The All New, All Daring Peter Parker, The Spectacular Spider-Man #121: Eye Witness!

Story: Peter David
Art: John Romita Sr., John Buscema, Bob McLeod, Alan Kupperberg, Keith Williams, Mark Texeira
Lettering: Jack Fury

This issue is about a bank robbery, told in flashback from three different people's perspectives.

Mary Jane's version has character after character pausing to stop and tell her how beautiful she is. She also portrays J Jonah Jameson in a good light to soften him up in preparation for Peter's imminent request for a pay-rise.

Then, JJJ's commentary predictably casts himself as the hero and Spider-Man as a menace.

My problem with both of these two accounts is that the embellishments are just too exaggerated. MJ must surely be aware of how obviously she's making it up. JJJ must surely be aware of the same thing. Neither of them can possibly think that Robbie is sitting there believing them.

That a group of people will swear to contradictory accounts of the same event is well-known, but really, no-one gets it this wrong. Had the differences in their stories been more subtle, then they might just have been misremembering without being aware of it.

I can't go too hard on the plot for that though. Partly because showing the same story from several different perspectives wasn't such a common plot-device back in 1986, but mostly because this is a comedy.

Finally, Peter Parker's words on the incident directly contradict many of the pictures that accompany them, suggesting that although Peter's words are not reliable either, the artwork is.

Alas, the key word there is 'suggesting'. By the end of this issue, I couldn't be sure of anything that I'd seen on these flashback-pages, which somewhat rendered my purchase of the comic pointless.

I do think that there was the potential for a good story here, but ironically author Peter David - who is one of my favourite Spidey-writers - has left me uncertain as to exactly what it was.

Peter Parker, The Spectacular Spider-Man #130: 24 Hours

Script: Bob Layton
Pencils: Jim Fern

The Hobgoblin is dead, killed in the climax to recent storylines in other Spider-titles.

So what better time than now to print a one-off caper in which Spider-Man battles the Hobgoblin?

Answer: any time.

A narration-box on the opening splash-page offers all the explanation that the editor seems able to be confident of:

This issue takes place before the events in Amazing Spider-Man #289

Thanks. That's great. But when before??

There are a few pointers. It's sometime after baby Osborn's hospital-stay of Amazing Spider-Man #265, and sometime before the Hobgoblin's death. (circa the above noted #289) Given Spidey's silence on the subject, it's probably before Flash Thompson's framing as Hobby too. (ASM#276)

Oh yes, and there's one other subtle clue:


The Hobgoblin ends the strip with a sling on his left arm, a cast on his right leg, a neck-brace and confined to a wheelchair.

Humm, now let's see, in which earlier issues did we also see Hobgoblin so attired? Oh that's right, in none of them.

So, given all the athletic fights that Hobby and Spidey have routinely engaged-in, exactly when would this story best fit?

I guess the answer is, as long as possible before one of those battles. Y'know, to give the Hobgoblin the maximum amount of time in which to so fully heal.

Encouragingly, both science and magic are somewhat advanced in the Marvel Universe, so the treatment of which the Hobgoblin speaks in this issue might not require that long to take effect.

However, before we start spreading our comics collections all over the floor, ASM#289 throws us another retroactive curveball.

It asserts that the Hobgoblin's secret identity all along has been Peter's colleague at the Daily Bugle Ned Leeds, who has generally been seen to be in reasonable health too. Spare a thought then, for Ned's poor unsuspecting wife Betty. She must have really wondered about those weeks when her increasingly-estranged husband refused to even stand-up.

One promising time-frame is just before Secret Wars II #7, in which Mephisto rounds-up several Marvel villains offering a different deal to each of them in exchange for their group-attack on the Beyonder. Though we see Hobby's involvement, we are not privy to the terms of his employment. Maybe it was for the restoration of his health after receiving these injuries. Those covenants were all reversed at the end of that issue though.

I haven't reached a definitive answer to this question, I guess because, without any official word that I am aware of from the writer or editor, it will always be a subjective one. However without pouring-over all the issues, I think I'd plump for straight after the above-mentioned ASM#265.

There were quite a few one-off stories getting published around that point, which suggests to me a longer period of time passing in the narrative. I know the Osborn kid looks a bit too old to be a newborn in this, but thanks to varying artists, I reckon that fluctuations in physical age are an accepted convention of the comicbook format.

Otherwise this is a perfectly decent story with clear artwork and an unusually manipulated hero. Hobby's dialogue is sheer pantomime, which could be fine, but for the character's much greater depth in his other appearances. Maybe he's just happy from taking all those painkillers. Or maybe it's all just a prank.

Or maybe it's a completely different Hobgoblin from Spidey's future...

Christmas Day 2009

One Christmas Day when I was kid, my mum had to go to work.

Her job was at the local old folks' home, so we all went in and had our Christmas meal with the residents there. I recognised that some people had to work on the most special day of the year, but all the same, it still seemed like a sacrifice.

Years later, on the other side of the world, it occured to me that the opposite was true.

Surely, if you're going to help other people out as part of your Christian faith, then Christmas Day is the most appropriate date on which to do so?

Hence, on Christmas Day 2004 I determined to pitch-in and help-out with the Auckland City Mission's meal for the disadvantaged. This was something of a disaster. I couldn't even find the place.

The following year I determined to do the same thing again, but they already had enough people, so I wound up spending the 25th slumped in front of the TV with Shane.

After that I just accepted my annual place on the sofa without any argument.

This year however I actually managed to contribute to the Christmas meal happening at the church five minutes away from where I live. Not by much, but just by arriving afterwards to dry-up, sweep-up and mop-up. An hour, easy.

They had a few gifts left over, so they gave me one to say thanks. I've no idea when I'll open it.

The thing is, despite what I said above about Christmas Day being the most appropriate date on which to help people, in my house it never gets around to happening until a few days later anyway...

Doctor Who - The Completely Useless / Unofficial Encyclopedia by Chris Howarth & Steve Lyons

It may be forgotten today, but the original series of Doctor Who was pretty popular too.

Heck, it was so popular that it ran for an incredible 26 years, and remained universally-loved for a good 22 of them. For those last four years, it was pretty much just fans who loved it, and even then just some.

In fact, once the show had been constructively-axed in 1989, a curious phoenix-like thing happened:

Fans carried-on making the show themselves.

Virgin Books, BBV videos, the Marvel comic strip and Big Finish CDs... the proliferation of new Who material was colossal. If you don't believe me, just go to www.drwhoguide.com, and see how long it takes you to scroll-down through the entire list of 214 eighth Doctor stories, only one of which actually went out on TV.

Undoubtedly the advantage here was the love. The BBC had clearly filed for divorce from Doctor Who back in 1985, but the fans who were writing, drawing, recording and producing these new adventures all adored it. Even if they were rubbish, they tried hard. Much like the original TV show.

And hey – since all those people respected both the show and other fans, what could go wrong?

Unfortunately, familiarity is well-known for breeding contempt. Success is great at going to one's head. And power is famous for its corruptive properties.

Ultimately fans turned-on the original series which had begotten all these spin-offs. Of course, we had always known that the original Doctor Who series had been pathetic. All these new tie-in stories were clearly garbage as well. Even other fans of Doctor Who were obsessives for liking it so much, unlike one's own moderate and balanced interest, of course. Hey - this was the cynical 1990s.

But you know what? I don't think anyone meant it. We chuckled at the infamous hand under Sutekh's bum, passionately debated the "UNIT dating controversy", and enjoyed chanting together Professor Zaroff's cliffhanging 1967 declaration that "Nothing in the world can stop me now!!"

Doctor Who, in all its forms, wasn't thought of as rubbish out of hate, but out of love.

We hated it because we loved it.

Into this arena, in 1996, was published Chris Howarth and Steve Lyons' book Doctor Who - The Completely Useless Encyclopedia.

