Whenever possible, I like to try new books by reading the first trade or several issues, enough to get a good feel for the story. That doesn't apply to everything, of course; if they launched a new Aquaman book or Nightwing book or Titans book, odds are I'm there from the first issue, and sold on each subsequent issue unless they are just awful, and maybe even then. But any new concept for which I have no prior knowledge, I try to be fair and give the book a solid chance to grab me.
I wasn't always so generous with my time and money.
I've mentioned in passing before that I've always liked the old Turok, Son of Stone series by Dell/Gold Key. At my youngest, it was likely mostly the dinosaurs which drew my attention. As I've gotten older, I've come to appreciate many things from different American Indian cultures, so there's the appeal of two competent Native American leads, as well. While I haven't gotten around to reading them yet, I was excited by the prospect and quickly snatched up the first three Turok Archives published by Dark Horse Comics in the last few years. The only reason I haven't yet bought Archive editions 4, 5 and 6, also available, is the cost. But I'll likely get them eventually.
Turok's adventures did not end with the publication of Turok, Son of Stone No. 130, the final issue of the series, however. In the 1990s, Jim Shooter's Valiant Comics bought the licenses to several of the original Dell/Gold Key characters and began publishing new adventures for them, including Turok, Dinosaur Hunter. This series debuted in 1993, well after I discovered my first comics specialty shop, and so I knew of its pending debut ahead of time, and had my copy of the first issue reserved. And when it arrived and I sat down to enjoy it, I was quite underwhelmed. In fact, I was VERY confused.
Turok, Dinosaur Hunter, No. 1 was obviously NOT the next comic to feature the character following Turok, Son of Stone, No. 130. Much of the first issue of this new series was Turok recalling, in flashback, a series of events that made little sense to me at the time. To make matters worse, the end result was Turok being dropped into modern times for this new series, along with a bunch of mechanically enhanced bionic-dinosaurs. That most definitely was not what I had signed on for, and I didn't pick up another issue of the series.
Until recently, of course.
Otherwise, what's the point of this post, right?
Well, thanks once again to the comics-themed podcasts I've been listening to, my interest in the Valiant series was rekindled, and I decided to give them a try when the opportunity presented itself. Since Valiant went out of business after just a few short years, I don't think any of the Turok issues were ever collected into trade format. But I came across a small lot of early Valiant Turok issues on eBay recently. The lot wasn't a consecutive run, but the price was right, so that I opted to overlook the missing parts and look at these issues as a sampling. Included in the deal were issue Nos. 1, 3, 4, 6 and 7.
I re-read the first issue and was quickly reminded of what must surely have turned me off the first time around. David Michelinie was the writer for the book, and he usually does a fair job. Bob Layton was the book's editor, and he, too, has done many books I've liked. But I still wasn't a fan of the bionic dinosaurs, and the page after page of recap was still a little hard to follow. To make matters worse, none of the recap events have editor's boxes or reference of any kind to let someone new know where to find more on the information provided. If you are a regular follower of a book or character, references to what issues or titles contained past events can be a drag sometimes. But not everyone IS a devoted follower of every character they pick up.
One advantage the subsequent years have brought me in dealing with this first issue of Turok, Dinosaur Hunter, is that I now recognize some of the other characters in Turok's flashback sequences when I didn't back in 1993. They are other Valiant characters, so I deduced that maybe this was some big company-wide crossover, likely a title I knew nothing about beyond the fact that it WAS a Valiant company-wide crossover title. That book was called Unity. So, I'm guessing that reading that book MIGHT give me more insight into how Turok went from the Lost Valley of the Dell/Gold Key books to modern times. If any of you kiddie cops reading this can help me track down what came between, I'm definitely interested in your input.
