Howard the Duck (1976) #29

Howard the Duck 29

Gerber writes the script from a Mark Evanier plot.

It starts with Howard in Cleveland again, though it doesn’t look like Howard. Will Meugniot and Ricardo Villamonte’s art is strange; Howard’s reality is gone. It’s a comic strip. Meugniot’s got fine enough composition, but zero detail.

The story doesn’t have much Cleveland–Howard almost immediately ends up in Las Vegas where he’s going on television because some idiot Vegas lounge act thinks Howard’s a kid with a strange disease. You know, a disease where he looks like a duck.

How did this one not get turned into the movie? Maybe it did. I don’t think I’ve ever finished the movie.

Anyway… it’s not exactly bad. The art’s not good. Gerber’s dialogue is funny but detached. And the satire is pretty tepid. There’s no great diatribes, no passion, just easy targets.

It feels like a pitch for a TV show.

Howard the Duck 29 (January 1979)

Howard the Duck #29 Gerber writes the script from a Mark Evanier plot.

How did this one not get turned into the movie? Maybe it did. I don’t think I’ve ever finished the movie.

Anyway… it’s not exactly bad. The art’s not good. Gerber’s dialogue is funny but detached. And the satire is pretty tepid. There’s no great diatribes, no passion, just easy targets.

It feels like a pitch for a TV show.

CREDITS

Help Stamp Out Ducks!; writers, Mark Evanier and Steve Gerber; penciller, Will Meugniot; inker, Ricardo Villamonte; colorist, Michele Wolfman; letterer, Joe Rosen; publisher, Marvel Comics.

Groo vs. Conan 2 (August 2014)

Groo vs. Conan #2 So Groo vs. Conan is already an imaginary story wrapped in the adventures of Sergio Aragonés as he runs around with (presumably) temporary dementia. But then he and co-writer Evanier feel the need to wrap another imaginary element around the finish. The last few pages, where Groo and Conan fight, are all in the imagination of one of the townspeople.

The mix of art, with Yeates’s Conan often in front of Aragonés Groo backgrounds, is mildly successful. Each artist does fine on their own, but the combination is distracting. It isn’t supposed to look real and it doesn’t… it also doesn’t come off as the most imaginative way to fuse the two styles.

The best stuff in the comic is Sergio’s adventures running around half naked as he tries to escape Evanier and his doctors.

Aragonés and Evanier don’t seem to know how to best exploit the series’s gimmick.

B-

CREDITS

Writers, Sergio Aragonés and Mark Evanier; artists, Aragonés and Thomas Yeates; colorist, Lovern Kindzierski; letterer, Richard Starkings; editors, Dave Land, Katie Moody and Patrick Thorpe; publisher, Dark Horse Comics.

Groo vs. Conan 1 (July 2014)

Groo vs. Conan #1 Groo vs. Conan. Even the title takes a moment to digest.

Sergio Aragonés and Mark Evanier fully embrace the absurdity of it, including the middle part of the comic–the majority of the comic, in terms of pages–being the two men walking around talking about doing such a crossover and how crazy it would be.

So why do it? Well, in the comic, Aragonés gets bumped on the head and thinks it’s a great idea.

As for the actual Conan and Groo scenes, the issue is mostly setup. Groo gets confused about who he’s supposed to battle and why and his concerned potential victims head to find Conan to save them. Tom Yeates draws the Conan pages. He does a fantastic job. Aragonés does fine with the Groo stuff and the “real world” stuff, but Yeates doing fantasy is treat as always.

The issue’s amusing without being particularly successful.

B-

CREDITS

Writers, Sergio Aragonés and Mark Evanier; artists, Aragonés and Thomas Yeates; colorist, Tom Luth; letterer, Richard Starkings; editors, Dave Land, Katie Moody and Patrick Thorpe; publisher, Dark Horse Comics.

Rocky and Bullwinkle (2014) #4

Rocky and bullwinkle 4

Once again, Evanier seems to be running out of ideas–at least for what to do with his titular characters. Even the Dudley Do-Right story has Dudley reduced to a brief walk on appearance. Though the whole horse thing is back, which is awkwardly hilarious.

But for the feature, it’s Rocky and Bullwinkle against Boris and Natasha–this time it’s a hamburger war. Evanier spends forever setting up the scheme from the villains and then has to quickly wrap it up in the second half of the story without Rocky or Bullwinkle getting much to do.

I apologize for that lengthy sentence.