It's a tongue-in-cheek A-Z of the show's most intricate trivia, which can only be understood, and enjoyed, by the very fans who it is lambasting.

Entries include:

'CRAP': Peter Davison's considered opinion of his entire run on Doctor Who, as given on the video The Doctors - Thirty Years of Time Travel and Beyond.

DAY OF ACTION: That fateful date, 30 November 1990, on which frustrated fans (not us) jammed BBC switchboards with requests to bring back their favourite programme (or Doctor Who, in many cases). Faced with such a force of public opinion, the Beeb avoided capitulation by the simple expedient of adjusting the number of calls received (allegedly).

DOWNTIME: Appropriately titled video spin-off: if you spent seventeen quid on its initial release, chances are you'd feel pretty down by the time you'd watched it.

'INDEFINABLE MAGIC': A term coined by fans who cannot for the life of them explain why they watch a tacky, cheap kids' show. 'Well, it has that indefinable magic, dunnit?'

LONDON (FICTIONAL): The unlikely target of 99 per cent of invasions, which was lucky for Earth as UNIT happened to have a big base there with a good scientific adviser. Had any malevolent ETs hit upon the idea of attacking, say, Dublin, we might now be living under the yoke of alien oppression.

RIDICULOUSLY UNREALISTIC SCULPTED MODEL HEADS OF THE FIRST AND SECOND DOCTORS: See 'Dimensions in Time'.

As you might gather, it's essential for any fan reading this to be able to laugh at themselves, or at the very least, to be misguidedly conceited about all other fans. (and Peter Davison) Even the Top Ten lists can be quite scathing:

Ten Tried And Trusted Ways Of Bringing Fandom Into Disrepute

Ten Sad Items Of Merchandise

Ten Popular Continuity Errors To Pick Over At Your Leisure And Slag Off With Your Friends

In such an already hostile environment, it carries a lot of punch when the authors get tired of repeatedly knocking themselves, and instead put all that bile to good use, by uniting with the reader against a common enemy.

'SCIENCE FICTION ISN'T POPULAR': Famous line employed by BBC 1 Controller Jonathan Powell when attempting to justify the cancellation of Doctor Who and the absence of all telefantasy series from his channel. So long as you ignore the viewing figures, the Audience Appreciation Index and the sheer number of fan clubs around the world devoted to SF in its various forms, you can almost start to believe that he had a point. Upon leaving the BBC, Mr Powell became Head of Drama at Carlton Television and thus probably has a better idea of what 'unpopular' means now.

Owwwwwwwch.

Ten years later, in 2006, the old show had finally clawed its way back onto BBC-1 again, so it was about time (cough) for a second volume.

Or was it? The market into which this volume was being released was decided different. As the writers themselves admit in the opening About This Book section...

Ten years ago, we also noted that it was the job of of the committed fan to rubbish any new Doctor Who before eventually accepting its merits in hindsight. However, this too has changed - thanks, we expect, to the series' sixteen-year absence from our screens and the fear that, if we fail to appreciate it enough, it might go away again. Now, you criticise a new episode at your peril, especially online. As you can imagine, this isn't much fun for us, so we've chosen to stick with the traditional approach. As a sequel, this book will of course be less funny than the original anyway...

Alas, though surely written with the best of intentions, I indeed found the second book to slightly less funny than the first, but really because the bite was missing.

T: Did you know that Russell T's middle initial doesn't stand for anything? He uses it to differentiate himself from some radio presenter. Though, after enduring 'The Long Game', we thought of at least a couple of appropriate words.*

* Terrific, tremendous, talented. What did you think we meant?

Tame?

Still, a very funny second volume, and I do hope that 2016 brings a third. Heck, Love & Monsters is just asking for it.

Lastly, as mentioned above, despite their tone, both these books are a huge embracement of Doctor Who, and fandom, in all its forms. Nothing is intended seriously, except the bits that are, and if you're that interested in reading it, then you already the difference.

The bottom line is this: Doctor Who was created to entertain, coins to formalise a system of barter, trains as a method of transport, and stamps as a means of funding the postal service. People find entertainment in all four. Which is the most understandable?

Elmer In The Snow by David McKee

"It wasn't long before all the elephants were throwing snowballs at each other."


Short story in which Elmer the patchwork elephant leads his elephantine friends out of the jungle and up a snowswept mountain.

There they have all sorts of fun before eventually returning home again.

Elmer seems like a fairly benevolent character, driven primarily by the simple desire to give his friends a good time. At this he clearly succeeds. When he teasingly builds a lifesize snow-model of himself and pretends to have frozen with the cold, the narrative treats you with enough respect not to spell this out.

The art is nice and colourful, but suffers from a significant inconsistency in Elmer's spots. Strangely, one of his vertical stripes seems to retain the same set of colours, while an adjacent one varies. Maybe this ability is explained in another volume?

Or maybe, that's Elmer's world.

The All New, All Daring Peter Parker, The Spectacular Spider-Man #120: A House Is Not A Home

Story: Bill Mantlo
Pencils: Keith Giffen

An uncomfortable tale of constructive eviction.

Old man Dominic Castellano has lived with his wife in his flat for years. One day his landlord decides to convert the place into a luxury co-operative, so all the tenants are asked to move out. Some refuse to leave their long-term homes, including Dominic and his wife. The landlord counters this by inviting gangs to move in and scare them away. Some go, but Dominic and his wife are made of sterner stuff.

Well, not that stern. Dominic's wife gets killed.

Now should he stay or go?

He stays.

Peter Parker and new colleague Blaine Browne try to build the whole thing into a human-interest story for the Daily Bugle. That seems like a positive step, but Peter has a nagging feeling that he's taking on the responsibility of watching an old man's back 24 hours a day.

Sure enough, despite the impossibility of the task, that night finds Spider-Man staking-out the building. It's a long night, briefly interrupted by a purse-snatching in nearby Chelsea Park.

Spidey's brief momentary absence is the only chance the gang needs.

This one-off story is a change of tone for Spider-Man for several reasons.

It's from a different production team to usual, opens with a page of handwritten poetry, and features Spider-Man's red-and-blue costume, which was recently destroyed in Web Of Spider-Man #17. This story is therefore out-of-sequence. An odd choice for Marvel's 25th anniversary month.

It's also darker, more visual, addresses a social issue in a poor community, and is thoroughly depressing. After Dominic's murder, the whole building gets torched, though the perpetrators are brought to justice, and the gang leader learns the nature of the fear he's been so callously dealing in.

Aside from the odd bit of banter with Blaine, the only glimmer of hope here comes on the final page. Peter attends his own tenants meeting, and the final panel has him signing a petition.

It sounds pretty feeble, but it represents his resolve to, from now on, take some responsibility for his own neighbours' rights.

Web Of Spider-Man #16-23: Underworld!/The Magma Solution/The Longest Road!/Humbug!/Little Wars!/The Enemy Unknown!/Profit Of Doom/Slip Slydin' Away!

Plot / writer / script: David Michelinie (#16-19), Larry Lieber (#21), Len Kaminsky (#23)
Pencils: Marc Silvestri (#16-19), Larry Lieber (#21), Jim Fern (#23)
#20 & #22 bear no credits.

Spider-Man's eight-issue run-in with the evil Roxxon conglomerate looks to be one of his more haphazard capers.

In a good way.

It all starts with the wallcrawler sneezing in the rain as he swings around New York. With no clean dry clothes, he has to go into work at the Daily Bugle wearing a pink Strawberry Shortcake t-shirt.

Here he's teamed-up with Now Magazine reporter Joy Mercado, and flown all the way down to Virginia to cover some labour unrest. They spend a whole two issues uncovering illicit activities in a gigantic underground complex, before the whole place duly explodes, with Spider-Man trapped inside.