But continuing on with the rest of my purchase, it began to seem that many of the elements I despised most about this new book quickly went away. I didn't have No. 2, but No. 3 seemed to wrap up that first story arc, and indicate that maybe the bionic dinosaurs would go away with the end of that arc. And sure enough, issue No. 4 brought a new writer, Tim Truman, and nary a trace of bionics anywhere. There were dinosaurs, yes, but normal ones. The government assigns a scientist "handler" to follow Turok, and he goes on missions to investigate possible dinosaur sightings, some of the huge lizards having made the journey from the Lost Valley the same way Turok did. Turok even finds Andar, although his former youthful companion is now much older, having arrived back in the real world much earlier than Turok did. Turok agrees to teach "the old ways" to Andar's grandson, also named Andar, and the character almost seems to have come full circle.
After this new try-out buy, I am ready to dip my feet into more of Valiant's run of Turok, so I'll be looking for additional back issues of this series. I'll let you know, if I find any, what I think in future posts. And again, if anyone out there has info on other Turok appearances, please let me know. Until next time, Happy Collecting!!
Showing posts with label Turok. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Turok. Show all posts
Thursday, May 20, 2010
Thursday, March 04, 2010
To Boldly Go ... Somewhere
Gold Key Star Trek collections 2 -- These are just fun collections!
I remember seeing some of these comics when I was younger, but for whatever reason never actually read one. I can't imagine why I wouldn't have tried, were it possible for me to, as I've always been a fan of TOS. (That's The Original Series for any non-Trekkies reading.) Maybe the books I saw were always in places where they weren't actually for sale.
Whatever the reason, I was always curious about them. As I got older and started collecting comics, Gold Key issues were rare and often expensive when copies could be found.
For those who don't know, Gold Key/Dell included some great original comic titles like Turok, Son of Stone, but the publishing company was best known for its licensed characters based off of popular television properties. Many of the early creators who worked on these books were foreigners, however, often painfully unfamiliar with the television shows the comics were supposed to be based on.
American fans of Star Trek's initial three-year run were likely puzzled by these books about a Starship Enterprise that had fire and exhaust shooting out the back end of its warp nacelles and shuttlecraft bay and that could physically land on planets the crew encountered. Inside the Enterprise, Capt. James T. Kirk and Dr. Leonard "Bones" McCoy didn't always act exactly "in character," but much worse were the blond-haired engineer Mr. Scott and the often excitable Mr. Spock whose pointed Vulcan ears seemed to have grown to twice — or even three times — their normal size.
Hearing stories about these strange characterizations made me leery of spending too much money on something I might not really care for, but my curiosity for these books remained. Several years ago, Checker Book Publishing collected these stories in some nice trade paperback collections. The nice collected price prompted me to finally decide to give these stories a try, and I'm glad I did.
Many of the early stories, while not quite featuring the starship crew I was familiar with, still were quite engaging and creative. In addition, the learning curve of the creators was faster than one might have expected. Changes began to be made to add other familiar characters like Uhura and Sulu, and Mrs. Spock and Scott slowly began to morph closer to their on-screen portrayals. Also, the popularity of both the show and this comic book series led to American creators more familiar with the franchise being hired to write the stories.
Even by the end of this second collection, these stories seem to be about some parallel dimension or alternate universe version of the familiar characters, but let's face it —- parallel dimensions and alternate universes are not so much of a stretch for anyone who's been reading comics or science fiction for any length of time. And the quality of these stories makes them well worth the cost of these nice trades. Beam aboard; you'll be glad you did.
I remember seeing some of these comics when I was younger, but for whatever reason never actually read one. I can't imagine why I wouldn't have tried, were it possible for me to, as I've always been a fan of TOS. (That's The Original Series for any non-Trekkies reading.) Maybe the books I saw were always in places where they weren't actually for sale.
Whatever the reason, I was always curious about them. As I got older and started collecting comics, Gold Key issues were rare and often expensive when copies could be found.
For those who don't know, Gold Key/Dell included some great original comic titles like Turok, Son of Stone, but the publishing company was best known for its licensed characters based off of popular television properties. Many of the early creators who worked on these books were foreigners, however, often painfully unfamiliar with the television shows the comics were supposed to be based on.