There’s nothing particularly great about the story or even the art. Langridge does a fine job and gets to do some variety, but there’s not a lot of enthusiasm. Or anything to get particularly enthusiastic about. Hamburgers aren’t visually exciting, no matter what.

It’s a decent finish.

Rocky and Bullwinkle (2014) #3

Rb3

What a splendid comic. I’m not sure of any other word for it. Between the two parts of the feature story, involving Rocky and Bullwinkle having to go to the moon to stop Pottsylvania from claiming it (and taxing anyone looking at it or talking about it or saying it–oops, looks like I owe), and the Dudley Do-Right story, Evanier and Langridge hit a home run.

The only questionable joke–in a comic with NASA jokes, no less–is when they get to the moon and there’s a one liner about moon restaurants having no atmosphere. It’s one of the first moon jokes and it seems like Evanier’s going to go the easy route. Instead, it’s a one off and it works because of it.

Great plot twists too. Not just in the feature but in Dudley Do-Right too.

Also–nice June Foray reference.

Moon-rockin’ stuff.

Rocky and Bullwinkle 3 (May 2014)

Rocky and Bullwinkle #3 What a splendid comic. I’m not sure of any other word for it. Between the two parts of the feature story, involving Rocky and Bullwinkle having to go to the moon to stop Pottsylvania from claiming it (and taxing anyone looking at it or talking about it or saying it–oops, looks like I owe), and the Dudley Do-Right story, Evanier and Langridge hit a home run.

Great plot twists too. Not just in the feature but in Dudley Do-Right too.

Also–nice June Foray reference.

Moon-rockin’ stuff.

CREDITS

Writer, Mark Evanier; artist and letterer, Roger Langridge; colorist, Jeremy Colwell; editor, Sarah Gaydos; publisher, IDW Publishing.

Rocky and Bullwinkle (2014) #2

Rocky and Bullwinkle Rocky Bullwinkle 2

Something is amiss in Frostbite Falls.

Evanier keeps his structure from the first issue–first part of Rocky and Bullwinkle, Dudley Do-Right, then the second part of Rocky. Only this time, the first part of the feature is weak. It feels tired, down to all the references to post-smartphone soullessness. Rocky and Bullwinkle come across a magician who can’t get a job anymore and, dang, if it’s not all apps and CGI’s fault.

The cliffhanger’s too deliberate and then the Dudley Do-Right tries too hard for a single laugh. It gets two but the first is mostly because of goodwill. By the end, the goodwill’s gone.

Then the second half of the feature is even worse than the first. Evanier reduces Rocky to an almost dialogue-free part in the feature and the narration is terrible.

Langridge doesn’t bother mustering much enthusiasm.

It’s a pedestrian licensed comic, which the first issue wasn’t.

Rocky and Bullwinkle 2 (April 2014)

Rocky and Bullwinkle #2 Something is amiss in Frostbite Falls.

The cliffhanger’s too deliberate and then the Dudley Do-Right tries too hard for a single laugh. It gets two but the first is mostly because of goodwill. By the end, the goodwill’s gone.

Then the second half of the feature is even worse than the first. Evanier reduces Rocky to an almost dialogue-free part in the feature and the narration is terrible.

Langridge doesn’t bother mustering much enthusiasm.

It’s a pedestrian licensed comic, which the first issue wasn’t.

CREDITS

Writer, Mark Evanier; artist and letterer, Roger Langridge; colorist, Jeremy Colwell; editor, Sarah Gaydos; publisher, IDW Publishing.

Rocky and Bullwinkle (2014) #1

Rocky and Bullwinkle Rocky Bullwinkle 1

I can’t decide if Rocky & Bullwinkle should or shouldn’t work as a comic book. Conceptually, I mean. I suppose I should mention it does work–and very well. Writer Mark Evanier and artist Roger Langridge adapt the source material’s sensibilities for the comics medium, which is exactly the way to go about adapting a property from another medium… yet so few ever do it.

The all-knowing narrator works well in exposition boxes; Evanier ups it with Bullwinkle becoming psychic. His predictions interact both with the narrative and how Langridge illustrates that narrative. Very cool stuff.

As for Langridge, I notice he’s working in a lot of simple, but intricate background activity. He’s keeping the reader’s eyes consuming even when the principals aren’t doing a lot.

And then there’s the Dudley Do-Right intermediate story. Evanier sets it up as a series of really funny, somewhat inappropriate jokes.

It’s an excellent comic.