Three days pass during which the webslinger is missing in action, and cannot even appear in his other two current titles - Amazing Spider-Man #279 and The All New, All Daring Peter Parker, The Spectacular Spider-Man #117.

Believe it or not, it turns out that he has unexpectedly survived the blast, although his last red-and-blue costume can't say the same, ripped to shreds right down to his undies. Basically, in an arguably genius merchandising tie-in, Peter Parker is at last wearing an actual pair of Spider-Man underpants.

Stealing food and clothes, he tries to hitch-hike home before winding-up in prison, where he uncovers and busts an illegal human war game.

Once back in New York, he and Joy are dispatched to London to cover a speech by Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher on terrorism. Understandable really, after all the repair work that's evidently been done to London since the devastation of Captain America #306.

Ahh yes, Marvel Comics' always entertaining version of Her Majesty's capital is all coming back to me now...

Blimey mate, this is a London where all the lads are dropping their aitches, red double-decker buses share the road with bright yellow taxicabs, and the IRA can successfully bomb Heathrow Airport by targeting a flight into Gatwick.

At one point Peter says that he can't believe that innocent people are being killed because of a threat that hasn't existed for hundreds of years. Perhaps he should apply this reasoning to his choice of British currency in 1986?

Peter Parker: (THINKS WHILE TIPPING THE BELL-BOY)"Darn. Is a farthing more than a shilling? What the heck's a 'bob'?! Oh, nuts. (OUT LOUD, DROPPING SOME RANDOM COINS INTO THE BELL-BOY'S HAND) Here."

Bell-boy: "Thank you, guv! (THINKS) Few more like that, an' I can bloody retire!"

There's no inker credited on issue #20, so I guess it'll be okay if I ask what happened to Maggie Thatcher's face?


Anyhow, despite the pair's official mission, Joy is still intent on following up her leads on Roxxon, so they decide to follow the trail over to Ireland.

The next issue is entirely devoted to the ferry journey, as Peter develops a cold and has a 22-page flashback to the last time he had one. Hummm, wasn't he sneezing at the start of this epic yarn? This self-contained issue appears to have been held-over for a few months, being by a different writer/artist, and enjoying an extra-page on the start and end showing Peter and Joy on the boat. Heck, this flashback's so long, it even contains its own flashbacks!

Anyway, that detour over, the next issue opens in Belfast, where there's a firefight between the army and the 'black hoods'. Curiously, the ayrish seem to speak with a bit of a London accent, dropping their gees, and peppering their language with 'mate' and 'bloody' too.

Liam: "I saw ya nabbed outside the pub, mates! Couldn't stand by and not help a couple o' drinkin' buddies out of a nasty bit of business now, could I?"

I must confess, it all sounds very Irish to me, but then I've never even set foot there.

Anyway, Roxxon are up to no good in Belfast too, but at least they're not doing it alone. No wait, that's worse. They're in league with the terrorists, various Members Of Parliament, and even 003 of the British Secret Service. Peter Parker seems to feel like he's wandered into a Bond movie.

Peter: "I don't believe this! Atomic cannons! Secret agents! Terrorists! This is crazy!"

He obviously has yet to notice that he's saying this while the master-villain has tied him and Joy to two chairs, and proceeded to spend the next two pages graciously explaining his plan to them before they die.

In summary, we really have seven different stories here (I haven't catalogued them all). I guess the authors could have submitted seven self-contained tales with no overall thread running through them, but I'm glad they didn't. I like sagas.

Still, on their flight back home to New York in the final issue, there's one overall plot-point that really needs addressing. Surely Joy Mercado has noticed that, everywhere she and Peter have travelled, Spider-Man has always shown up to rescue them? She must have worked it out by now, surely. She can't be that galactically stupid, can she?

Well, she does have a few stern words to say to Peter on the subject... (as they argue in a toilet in first class)


Oh what a tangled Web Of Spider-Man we weave.

The All New, All Daring Peter Parker, The Spectacular Spider-Man #112-113 & 115-118

Writer / Script: Peter David
Artist: Bob McLeod (#113)
Pencils: Mark Beachum (#112, 115), Rich Buckler (#116), Dwayne Turner (#117)
Storytelling: Rich Buckler (#117)
Breakdowns: Mike Zeck (#118)

Who among us can keep pencils in order?

I can't, not even those considerately hexagonal ones.

Anyway, as you can see above, I can't keep "Pencils" in order either.

(I'm sorry, I needed an opening)

Pencils, inking, breakdowns, finishes, layouts, art... it's all a bit of a muddle to me. A while back Herschel gave me a vague lesson on their differences in definition, but clearly I'm still a bit blank.

This ignorance is probably the main reason why I can't recognise most of these artists' work when I see it. Alan Davis' masterpieces are pretty spectacular (such as those he did for Captain Britain), but I still get his visuals mixed-up with others'. Basically, in Marvel Comics at any rate, there's never been anyone whose nib-strokes I could positively identify.

Until now.

I shan't dwell on this, but Mark Beachum seems to have a real way with women. In fact, he really seems to enjoy drawing them, no matter how boring, mundane or dull the activities which they happen to be engaged in.

(he draws men well too, but somehow that doesn't notice so much)

For example, in this scene, he has to draw Felicia Hardy putting down the telephone.


Really - this is just the tip of the iceberg. The previous page is filled with that nice Mary Jane lazily getting out of the bath...

Speaking of soapiness, Spider-Man comics often run multiple storylines overlapping with each other, with the result that it can be tricky to figure-out how to group these issues together for review.

For instance, you'll notice that the title of this post misses-out issue #114, as that's a stand-alone story, which I reviewed in isolation in my preceding entry.

Bearing all that in mind, among all the other comings and goings, from these six issues there are two distinct story-arcs that emerge...

Storyline A: The Black Cat Returns And Loses Her Powers

After putting down the phone, undressing, putting-on her skin-tight costume and waving her butt around town rather alot, the Black Cat eventually crosses the path of her ex-boyfriend Peter Parker.

Or, more accurately, he crosses hers.

Now our boy Parker has some pretty poor fortunes at the best of times - it's part of what makes his character tick. Lately however things have been going even worse than usual. Well, they would have done if this particular storyline has been foreshadowed a little better, but I digress.

In #115 (again pencilled by Beachum) Parker manages to screw-up yet another assignment for his boss Kate Cushing. She gets some great lines in this issue.

Kate: "Parker, for as long as I've been the Bugle's City Editor, you've been worse than useless."

Kate: "...don't screw up. Pretend you're a pro photographer -- like Lance Bannon."

Kate: "What did you do, flag down a tortoise and crawl over there?"

Peter: (thinks)"Now I know Flash isn't the Hobgoblin. Cushing is."

Then, suddenly, out of nowhere, on page 14, the best Spider-Man scene ever happens.

Depressed after all his tribulations, Peter sits dejectedly alone and begins to toss a coin, determined to comfort himself with some sort of good fortune. It's a fifty-fifty chance, right? As he puts it himself, that's better than his odds of ever selling a photo to Kate Cushing.

So he calls heads, and of course it's tails.

So he tries again, and he's wrong again. And again. And again. And again.

By the time he eventually gives-up, he's been wrong 179 times straight, with seven different coins.

Something intangible has been insidiously working its way into his life. That moment of realisation is awesome.

And, even better, that means it's time to call-in the always amusing Doctor Strange.

A year earlier, author Peter David was writing alot of very funny Spidey-stories. Fortunately he was smart enough not to pigeon-hole himself, and by this era he seems to have settled on penning some very dark tales, broken-up with comedy.

So here's his other, darker, plotline:

Storyline B: Alexander Woolcot

Alexander is a child with a huge problem.

His dad hits him.

So much so that one of his teachers sees the bruises and files a lawsuit for child abuse against the parent.