American fans of Star Trek's initial three-year run were likely puzzled by these books about a Starship Enterprise that had fire and exhaust shooting out the back end of its warp nacelles and shuttlecraft bay and that could physically land on planets the crew encountered. Inside the Enterprise, Capt. James T. Kirk and Dr. Leonard "Bones" McCoy didn't always act exactly "in character," but much worse were the blond-haired engineer Mr. Scott and the often excitable Mr. Spock whose pointed Vulcan ears seemed to have grown to twice — or even three times — their normal size.
Hearing stories about these strange characterizations made me leery of spending too much money on something I might not really care for, but my curiosity for these books remained. Several years ago, Checker Book Publishing collected these stories in some nice trade paperback collections. The nice collected price prompted me to finally decide to give these stories a try, and I'm glad I did.
Many of the early stories, while not quite featuring the starship crew I was familiar with, still were quite engaging and creative. In addition, the learning curve of the creators was faster than one might have expected. Changes began to be made to add other familiar characters like Uhura and Sulu, and Mrs. Spock and Scott slowly began to morph closer to their on-screen portrayals. Also, the popularity of both the show and this comic book series led to American creators more familiar with the franchise being hired to write the stories.
Even by the end of this second collection, these stories seem to be about some parallel dimension or alternate universe version of the familiar characters, but let's face it —- parallel dimensions and alternate universes are not so much of a stretch for anyone who's been reading comics or science fiction for any length of time. And the quality of these stories makes them well worth the cost of these nice trades. Beam aboard; you'll be glad you did.
Sunday, October 29, 2006
Make Mine Marvel ... Once In A While
Most of the people I know in and around this part of Oklahoma and Arkansas seem to have grown up with Marvel Comics and much prefer that stable of heroes out of the Big Two comics publishers. A lot of that affinity seems to stem from the time those folks got interested in comics and a number of Marvel characters on television when they were young. I suppose my preferences come from much the same sources, but took the opposite turn.
Somehow, I managed to miss the first, somewhat crude by today’s standards, launch of Marvel superhero cartoons in the late 1960s and early 1970s. But I did watch the Batman and Wonder Woman and Superman live-action shows when they were on in first-run or syndication. And I never missed the Superfriends among my Saturday-morning TV viewing. Sure, there was also the live-action Incredible Hulk and Spider-Man shows and Spider-man and His Amazing Friends later on. I’m not ignorant of the Marvel characters, but DC’s group was always the ones I knew and loved just a bit more.
That preference is reflected in my collection, especially during the mid-1980s when I discovered my first-ever Comics Specialty Shop. I had a number of single issues of DC Comics from the grocery store as a small child, things like Superman Family or Batman Family, maybe some World’s Finest and Justice League of America. Even an occasional issue of Spider-man, some based on his appearances on The Electric Company, that PBS series for kids too old for Sesame Street. Sadly, many of those silver-age comics are no longer in my possession because smaller children don’t always take care of things like their parents might wish they would. At this time, besides TV, my only other contact with the world of superheroes were some copies of Superman, Action and Adventure (staring the Legion of Super-Heroes) comics while awaiting my turn at the barber shop. Once in a while, they’d also have some Turok, Son of Stone, too. But it was rare that I owned or read any two issues in consecutive order of any title.
The yearning for that to change came about in the early 1980s when I discovered The New Teen Titans annual #2, a story I’ve related here before and won’t bore you with again. But the desire was not matched immediately with access. That wouldn’t come until a few years later when a friend of mine at school introduced me to that all-important comic shop. I was just in time to snatch up every new issue of DC’s Crisis on Infinite Earths. Of course, I also followed the Teen Titans titles at the time. I tried some other books which I no longer own like DC Challenge and a Rip Hunter, Time Master re-vamp. From Marvel, I tried some Spider-man and Captain America issues, but my favorite title from them was Squadron Supreme, an alternate version of DC’s Justice League. And forget other titles like Jon Sable or Warlord from the time; I knew nothing about them and didn’t try that much new back then. My passion for those titles is somewhat more recent (Thank God for back-issue sales, right?).
