have gotten ahead of themselves again. The story begins after the entranced Conan and Marielle return home and as he attempts to fawn over her she snaps and scolds him, suddenly deciding she’s had enough.

Conan begins to weep and after Nateesa is ordered to bring them food and wine we huffs and begins to rebel. He may still be under her influence but he’s not meant to talk back. Suspecting he needs further drugging, Mariella orders Nateesa to give him more wine filled with the toxin but quickly realises Nateesa has been giving him regular wine, trying to help bring him out of this state naturally.

Marielle orders another servant, a vile man by the name of Zogran to take Nateesa away and punish her. Conan doesn’t flinch at her pleading as she’s dragged away and soon Marielle is feeding him more of the laced drink. We see Nateesa trying to convince Zogran not to harm her and it appears he’s well aware Marielle is evil. But he’s still a creep and soon he’s whipping her for his own pleasure, the screams echoing throughout the mansion.

Things end for now as Conan is led towards a giant cauldron. Marielle has finished with him. (Her male servants tending to the pot are shocked he lasted almost a week!) With the spoiler in the summary box last week it’s clear whatever is in this cauldron turns men into stone for Marielle’s collection of lifelike statues. (So in a way I guess she did create them after all.) I think we’re set for the conclusion next time and it’s been a fun ride with some surprising dialogue so far. I hope it keeps the surprises coming and doesn’t just end with a clichéd fight.

Our final strip for this issue has been my most eagerly anticipated, what with Michael Collins just beginning to wake inside the Deathlok cyborg. Tearing its way through the settlement from last time, killing any and all forms of resistance, Michael can do nothing but look on in horror at what his brain is helping achieve (it’s confirmed here in a scene in Ryker’s control room that the live human brain is only meant to be used for storage). He tries to mentally battle with the computer and it appears to be working when the termination program (see #1) fails.

Michael’s brain proves to be a formidable foe for the computer and later we find out its new operating system won’t allow the computer to destroy the brain after what happened to Colonel Kelly. Deathlok asks headquarters if it should proceed and Ryker obviously instructs it to do so. Michael screams at Ryker but no one can hear him except the computer. Then Deathlok comes across a young girl who picks up a large gun in desperation, with no idea of how to use it. The Deathlok computer selects ‘Full Assault’ but Michael’s reaction actually stops it. This is where things get really interesting!

Michael now knows he can interact with the program running the machine and Ryker’s response to it letting the child live is truly shocking. Clearly there’s nothing this man won’t instruct Deathlok to do for his client’s money. Days later the techs are going over Deathlok with a fine-toothed comb and Ryker has his suspicions about Collins being “in there”. With the cyborg in its recharge cradle, unable to move, Michael asks the computer to open up the operating system and thus begins what I loved the most about this strip.

Deathlok: Brains of the Outfit is written by Dwayne McDuffie and Gregory Wright, with art by Gregory Wright and Jackson Guise and letters by Richard Starkings. So, Michael’s countermanding order was enough for the computer to accept him as its new programmer and finally we get to see the two of them interact. These interactions between Michael’s Everyman language and the computer’s monotone voice would lead to some great moments from what I remember, including some well placed humour, very much reminding me of the earliest episodes of Knight Rider when K.I.T.T. hadn’t yet loosened up from interacting with that show’s own Michael.

I’d completely forgotten about this visual representation of Collins as he hacks into the computer systems Ryker’s team were about to use in order to wipe his brain clean, to effectively kill him all over again. That last panel with Deathlok confirming they’re now able to physically move has me super excited for #6. Hoo boy, I can not wait! Between Ghost Rider and Deathlok it’s impossible for me to pick the strip I’m most looking forward to over the coming weeks, I keep switching back and forth between them. That’s not a bad problem to have in writing these reviews!

As always, ignore the date on the Next Issue page above, the next review will be here from Wednesday 10th August 2022. There may only be four issues left before the comic was unceremoniously pulled by Marvel UK but I’ve a feeling it’s going to be a great month! See you in seven.

iSSUE FOUR < > iSSUE SiX

HAVOC MENU