It's obviously a very tragic topic, and maybe in part written to hook-in and breach the subject with kids in similarly unhappy home situations.

However this is also a Marvel Comic, so Alexander's dad happens to be a scientist, who devises a machine that malfunctions while he's out of the room and accidentally gives Alex super-powers.

It's the kind of crazy plot-device that usually makes the world a much more lively and enjoyable place, if only for the reader. Here however, the first time Alex uses his cool new abilities, he accidentally murders his father.

In any other situation, Alex's next immediate thought might sound like a joke, but the context here is so heavy that I guess it's the first thing that many distraught kids would think.

"Oh, geez, Mom's gonna kill me."

Alex runs away. His overwrought mother, trying to distract herself from her family's sudden unexplained absence, cleans his bedroom, obliviously vacuuming-up her husband's ashen remains.

On the street, Alex is nearly abducted by creepy old men, but he escapes. By spontaneously combusting their car. And accidentally blowing-up the nearby electricity station. Causing a major city-wide power-cut.

By the end of these six issues, Spider-Man finds he's fighting a battle on two fronts. What had begun as an item for the Daily Bugle about child abuse, has now ballooned into a pitched battle between the military (SHIELD) and one petrified little kid.

Both are using attack as their only means of defence, not against their opponent, but against what they fear their opponent will do to them.

Stuck in the middle, Spider-Man has to

a) stop the army killing Alexander,
b) stop Alexander killing the army,
c) stop both of them from killing him, and
d) stop both of them from hurting any of the surrounding civilians caught in the crossfire.

Another galling scene features SHIELD sending out a huge laser-powered robot to attack Alex. Forced to defend himself, our scared young protagonist makes mincemeat of that, but then discovers too late that it wasn't a robot after all. There was a man inside.

Big guilt-trip just got even bigger.

In the final scene, Spider-Man at last gets the kid alone on a roof-top and manages to open a dialogue with him.

Spider-Man: "You shouldn't have run away, Alexander. Everything would have been fine if--"

Alexander: "You don't understand! When I was six they almost sent me to jail for swiping a superball from Woolworths! Two weeks ago, I incinerated my own father! I don't even want to think what they do to you for something like that!"

Spider-Man: "I was afraid that's what happened. I won't lie to you, Alex. You're in big trouble. But let's handle one fiasco at a time."

In a messy, thoroughly unsatisfying conclusion (like life), Spider-Man succeeds in defeating a couple more Mandroids, but SHIELD still manages to shoot Alexander dead.

There is no positive, upbeat ending. Just an unspoken lesson in not letting a terrible situation escalate.

The All New, All Daring Peter Parker, The Spectacular Spider-Man #114: The Key

Script: Len Kaminski
Pencils: Joe Brozowsky
Inkers: Keith Williams, Del Barras

If you were asked to write just one issue of Marvel's Spider-Man, what would you do?

You'd write the most awesome mould-breaking Spider-tale imaginable wouldn't you?

Ah, no, you wouldn't. They would never let you rock the boat like that. Your best bet would be to figure out what passes for a normal strip, and then try to write one of those, but really really well.

But how exactly does one go about doing that? Ask Len Kaminski.

This isolated story is, for me, quite an unmemorable one, yet somehow it has a warmth, charm and rightness about it that isn't always there in the excellent regular issues.

Peter Parker's flat is broken into, and all his spare Spidey-gear gets stolen.

Before long, he also becomes a victim of identity-theft.

Parker is understandably mad, but upon learning the motivation for the teen's mixed-up behaviour (trying to support his hard-up pops since ma passed away), seeks to set him back on the right track.

By the end of the issue, the kid has found a better way to deal with his problems and is turning his life around. That may sound crass out-of-context, but the story wisely allows several weeks to pass for this change to convincingly take place.

The only disappointment really is that this self-contained adventure was published right in the middle of the series' other ongoing storylines. As a result, despite containing all the right ingredients, this would have struggled to deliver on the regular reader's expectations.

A shame it didn't get a better chance.

Web Of Spider-Man #14-15: All That Glitters... / Fox Hunt

Writer: David Michelinie
Pencils: Mike Harris

Two-parter featuring this year's retirement-plan for the Black Fox.

At least, I think another year had passed since his last two final jobs in ASM#255 and ASM#265. While 12 months had just about gone by in the real world, in anything-goes Marvel-Time it may well have only been a few weeks.

Anyway, in the background of the usual runaround after the Fox, #15 is the one when Peter Parker finally makes a decision about what to do with the solid gold notepad he salvaged from someone's trash-can back in Web Of Spider-Man #6. It was described at the time as a turning-point in his life. As suspected, it really hasn't been.

Ever since Spider-Man saved this priceless item from the government's plan to dump it at the bottom of the sea, Peter has been paranoid that this action makes him a thief. Does it?

As I mentioned in my review of that issue, I'm not sure that this really counts as stealing if someone's thrown it away. If Peter really felt that bad about rescuing the gold notepad, then he should have given it to Power Man and Iron Fist, since the Beyonder intended the whole building of gold as a payment to them for their services. (they never got anything - the US government stole it)

Finally, at the end of this current story, due to renewed pressure from his landlady, our hero finally acquiesces and sells the darned thing. Alas, Parker is still so unsure of his conscience that he lacks the necessary confidence to haggle with, and gets a really, really low price for it. Which he immediately wipes out by using it to anonymously pay for Nathan's medical bills.

One of the real edges that Peter Parker has, and it goes for some other Marvel characters too, is his deep commitment to doing the right thing. Spider-Man doesn't just punch villains, he has this whole internal struggle every issue about the morality of his actions.

It gives these stories a really strong hook with which to hold the reader's attention, because most of the rest of us have that struggle every day too. I mentioned above my angle on his taking the gold notepad. I only hold that viewpoint because the comic has prompted me to think about it.

Peter's not perfect either. Lately he's been losing his temper quite a lot. Again, like we all do.

It's just a real shame that he can cut the rest of the world so much slack, but not himself. He seems to treat others with compassion, but himself with legalism, forgetting that to them he himself is another person.

If Spider-Man had somehow met Peter Parker and heard about his imminent eviction, then wouldn't Spidey have happily given Peter the gold / money to help him keep his home?

The Avengers #263, Fantastic Four #286 & X-Factor #1: What Lurks Below? / Like A Phoenix! / Third Genesis

Writer: Roger Stern (TA#263), you know who (FF#286), Bob Layton (XF#1)
Breakdowns: John Buscema (TA#263)
Penciler: you know who (FF#286), Jackson Guice (XF#1)

It was Saturday night, so I figured it was about time I joined the rest of the country and caught-up on X-Factor.

Oh that's right, I forgot, the phenomenally-popular TV series du jour quietly took its name from a 1985 Marvel comic.

After all, the similarities are undeniable. Both feature a quest for ordinary members of the public who possess unusual talent. (on TV it's musical talent, in the comic it's mutant superpowers) Both required the reduction of an earlier series to make room for it. (On TV: Pop Idol, in comics: The New Defenders) Both are made in colour. Both... erm... both have a big letter 'X' in their logo...

Yeah, well, anyway, the first X-Factor was a clever ruse to bring back the original X-Men line-up from 1963. They're all here - Angel, Beast, Cyclops, Iceman, and even Jean Grey, despite feeling a little under the weather from a slight death five years earlier.

In fact, the story of Jean Grey's passing remains arguably the most famous demise ever to take place in Marvel Comics. Small wonder that here it takes three issues to explain away.

I've never read that original tale of woe, which might be why this resurrection-arc appears to me to be extremely well worked-out. There's certainly a lot more effort gone to over undoing that, than over undoing her boyfriend Cyclops' new wife and kid.