Anyway, this lengthy introduction is not meant to bash Marvel, but rather to explain why there aren’t that many Marvel titles in these retro-reviews posts. That just wasn’t my preference then, and while I really like some of their characters, Marvel is still second in my own personal rankings. So, there really aren’t going to be many Marvel titles this far back in my collection. In an effort to make some small amends for that, here are a few Marvel comics I DO have.
The Amazing Spider-Man: The Death of Jean DeWolff tpb (Marvel Comics, 1990) — This collection written by Peter David and illustrated by Rich Buckler was originally published as Peter Parker, the Spectacular Spider-man #107-110 from 1985-86. I’ve never seen or read any of the other stories featuring Jean DeWolff, but this story makes me think of her as an early precursor to Maggie Sawyer over at DC (there I go again, relating it all to DC). DeWolff is a police captain appearing in a number of previous issues of Spider titles apparently. She was created by Peter David according to the forward in this collection, and though she hadn’t been around long, she was gaining fans. This story, obviously, kills her off. Apparently, that caused some furor at the time because of DeWolff’s popularity. Further angering her shocked fans, she doesn’t die at the end of the story in heroic battle or sacrificing herself to save another like so many characters in comics. She dies off-panel at the very beginning of the story. And it takes not just Spidey, but also Daredevil, to help unearth the true identity of her killer, at first only known as the enigmatic Sin-Eater. The story is a compelling one even if you’re not familiar with DeWolff, and features some nods to classic Spider-man history.
The Thing 33-36 (Marvel Comics, 1986) — These are the last four issues of Thing’s solo series, and in all honesty, I was a little disappointed in them, mostly because there is no final resolution. Obviously, Ben continues to be a character in the Marvel Universe. I didn’t expect them to kill him off, or even necessarily reunite him with the Fantastic Four, but this tale just leaves the reader hanging unless you want to go buy other books.
When last we checked in with Ben Grimm, he was wrestling in the newly formed Unlimited Class Wrestling Federation, and was only beginning to wonder where all of the extremely powerful brawlers in the UCWF had been coming from. Before this, all of the other wrestlers shown have been male. Issue #33 shows readers that there is, in fact, a female division, and the champion female UCWF wrestler wants to challenge her male counterpart, Thing. Along the way, we learn that Sharon, the woman Ben is currently interested in, is interested in joining the female UCWF and we again hear the mysterious name, the Power Broker, the individual responsible for powering up many of the competitors. Ben is concerned about Sharon’s plans and tries to stop her. Further complicating things is the fact that Sharon does not share Ben’s feelings.
Ben vows to finally check out this Power Broker person, but is side-tracked in Issue #34 by the appearance of the Sphinx, a villain from Marvel Two-In-One, and the re-appearance of the Puppet Master. Ben manages to make peace with the latter and defeats the former, but along the way, the dizzy spells he has been suffering from grow worse. These spells were first introduced a few issues before.
Issue #35 has Sharon going to the Power Broker, now revealed to be Dr. Malus, a villain I’m not familiar with. He augments volunteers for a price, but then manipulates them into doing his bidding. Unless of course, the aumentation process fails. Those poor, mutated souls are locked away in a dungeon. Sharon is successfully augmented, despite a change of heart on her part, and becomes the all-new Ms. Marvel, or at least a version of the character that I don’t remember seeing anywhere else, so I’m assuming hers was short-lived. She also meets a new friend, Army Lt. Michael Lynch, whose rank changes a couple times in the story, and the two instantly have chemistry. That added to the fact that Sharon has already gone to the Power Broker angers Ben, who storms the Power Broker’s lair only to find it abandoned. First, all of the other augmented wrestlers are against Ben and Sharon. But then, they all join forces to hunt Malus down. That is, until Ben starts to change.
