You thought it was over, didn’t ya? You thought I was all done showing off all of the horrible comicbooks I did before I had two hairs on my nuts. Not so, True Disbeliever!
When I was nine, ten, eleven years old… clearly, I had plenty of energy to spare. And, apparently, plenty of spiral notebooks. So here we go again. Only this time, I really have no clear memory of why I did these particular “kid comix”, other than out of an ever-deepening love for the medium and the characters. I guess that’s enough of a reason…
The issue number I put on this cover baffles me. Why did I pick #203? And naming the story “The Return of Ultron” would suggest that I had no idea that Ultron would be involved in the prior two issues of the actual Avengers series. So that might place this issue’s conception before I “crafted” my version of issue #202 (proudly shared with the masses in a pair of previous newsletters).
And of course, if my life depended on it, I couldn’t begin to tell you what the “secret” of Ms. Marvel’s baby actually was in this instance. But that would also place this before I’d ever read AVENGERS #200 (in which the actual secret of her “baby” was revealed).
I think I’m just going to present the existing pages with no Commentatus Interruptus on my part, and I’ll just see you on the other side. God help us all…
Hooboy. Okay, then…
Given the issue number I picked (203) and what was actually going on in the Avengers series at that time, I guess I must’ve had Ultron on the brain, as well as Jim Shooter’s prose novella, “This Evil Undying”, because it seems to me that this aborted tale is just a skewed version of that story, taking certain elements and performing a little remix. To go even deeper, I detect more than a slight AVENGERS #153 influence, as well, where the team fought an aging speedster -- the Whizzer -- within the confined hallways of Avengers Mansion (a sequence masterfully staged by John Buscema).
Moving on, here’s another attempt at an Avengers comicbook that directly recalls one of my favorite periods of the team… albeit one that I wasn’t actually alive for when it was first published… that being the classic Roy Thomas/John Buscema run from the 1960’s, especially the issues that featured a seemingly anemic lineup consisting of Goliath, Wasp, Hawkeye and the Black Panther.
My version doesn’t even try to fit in with the actual series, as evidenced by the #1 on the cover. I even attempted to replicate the original Avengers logo from the first ninety-something issues…
Interesting to think that I did end up officially revisiting this era of the Avengers in the second EARTH’S MIGHTIEST HEROES series I wrote back in 2006. And my personal affection for the featured villain -- the Living Laser -- was also able to find expression in IRON MAN: THE INEVITABLE, a series that I conceived and wrote in 2005 (with fantastic Frazer Irving artwork).
Once again, let’s just roll on with this bizarre artifact and I’ll muse on it afterwards…
Uh-huh…
… y’know, seeing this now does kinda freak me out a little. Again, knowing how deep a dive I did on the Hank Pym/Goliath character in EMH2, where we depicted him as constantly grappling with his own fragile psyche in a way I’d always wanted to see. And, clearly, I was interested in it even when I was a kid. The subtext of the captions on Page One -- “The man called Goliath sits… thinking. About Jan, the Avengers, the lab, his life, and such.” -- are certainly not lost on me now.
I’m not at all impressed with my story sense on this one, either. It’s yet another “bad guy attacks the good guys’ headquarters” story, although I’ll give my young self a tiny bit of credit for the flashback placement of the tale I was telling… even though I was probably just making it all up as I went along and, at some point, suddenly realized I need to cram in certain information after I’d already gotten a couple of pages in. Hey, it’s how you learn, right…?
I don’t know where I came up with the idea that the Living Laser was in love with the Wasp, especially since I must’ve known even then that it was the villain known as the Whirlwind who actually started out having the crush on the Wasp. Maybe I just liked the Living Laser’s costume better and simply grafted Whirlwind’s motivation onto him. Or maybe I was planning some twist that I never got around to. Yeah, that sounds better…
Good times, all around. And, yeah, there’s still more coming. But I think I’m gonna parse it out a bit going forward. Y’know, make it last.
And speaking of Avengers, be here for the next newsletter, where I jump forward about twenty-three years…
Joe Casey
USA
I respect the ambition shown in the work.
IIRC, the Laser’s debut revolved around his lust for Jan.