Poor Scott Summers. Convinced of Jean's death, he's done the right thing and got on with his life. It's tragic to observe him silently walking the tightrope between loyalty and, um, loyalty.

Back-stories aside, the premise of the new team as a whole didn't hang together for me. However this is the pilot issue, and I understand that the writers did spot the inherent problems with X-Factor's secretly extortionate business-plan before too long.

My top moment in these three issues though has to be the first couple of pages to part two, which begin with the Fantastic Four returning to Earth. Maybe I'm reading too much in here, but it sorta sounds like author John Byrne had really wanted to keep them out in space for a few more adventures yet. After all, there is a pretty big gap in the storyline immediately before this...

Reed: "There she is! Terra firma! Mother Earth!"

She-Hulk: "There've been times in the past few weeks when I began to wonder if we'd ever see her again!"

Reed: "Really now, She-Hulk, you make it sound as if our eventual homecoming was unlikely!"

She-Hulk: "Well... not 'unlikely' exactly, Reed. It just seemed to get further and further away... what with one detour after another!"

Sue: "By now you should know Reed well enough to realize he's intellectually incapable of passing by anything of the slightest cosmological interest. But... that's one of the reasons I love him as much as I do!"

Reed: "Sue..."

She-Hulk: "Well, if nothing else, at least some of the little side trips we took on the way back should provide grist for some fine stories for the people who publish our magazine."

Torch: "Maybe. Last time I heard, there was a theory over there that 'cosmic doesn't sell.' And you can't get much more cosmic than the last few weeks."

She-Hulk: "Maybe not, Torchie... but I'll just bet the FF's legion of fans would be mighty peeved if they thought they weren't getting all the stories."

I really hope that ITV's version doesn't cut-out loads and loads of perfectly good stuff too.

The Sarah Jane Adventures: The Wedding Of Sarah Jane Smith

It's the third story of this series, and as I watched it, I couldn't shake a certain sense that we might be getting these in the wrong order.

The preceding programme revealed that the Doctor would be returning at some undisclosed point in the future. Now they've pulled that trigger in the very next episode. Nothing actually wrong with that, I just thought they might milk it a bit longer than a mere six days.

Also, Clyde's intergalactic grounding in Prisoner Of The Judoon, which went unmentioned on the spaceship in last week's The Mad Woman In The Attic, is now back in Sarah's memory again.

I guess the real surprise is that the Gareth Roberts-credited story with 'Sarah Jane' in the title, that features the Trixster, and ends with the guest-actor considerately agreeing to die in the past, is usually broadcast fifth. (cf. Whatever Happened To Sarah Jane? and The Temptation Of Sarah Jane Smith)

But hey - there's no reason why that story shouldn't go out third just for a change.

As the title suggests, the plot revolves around Sarah meeting this guy and getting engaged to him. But the engagement ring, heh-heh, you'll never see this coming, heh-heh-heh, turns her into a zombie.


Well, I guess it has been almost a fortnight now since this last happened to her. Ramping-up the transmission-schedule to two episodes a week isn't doing this show any favours.

However I should be more reasonable. Sarah's zombification in this one is not total. The glowing ring convinces her to make one or two minor changes in her life, specifically giving up all her dealings with aliens, closing-down her super-computer Mr Smith (there's now a risky lever on the wall for that) and, most hard to find a reason in the story for, lying to Peter.

One of the big problems that I had with this tale is that Sarah begins making out-of-character decisions before she puts-on said ring. She gets engaged to a guy who she's only known for a short time. She then agrees to marry Peter without having told him what she spends her life doing.

Not only is this behaviour nothing like her, but for a kids' role model it sets a poor example.

The other regular characters go along with events as best they can, but they're not given much motivation for accepting Sarah's unlikely decisions either. Luke especially accepts his sudden dad to the point of arguing with Clyde over it.

I guess the really big flaw here is that such a huge emotional curve has to convincingly happen in the space of just one episode. The production team's biggest success in this endeavour is the inspired casting of Nigel Havers as Sarah's intended. Havers has both the charm and integrity, and it's hard to think of anyone else with a better chance of making this rushed storyline work.

Given that the Doctor made it to Sarah's wedding (he wasn't sent an invite - they must have lost his number since The Stolen Earth), it is a bit of a shame that the Brigadier didn't. I was hoping for a line excusing Brendon too, but that's just me.

Without having seen the rest of this season yet, I do think that this tale would have worked much better as the final one. If Peter had featured throughout this whole series, then he would have had a proper chance to win-over Sarah Jane, her son, her friends and the audience as well.

Not to mention how much more powerful his sacrifice in the final episode would have then been.

Otherwise, I decided to just let it be fun. Great to see David Tennant's Doctor in the show for a couple of episodes, Haresh and Gita are a great double-act as Sarah's neighbours, and the other regulars get to enjoy it too.

Superman #11 (1987): The Name Game

Story & Pencils: John Byrne
Inks: Karl Kesel

I guess there are three types of crossovers between comicbook characters.

1. When two characters from the same publisher meet, which can happen alot, because it's relatively easy to do.

2. When two characters from different publishers meet. This is very difficult, because it requires two business competitors to work together.

3. When two characters from different publishers meet, without the other side's permission.

That third one is actually not so unusual, and can get quite interesting, this issue being a prime example.

Having spent years producing type-1 crossovers for Marvel Comics, writer-artist John Byrne switched sides to competitor DC Comics where, along with his old friend Mike Carlin, he looked-after the revamp of their most famous product Superman.

I guess after ten issues he'd gotten a little comfortable in this new gig, so much so that he snuck-in a brand-new crossover-issue with Marvel's now-completed Secret Wars II saga.

Honestly:


Or did he? That sure does look like the all-powerful godlike Beyonder on the left above, and John Byrne would certainly know how to draw him. He'd already pencilled the one from beyond in no less than four official crossovers while still working for Marvel about a year earlier. Visually, the only difference that I can see is that this guy has stubble, which is hardly an inconsistency.

Of course, he never refers to himself as "the Beyonder" for obvious legal reasons, and the character never introduced himself as this in his Marvel adventures anyway. (although he did recognise that others used it) Here he gives his name as the anagrammatic "Ben DeRoy", describes himself as having come from "yonder", and causes no end of chaos as he grants various passers-by whatever they thoughtlessly wish for. All very Beyonderish, as of course is his presence in a different universe.

However, on this visit to the Daily Planet, he steals Lois Lane away from Clark Kent, takes her on a lunchdate, and asks her to marry him, the cad. (having just met him, she answers yes, the minx)

Hmm, actually that's not so Beyonderish, in fact his entire attitude here is uncharacteristically sinister.

Still, I'd place these events after The Incredible Hulk #312 and before Secret Wars II #4, because his stubble suggests that a long night has just passed, and he seems to be in the early stages of looking for love. Also, his rampant wish-fulfilment for those around him doesn't reflect his subsequent learning curve in Rom #72. Yep, that's definitely when this issue must take place.

Well, until page 13 anyway, when the man of steel finally confronts him, and this familiar stranger turns out to have actually been Mr Mxyzptlk in disguise all along. Sadly, from that moment on, the remaining nine pages are a Mr Mxyzptlk story, which never do very much for me. Sorry, Mr Mxyzptlk.

Still, it was nice to believe that I was reading Secret Wars II again, if only for half an issue.

(sometimes available here)
(with thanks to Herschel)

Blogback

Often when I disagree with an aspect of someone else's faith, I'll take it on board for a while to challenge my opposing belief with, in order to better understand why I am right.

Sometimes, after maybe a year has passed, I find that I have at some point come to agree with the other person's perspective, and realise that my own long-standing assumption has always been flawed. In other words, I discover that I was wrong.

Nearly five years ago - in May 2005 - new friend Brett published a blog-post in which he expressed a minor viewpoint with which I flatly disagreed.