The final issue has Sharon take Ben to the hospital, but of course, normal physicians have no clue what to do for the Thing. Ben continues to mutate painfully, a condition reported on in the news and attracting the attention of She-Hulk, Ben’s replacement in the FF. Shulkie travels to California to see what is up only to clash with the new Ms. Marvel, who thinks Ben wouldn’t want to see She-Hulk. Ben, who doesn’t want to see anybody, breaks out of the hospital and disappears. The end. A teaser on the last page says to check out West Coast Avengers #10 for more. Don’t have that book. If anybody knows for sure what happens after this to Thing, feel free to let me know. Most of the illustrations of Ben in this issue are vague, but a few seem to show some points, so I’m thinking maybe this is how he adopts the pointed rocky appearance he had for a while, but it seems like that happened in the 90s. A hint on the letters page also says he will soon be joining a team but doesn’t reveal what team. I wonder if this is when he does, ultimately, rejoin the FF, but again, I don’t know for sure. Little help?
Somehow, I managed to miss the first, somewhat crude by today’s standards, launch of Marvel superhero cartoons in the late 1960s and early 1970s. But I did watch the Batman and Wonder Woman and Superman live-action shows when they were on in first-run or syndication. And I never missed the Superfriends among my Saturday-morning TV viewing. Sure, there was also the live-action Incredible Hulk and Spider-Man shows and Spider-man and His Amazing Friends later on. I’m not ignorant of the Marvel characters, but DC’s group was always the ones I knew and loved just a bit more.
That preference is reflected in my collection, especially during the mid-1980s when I discovered my first-ever Comics Specialty Shop. I had a number of single issues of DC Comics from the grocery store as a small child, things like Superman Family or Batman Family, maybe some World’s Finest and Justice League of America. Even an occasional issue of Spider-man, some based on his appearances on The Electric Company, that PBS series for kids too old for Sesame Street. Sadly, many of those silver-age comics are no longer in my possession because smaller children don’t always take care of things like their parents might wish they would. At this time, besides TV, my only other contact with the world of superheroes were some copies of Superman, Action and Adventure (staring the Legion of Super-Heroes) comics while awaiting my turn at the barber shop. Once in a while, they’d also have some Turok, Son of Stone, too. But it was rare that I owned or read any two issues in consecutive order of any title.
The yearning for that to change came about in the early 1980s when I discovered The New Teen Titans annual #2, a story I’ve related here before and won’t bore you with again. But the desire was not matched immediately with access. That wouldn’t come until a few years later when a friend of mine at school introduced me to that all-important comic shop. I was just in time to snatch up every new issue of DC’s Crisis on Infinite Earths. Of course, I also followed the Teen Titans titles at the time. I tried some other books which I no longer own like DC Challenge and a Rip Hunter, Time Master re-vamp. From Marvel, I tried some Spider-man and Captain America issues, but my favorite title from them was Squadron Supreme, an alternate version of DC’s Justice League. And forget other titles like Jon Sable or Warlord from the time; I knew nothing about them and didn’t try that much new back then. My passion for those titles is somewhat more recent (Thank God for back-issue sales, right?).
Anyway, this lengthy introduction is not meant to bash Marvel, but rather to explain why there aren’t that many Marvel titles in these retro-reviews posts. That just wasn’t my preference then, and while I really like some of their characters, Marvel is still second in my own personal rankings. So, there really aren’t going to be many Marvel titles this far back in my collection. In an effort to make some small amends for that, here are a few Marvel comics I DO have.