He had listed four invalid ways of arguing a point. I disagreed with one of them, and after the statutory year had passed, I realised that he had been right after all.

However he had also listed three other methods of arguing unreasonably, and I couldn't remember what they had been.

I ploughed back through his blog, but couldn't find it. I checked some of the comments from Rhett's late lamented blogspot, in case I had actually read it there, but no joy. I kept intending to ask Brett personally at some point what they had been, but as usual never got around to it.

Today I checked Brett's current blog, and saw that some random blogger / spam program had left a new comment on an old post of his, which had automatically created a backlink to it in his sidebar.

So I clicked on it, and suddenly there it all was again...

"I've been pondering the past few months on how frustrating it can be debating important issues with other Christians (no wonder Paul warned against it). What I've noticed is at best a laziness in debate; at worst intellectual dishonesty. I've seen this on discussion boards, blogs and in real time. Here's just some of what I see:

• The straw man argument - you take something someone said, exaggerate it to a point that they themselves did not take it to, and then proceed to knock down the exaggeration instead of the actual proposition. Its very effective as a tool of argument but ineffective in promoting understanding;

• Arguing from the abuse to the abolition. Simply put: the abuse of a thing does not logically lead to its abolition. That does not mean that the abuse is justifiable but the thing which is abused may well be. Here's an example that Christian readers might relate to: Christians act hypocritically, therefore Christianity must be wrong. A relatively well know Christian, Augustine was his name, wrote that a thing ought not to be condemned because it lent itself to abuse - his subject was gold - kinda makes the same point;

• "Play the man, not the ball" At the risk of being tautologous...this sporting metaphor carries the foulplay analogy into the realm of debate. Its always easy to find something personal to criticise;

• The irrelevant crititque - when you're getting beaten in an argument, a good tactic is to select something irrelevant in a person's statement and start crtiquing that - its easy to do because most people don't express themselves perfectly 100% of the time.

My point is that it can be awfully tiring attempting to pursue truth in a discussion when you have to clear your way though the murkiness of the approach to discussion."

It turned-out that Brett hadn't quite made the exact point that I had taken from his post and reflected upon. However the broaching of the subject in general has, down the years, led me to identify some of my own sloppy methods of discussion and opinion-forming:

- Using an analogy to replace the argument, instead of to demonstrate how the argument works.

- Quoting a famous person, not to give them their due credit, but so that my argument gains credibility.

- Taking the subject under discussion and placing it into a new context, which can be the same as:

- Replacing the subject under discussion with a different one, which may at first appear to be the same.

- Boiling three or more opposing viewpoints down into just two.

- Polarising those opposing viewpoints, by labelling them 'right' and 'wrong'.

- Believing, for some crazy reason, that there can only be one answer that is 'right'.

- Tending to listen more to opinions that I already agree with.

- Discrediting a source as unchecked by quoting another source, also unchecked.

- Disagreeing with a viewpoint because of its popularity, in order to make myself feel wiser. This is similar to:

- Distancing myself from every viewpoint in order to feel that I can see a bigger picture than everyone else. (belittlement)

You want proof? Just read some of my own previous posts! (not to suggest that I don't still practice the above...)

:)

Captain Britain

Captain Britain Monthly (as it was known) is one of those rare titles of which I actually managed to collect every single edition.

Throughout 1985 these 14 issues proudly flew the Marvel UK flag, presenting about 30 pages each month of British-made comic-strips. Even better, it was all getting exported to the US, where its sales were significantly stronger than here.

Although it was black-and-white and padded-out with reprints and a text-story, the brand new material was first class stuff, and probably aimed at readers somewhat older than I was at the time. (14)

The title-strip exemplifies this, being so detailed and embedded in Captain Britain's pre-existing continuity, that I found it very hard to get into.

Well, having put-on another 24 years since then, and also inspired by having re-read Cap's guest-appearance in Captain America #305-307, about 14 weeks ago I decided to give the whole series another go...

The Mysterious Night-Raven

#1-4, 6-14 Script: Steve Parkhouse, art: David Lloyd, Midsummer Madness text by Jamie Delano, illustrations by Ivan Allen

Fun three-page reprints set in 1930s America, about a superhero whose skills at conjuring and misdirection almost make him more of a magician than a crime-fighter.


Night Raven's brooding quietness in these three-pagers is interesting given that his final chronological adventure here (in #10-12) is a similarly dialogue-light modern-day text-story. Though he misses issue #5, he gets a double-bill in #10, #11, #12 and #14, while #13 features a full-page Mastermind Specification Scan 2 recapping his history.

The Black Knight

#12-14 Script: Steve Parkhouse, art: John Stokes


Thanks to the mag's cancellation, these reprints only got as far as covering the origin of the Black Knight's partnership with Captain Britain. Its bleak, desolate location conjures-up the cold oppression of The Wicker Man.

Captain Britain

#1-14 Co-creators: Jamie Delano, Alan Davis, Mike Collins, art assistant #11-13 Noel Davis, inks #14 Mark Farmer

I found that this brand-new title-strip required alot of concentration to follow, evidently more than I was willing to offer on either reading. When the storylines sometimes lost me, the letters-page (Captain Britain Communications) would be the place to discover what other readers had uncovered going-on in there. It didn't help that Jamie Delano seems to have preferred writing about groups rather than individual characters, especially when there were only twelve pages each month in which to introduce so many grotesques.

That said, the actual words in here have been purified-down into sheer poetry. The description of Sydney Crumb's illness that opens issue #4 is a prime example. Likewise Alan Davis' artwork is nothing short of spectacular. He puts his heart and soul into every panel, making subjects as dry and boring as even a newspaper headline look awesome.


Even Steve Craddock and Annie Halfacree's lettering joins-in the party. I'd criticise the whole thing for reeking of creators who are trying far, far too hard, but the end concoction is comicbook caviar.

Helpfully, issues #11-12 each carry half of a two-page Mastermind Specification Scan 1 feature on the teeth-gritting Captain's story-so-far. It's easy to be wise after the event, but I really could have done with that about a year earlier.

The Cherubim: Playgrounds And Parasites!

#11-14 Plot / script / pencils: Mike Collins, plot / inks: Mark Farmer


Young warpies escape from the lead strip and cause chaos in London. If the storyline appears thin, then the artwork more than compensates. Richard Starkings' lettering is inviting too.

Captain Granbretan

#13 by Grant Morrison, illustrations by John Stokes


The somewhat disturbing fate of a superhero on a parallel Earth. Captain Granbretan is a well-realised tale of the unexpected about how even super powers can become boring. Grant Morrison may be better-known for his comic-strip work, but his prose here is highly evocative, paticularly his description of what it's like to fly. Has this guy actually flown? It's very funny too.

Thicker Than Water

#9 by Steve Alan, illustrations by Jeff Anderson


Not so much a text story, more a series of black comedy sketches about an old lady who seems to be Death. And also about her victims.

The Eye Witness

#8 by R Hunter, illustrations by John Stokes


Short, punchy text whodunnit, with a good twist at the end, but which doesn't actually solve the conundrum. (or maybe I missed something, hey - it is a murder-mystery) It's entirely conveyed through the characters' speech, which makes the story flow well, if not the actual dialogue.

The Paragon of Painthorpe Street

#1-4 Writer: Steve Alan, illustrations: Jeff Anderson


Witty, clever, sad text-story about Redmond Jonah Pringle - a (now) stereotypical forty-something overweight comic-fan who dreams of becoming his hero. The first chapter is so down-to-earth that it's almost a shame when subsequent entries feature him stumbling onto science-fiction technology that can make his dream a reality. Enthralling, and contains some very funny parodies of superhero conventions via Redmond's favourite back-issues.