The Amazing Spider-Man: The Death of Jean DeWolff tpb (Marvel Comics, 1990) — This collection written by Peter David and illustrated by Rich Buckler was originally published as Peter Parker, the Spectacular Spider-man #107-110 from 1985-86. I’ve never seen or read any of the other stories featuring Jean DeWolff, but this story makes me think of her as an early precursor to Maggie Sawyer over at DC (there I go again, relating it all to DC). DeWolff is a police captain appearing in a number of previous issues of Spider titles apparently. She was created by Peter David according to the forward in this collection, and though she hadn’t been around long, she was gaining fans. This story, obviously, kills her off. Apparently, that caused some furor at the time because of DeWolff’s popularity. Further angering her shocked fans, she doesn’t die at the end of the story in heroic battle or sacrificing herself to save another like so many characters in comics. She dies off-panel at the very beginning of the story. And it takes not just Spidey, but also Daredevil, to help unearth the true identity of her killer, at first only known as the enigmatic Sin-Eater. The story is a compelling one even if you’re not familiar with DeWolff, and features some nods to classic Spider-man history.
The Thing 33-36 (Marvel Comics, 1986) — These are the last four issues of Thing’s solo series, and in all honesty, I was a little disappointed in them, mostly because there is no final resolution. Obviously, Ben continues to be a character in the Marvel Universe. I didn’t expect them to kill him off, or even necessarily reunite him with the Fantastic Four, but this tale just leaves the reader hanging unless you want to go buy other books.
When last we checked in with Ben Grimm, he was wrestling in the newly formed Unlimited Class Wrestling Federation, and was only beginning to wonder where all of the extremely powerful brawlers in the UCWF had been coming from. Before this, all of the other wrestlers shown have been male. Issue #33 shows readers that there is, in fact, a female division, and the champion female UCWF wrestler wants to challenge her male counterpart, Thing. Along the way, we learn that Sharon, the woman Ben is currently interested in, is interested in joining the female UCWF and we again hear the mysterious name, the Power Broker, the individual responsible for powering up many of the competitors. Ben is concerned about Sharon’s plans and tries to stop her. Further complicating things is the fact that Sharon does not share Ben’s feelings.
Ben vows to finally check out this Power Broker person, but is side-tracked in Issue #34 by the appearance of the Sphinx, a villain from Marvel Two-In-One, and the re-appearance of the Puppet Master. Ben manages to make peace with the latter and defeats the former, but along the way, the dizzy spells he has been suffering from grow worse. These spells were first introduced a few issues before.
Issue #35 has Sharon going to the Power Broker, now revealed to be Dr. Malus, a villain I’m not familiar with. He augments volunteers for a price, but then manipulates them into doing his bidding. Unless of course, the aumentation process fails. Those poor, mutated souls are locked away in a dungeon. Sharon is successfully augmented, despite a change of heart on her part, and becomes the all-new Ms. Marvel, or at least a version of the character that I don’t remember seeing anywhere else, so I’m assuming hers was short-lived. She also meets a new friend, Army Lt. Michael Lynch, whose rank changes a couple times in the story, and the two instantly have chemistry. That added to the fact that Sharon has already gone to the Power Broker angers Ben, who storms the Power Broker’s lair only to find it abandoned. First, all of the other augmented wrestlers are against Ben and Sharon. But then, they all join forces to hunt Malus down. That is, until Ben starts to change.
The final issue has Sharon take Ben to the hospital, but of course, normal physicians have no clue what to do for the Thing. Ben continues to mutate painfully, a condition reported on in the news and attracting the attention of She-Hulk, Ben’s replacement in the FF. Shulkie travels to California to see what is up only to clash with the new Ms. Marvel, who thinks Ben wouldn’t want to see She-Hulk. Ben, who doesn’t want to see anybody, breaks out of the hospital and disappears. The end. A teaser on the last page says to check out West Coast Avengers #10 for more. Don’t have that book. If anybody knows for sure what happens after this to Thing, feel free to let me know. Most of the illustrations of Ben in this issue are vague, but a few seem to show some points, so I’m thinking maybe this is how he adopts the pointed rocky appearance he had for a while, but it seems like that happened in the 90s. A hint on the letters page also says he will soon be joining a team but doesn’t reveal what team. I wonder if this is when he does, ultimately, rejoin the FF, but again, I don’t know for sure. Little help?
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