City: Snapshot

#5-7, by Mike Collins, illustrations by Mike Collins and Mark Farmer

A fairly simple text detective story, made fascinating by the depth of the near-future setting in which it all happens. The early 21st century is a grim, dirty and old environment, yet author Mike Collins somehow made me want to live there. I should be careful what I wish for...



Space Thieves

#5-10 Script: Dave Harper, art: Barry Kitson, John Stokes, Jeff Anderson

The funniest strip I've ever read. The sitcommy script, the running jokes, Barry Kitson's stark art and awesome layouts...


What on Earth happened to these spacefaring misfits? This is Blake's 7, only as (even more of) a sitcom. Even the Next Month captions are funny. Only six episodes ever? Whuh?!?



Free-Fall Warriors

#1-4 Script / inks #1: Steve Parkhouse, art: Jerry Paris, inks #4: Leach


I'd read a strip featuring this group of renegades before in Doctor Who Magazine, but hadn't been able to make sense of it. I couldn't make any sense of this origin story either. No matter though, I never came across them again. The whole thing looks incredible, particularly the minimalist splash panel of the space-station exploding on the penultimate page.

Abslom Daak - Dalek Killer

#1-11 Script: Steve Moore, art: #1-7 Steve Dillon #8-11 David Lloyd


Yes, another refugee from Marvel UK's Doctor Who Magazine. This is the third printing I have of some of these episodes, so I guess Daak (pronounced as in "Quark") must have been quite popular at the time, despite his usual relegation to back-up strip. Which is fair enough, for a character who is such a rough-edged B-movie hero.

Sentenced to death by teleport to a Dalek planet, Abslom fearlessly wipes out the entire local population, but not before the last one exterminates his new girlfriend mid-embrace. Cryogenically freezing Princess Taiyin's body, he sets out to both find a way to save her and, in most of his own words, kill every stinking Dalek in the galaxy.

Well, who among us can argue with him there?

Read him as Ace Rimmer. I did, and I had a ball with this.

Marvel Team-Up #65-68 as presented in Marvel Tales #201-204

Introducing, Captain Britain / Murder World / Tigra Tigra, Burning Bright! / The Measure Of A Man!
Author: Chris Claremont
Artist: John Byrne

Unlucks Buck$ or The Illegal Eagle
Script: Steve Mellor
Art: Joe Albelo

Four slightly psychedelic issues reprinting some of Spidey's classic team-ups, specifically with Captain Britain, Tigra and the Man-Thing.

I say slightly psychedelic because all three stories challenge our heroes' perceptions of reality. The last tale has D'Spayre as the villain in a magical environment that our gibbering webslinger perceives as just swampland. The preceding tale shows us Spidey getting drugged and seeing Kraven as the bony figure of Death. And the first tale? Well, that features Spider-Man and Captain Britain thinking they're encased in transparent spheres on a gigantic life-size pinball machine. No wait, I'm sorry, that's real. Sheesh, it's so easy to get mixed-up in these things.

Captain Britain seems to have brought some of his Marvel UK resourcefulness across the Atlantic with him, as these editions of Marvel Tales represent the only time I've ever seen two US comics apparently merge.

Peter Porker, The Spectacular Spider-Ham was being discontinued after 17 issues, so Marvel Tales #201 proudly threw him and his friends a lifeline in the form of an ongoing back-up strip. Ironic given how their Spider-parody started life as the one-shot Marvel Tails. What great news for all readers.

Inside this Spider-Ham four-parter I found a lot of silliness and fun. I hadn't really encountered this world before, which is perhaps a shame as it turned out to be an awful lot like my favourite cartoon Danger Mouse. The strip embraces all the usual genre conventions, right down to crazy ideas and lazy plotting.

If there's a downside to this, it's that through the lens of certain modern science-fiction, I found this 22-year-old satire to be still painfully hitting its mark.


Fig. 1: The original Spider-Pig.

Judith

There's no doubt about it - Judith was a woman of great conviction.

Her people were facing starvation, invasion and death, when she had the guts to reprimand their leaders thus:

When the leaders arrived, Judith said to them, “Leaders of the people of Bethulia, please listen to me. What you said in front of the people today wasn’t right. You made a promise to God. You promised that you would surrender to our enemies if the Lord didn’t help us within five days. Who do you think you are? You are testing God and taking the place of God in human affairs.

- Judith 8:11-12 (God's Word)

What if he doesn’t want to help us within five days? He has the right to protect us whenever he pleases or to destroy us in front of our enemies.

- Judith 8:15 (God's Word)

The Lord isn’t putting us through a severe trial as he did our ancestors. He isn’t punishing us. Instead, the Lord disciplines those who are close to him in order to warn them.”

- Judith 8:27 (God's Word)

Bold words to tell off your people's leaders with, especially in the face of the huge Assyrian army. Like I said, a woman of conviction.

Well, that how she initially seems anyway. Later she lies her way over enemy lines, and charms her way into the bedroom of the army leader (Holofernes), so that she can hack off his head.

Why? Because she honestly believes that this is the will of God.

Hmm, maybe also a woman of contradiction.

This pattern of God being merciful to someone, only for them to become all arrogant about it, is a fairly common dance in the Old Testament. So much so that the misconception even appears to have spread to some of those who wrote the events down, simply because so many of them omit to draw attention to their subjects' pride.

The one-shot Obadiah would be one of the exceptions, and puts much of the rest of the Bible-Wars into some perspective. (since you ask, Obadiah is one chapter long and readable here)

I guess that Judith's cliffhangery (and therefore unusually readable) odyssey leaves me with two overriding thoughts:

1. Exactly how did she get the idea that God wanted her to treat her enemies in such an unChrist-like manner?

2. If her assassinous intention was in fact born of her own free will, which she misattributed to God, then coupled with Holofernes' plans to kill her people, a conflict between the two was unavoidable.

If God was allowing these two enemies the freedom to make their own decisions, while also remaining in authority over them both, then I reckon that God had to choose which of them he would let succeed, even though he ideally wanted neither of them to. That's the only way that I can think of to balance these three forces of will.

After all, the consequences of allowing Judith to kill Holofernes only appear to have been partially positive.

On the one hand it had such a good effect on God's people that they wrote it down, and many of them have been studying it to learn from it for thousands of years.

On the other, many of God's people seem to have learnt nothing from it.

You’ve done all this by yourself. You’ve done good things for Israel, and God is pleased with what you’ve done. May you be praised in the presence of the Almighty Lord forever!” And all the people said, “Amen!”

- Judith 15:10 (God's Word)

Judith even has a song attributed to her about how wonderful it all is.

However, if God had instead allowed Holofernes to kill Judith, then that outcome would probably have been even less positive. The enemy army were already under orders to worship King Nebuchadnezzar as God.

How much more arrogant would they have become after winning?

Today's celebrity Apocrypha Reader is... Gloria Gaynor

My weak people were afraid;
They were terrified.

- Judith 16:11b (God's Word)

You've Been Spammed

Spam.

We all receive it. Most of us delete it. Just occasionally we even dare to actually read it.

Junk emails are called spam because, like the repetitive lyric in the famous Monty Python song, there seems to be a heck of a lot of it.

I can't help wondering if a better reason for the name might be how hard spam is to get open.

Spam that goes to my Hotmail is usually filtered into my junk folder. In the event that I even go to that folder, if I do attempt to open a message, Hotmail gives me a blank screen along with a warning that the contents have been withheld from me for my safety. When I override that, it still withholds all the links and other active content. Only when I override that can I finally fully open it.

Well, you know how tricky it can be to get into a tin of cooked meat as well.

Spammers also know from the outset how tough it can be just to get their victims to make that very first click towards opening their grammatically creative epistles. In recent years, they have gone to a considerable amount of trouble to try to make that opening subject-line as enticing as possible.

Here are just a few that I have received:

"Get in touch with me Urgently...Goble"

"Horse gets swallowed by snake"

"Boy pokes fork into sister's eye"

"Anne Hathaway dairies seized by FBI"

"And I hate your son"

"You're a moron"

Today however I think I received the all-time winner. Let me reassure all the spammers who entered that all your submissions were of an extremely high standard* (* excluding spelling**) (**etc.), and the other judges and I really wished that we could have given everyone a prize. However then we remembered how you all say you have millions of spare dollars sitting around just doing nothing, and, well, that makes you a bit hard to buy for.

Anyway, without further ado, here is my all-time top spam-title, along with the incredible entry that accompanied it...

Attention:Dear Scamm victim.

My name is Mrs.Rose Charles the inspcetor general of police Ouagodougou Burkina Faso,This is to inform you that the government of this country Burkina Faso in conjucture with United Nation are rewarding you the sum of $1.5m Dollars as one of the scamm victim.

We where able to get your email through those that extort money from you when the police got them arrested ,Then one of them gave us your email address,below is the picture of the arrested scamer when police get him arrested

The president of this country His Excency Mr.Blaise Compaoré,has sent aside sum of $1.5m to send to you through Bank To Bank Wire Transfer,So contact Mr. Brawn White ECO BANK PLC WEST AFRICA Manager now for immediate transfer of your fund to your account .

Contact him with your full informtion, Bear it in mind that I Mrs.Rose Ahmed the inspcetor general of police Ouagadougou Burkina Faso has signed that the only money you will pay to the ECO Bank is $550 which is for wire transfer processing fee.

Try to contact bank through this information.

THE MANAGER NAME IS MR.BRAWN WHITE/ ECO BANK PLC MANAGER EMAIL== cbank8367@gmail.com
This is information the Bank Manager need from you.
YOUR COUNTRY............
YOUR FULL NAME........
ACCOUNT NUMBER............
ROUTING NUMBER........
SWIFT CODE IF POSSIBLE.....
NAME OF YOUR BANK................
SCAN COPY OF ID..................
OCCUPATION...........
HOME ADDRESS.....
MOBIL PHONE NUMBER.....
OFFICE NUMBER.........
HOME NUMBER............
AGE....
SEX....
Best regard

Mrs.Rose Ahmed
Inspector General Of Police Ouagadougou Burkina Faso
Below is some example picture of the arristed scammers

A Family Christmas In Southfields

Enjoyed a very beautiful evening at Southfields Baptist Church in the company of Austrian conductor Achim Holub, as he led a small group of musicians and singers through a seasonal show of Christmassy chorales.

Usually I'm one of the first to protest when a church building has a lot of echo (because a sermon can get lost in it), but the harmonies I heard tonight had my opinions seriously back-pedalling. Of course. Churches. Music. They're echoey for the music.

When the first soloist stood up and opened his mouth, he positively thundered. It was awesome.

Song after song followed, each so intricately detailed that, rather than let it wash over me, I found that I was listening very intently. Not so much to the lyrics, but rather to the beauty of it all.

During some pieces I could have sworn that my ears were perceiving many more people than I could see, so for a few numbers I found it helpful to close my eyes.

Another duet featured a ghostly delayed echo from high above and behind us, thanks to the strategic position of the second singer.

At another moment everything got loud. Really loud. Usually such a volume would make me wince, but these sounds were so graceful that I was instead embracing them all.

A really special evening, all the more so given how little I usually 'get' music.

Visit Music To Share's website here.

The Thing #11-19 / Fantastic Four #274 / Questprobe #3 Featuring The Human Torch And The Thing / The Thing #20-22: Rocky Grimm, Space Ranger

Plot / Scripter / Writing: John Byrne (TT#11-13, 19-22, FF#274), Mike Carlin (TT#14-17), Bob Harras (TT#18), David Michelinie (Q#3)
Artists: Ron Wilson (TT#11-22, Q#3), Joe Sinnott (TT#11-18, 21-22), Andy Mushynsky (TT#14), Bulanadi (TT#16), Mike Gustovich (TT#19-20), John Byrne (FF#274), Al Gordon (FF#274)

At the end of the 12-issue Marvel Super Heroes Secret Wars, the Thing remained behind on Battleworld to embark upon his own private 14-issue Secret War.

That rather makes it sound as though the second story is a sequel to the first. Well, it is, however it's worth noting that the two were produced and published concurrently over an entire year.

As a result, the first part of the Thing's saga doesn't follow-on entirely smoothly after the final part of Secret Wars, apparently having been written many months ahead of it.

For example, at the close of the Secret Wars, there was a wish-fulfilment fall-out from the Beyonder's power, enabling most of the characters' desires to come true. At the start of Rocky Grimm, Space Ranger however, it takes our hero several issues to recall this and draw a few conclusions.

Maybe author John Byrne didn't want to give away how Secret Wars was going to ultimately finish, or maybe he just didn't know yet. Certainly, Secret Wars scripter Jim Shooter had the luxury to foreshadow the events of this chronologically later story.

Either way, the Thing's chief motivation in staying behind on Battleworld is because, for some unknown reason, he can change back-and-forth into his human body here, an ability he doesn't possess back on Earth. Hence he's keen to spend as much of these few weeks as possible in his human form, in case he never gets the chance again.

Well, a comicbook entitled The Thing can hardly allow him to maintain that guise for very long. Certainly not for 22 pages in a row.

As Ben explores the brilliantly diverse patchwork planet with his new friend Tarianna, again and again he finds himself forced into situations where he just has to transform back into old rock face, often to save local civilians.

Now, the Thing has never been the brightest member of the Fantastic Four, but even he can see that his environment is not adding up.

The sky in this part of space should still be empty after the Beyonder destroyed it, yet it's full of stars and planets. Some of these new civilisations paradoxically have histories too. Some of them are eerily similar to his own life back on Earth.

When the two-part crossover Monster Mash finds him battling a series of famous horror movie characters, complete with lines of dialogue quoted from the genre ("... room for one, inside, Sir"!) the source of the planet's ever-shifting trippy environment is unavoidable.

The whole world is being trawled from the Thing's own subconscious, apparently by a sinister cloaked figure who he keeps on glimpsing.

In the middle of all this there's also a crossover to issue #3 of Questprobe. Although billed as taking place after Thing #17, I tentatively vote that it makes more sense straight after Fantastic Four #274, as Johnny appears to be reminiscing about the soon-to-be-vacated Baxter Building. Throughout his guest-appearance, our rocky hero remains in his Thing identity, for reasons unexplained. Like Spider-Man in Questprobe #2, he also mistakes the cloaked Chief Examiner for one of his villains. All right, I've digressed enough.

The Questprobe crossover out of the way, the villain who is actually in control of Battleworld is another aspect of the Thing's subconscious become real.

In other words, this version of his human side - in the form of Ben Grimm - is a part of himself, but one determined not to cease to exist when the Thing eventually leaves the planet. Evil Ben's plan of self-preservation is to kill the real Thing and then take-over his life. I guess that's just a part of the Thing's own free will playing-out. It's a crazy way to commit suicide.

The final issue sees the Thing's friend Tarianna (she never quite becomes his girlfriend) killing his evil Ben nemesis, effectively making it impossible for the Thing to ever assume his human form again.

The Thing can hardly blame her. She was an expression of his own subconscious like everything else in these 13½ issues, so effectively, he did it.

After this run had ended, the Thing did indeed return to Earth, and found himself pining for the also deceased Tarianna, realising that she was his dream-girl. The fact that his actual long-term girlfriend had also ditched him for one of his mates during his month on Battleworld obviously made life alot worse. There's other stuff he goes through too, but to go into even more of the Thing's woes here seems like overkill.

No wonder he wanted to execute the Beyonder in Thing #30.

In summary: Outstanding story, wonderful artwork.