1969: the Best Year in Rock and Roll is also the Best Year for Comics

My hypothesis is that the best year for comics was also the best year for rock and roll: 1969.

How can you argue with the year that gave you Woodstock, the first 2 Led Zeppelin albums, Cream's final album, the Beatles' final album, Blind Faith's only album, 2 Creedence albums, The Who's "Tommy," Crosby Stills and Nash, Santana, the Stooges, the Band, Jefferson Airplane's "Volunteers", The Rolling Stone's "Let it Bleed," and for you Country fans Bob Dylan's "Nashville Skyline"

Plus, growing up in Queens you can't beat the year the Mets got "Amazin'" (And I'm not even much of a sports fan)







Now in order to prove my conjecture I started looking at the covers of comics in 1969 and I saw, Steranko Captain America, Neal Adams' X-men, Gene Colan's Daredevil and Avengers, and of course Herb Trimpe in the Incredible Hulk. (Not to mention Kirby's Thor and FF!) I saw the Thing sold as a Skull slave, Thor battling the Silver Surfer, And Spider-man's "Death Without Warning." and I haven't even mentioned Iron Man, Dr. Strange, the Sub-mariner, Nick Fury Agent of SHIELD, and Captain Marvel which were all running on all 8 cylinders too. Meanwhile at DC the Legion of Superheroes was better than ever with Jim Shooter at the helm.








Here are some great interior shots. They are all originally from 1969! Enjoy.

Captain America # 111 p 12-13 and below p. 10





Silver Surfer # 4 p10




X-Men 58 p3


X-Men 57 p13


X-Men 59 p19


X-men 63 p7



Avengers # 68 p11 and 19




Avengers # 65 p 1


Fantastic Four # 83 p 10



Fantastic Four # 87 p5 and 14





Fantastic Four # 89 p3 and 6






Fantastic Four #91 p 4



Fantastic Four #92 p17 panel 1



Fantastic Four #93 p 5

Thoughts on "Farnham's Freehold"

Originally posted Jan. 16, 2009

I just flew through the book at top speed and was excited to read
everyone's comments thus far because after I read some subjects lines
about twists and turns toward the end I stopping reading comments
about the book ahead of time.

Anyway SPOILERS below here:

Hopefully I am coherent, the heat in my apartment didn't come on today
and it's eight below outside so I'm pretty frazzled.

I see that a lot of people said they didn't like the book or didn't
like characters. Others said it was "hard to get through"

I didn't have this trouble at all. I liked some of the characters, I
liked Hugh, even though he was a very thinly veiled stand in for
Heinlein himself IMHO. He was intelligent and offer all a good guy, I thought who was always trying to do the best he could for his family. He cared about his son, stocked cloths and supplies for him in the shelter, even though they didn't really get along and he tried to help his wife, a women most men would have divorced. (myself included).

I liked Barbara too, except that I thought it odd how she fell madly in love with Hugh so quickly and their sex scene on my page 33, has to be one of the worst written passages ever.

Joe seemed like the most good-natured character of the bunch while this were in the wilderness. However, when they are assimilated into the future society he becomes evil. I got the feeling that this was about absolute power corrupting absolutely. Even a nice guy like Joe can turn if given too much power too quickly.

I could not stand Grace or Duke for the beginning. Grace was worthless and Duke was a momma's boy.

As I said before it was awfully strange that a woman in her 20s was so attracted to a man in his 50s but I accepted it A) because it was a survival situation and Hugh proved himself to be the best at surviving. B) I got the feeling that Heinlein was living out a sort of fantasy so of course every woman was crazy about the character he identified with. The incest line that was skirted in this story was uncomfortable to say the least, especially the bizarre conversation Karen had with Hugh about wanting to marry him. But at least that was all it was, talk. It skirted the line but didn't cross it. I think it can be interpreted as Karen saying that she would want to be Hugh's
wife. Not Karen saying she wanted to have sex with her father.

But enough about that there are much more interesting things to discuss.

Like Double Star, which I felt was two book ideas patched together, this book came off to me as several ideas together. There was the atomic bomb story in the beginning, the survivalist story in the middle, the story of a futuristic society in the middle eight, and I time travel story tagged on as an epilogue. In my opinion with the exception of the ending transition which I didn't think quite worked I though the storied transitioned effectively.

I didn't think it was odd that they were forced to go outside shortly after the bomb hit. This was explained, the bomb shelter was designed to keep them alive indefinitely but the fan that filtered air for outside broke so that they were forced to go outside of suffocate.

I found each of the different stories to be interesting in their own right. Never having been in a bomb shelter it was fascinating to think how they worked and what would have to go in them and what people would forget. Then the survivalist story was fun because though they all had modern knowledge they soon realized how incomplete that knowledge is because they never had to learn very basic things like how to properly gut an animal or how to farm. This knowledge is all well known, but society is so fragile because no one can know everything.

The futuristic society I found most interesting of all. Though they have superior technology it seems to not influence their everyday lives too much. Instead of enjoying a better life than people today, this future more closely resembles court life in Turkey or somewhere around the times of the crusades. And yet when you look at it from Ponse's side you do believe he has the best interest of his people in mind, until you learn that he is a cannibal. I looked at the society
with different eyes at that point and hoped that it could one day be brought down my the Underground. However, a culture as stagnant as the one portrayed ie, no original scientific discovers could not survive for long.

I did think it was interesting that like Moon is a Harsh Mistress and Stranger in a Strange Land this book explored alternate societies. What was it that made Heinlein so interested in that sort of thing?

The ending where they sent Hugh and Barbara back I felt was way out of character. I felt there was no way Ponse would let Hugh live after his escape attempt. Why did he send all 4 of them back in time. Surely he knew that if he gave Hugh exactly what he wanted, he would get nothing
in return. I think it would have been much more likely that Ponse would have sent Hugh back in time alone and claimed to be able to recall Hugh back to the future somehow if Hugh did exactly as instructed. He might even promise to let him and Barbara go after the experiment was a success. Then Hugh would have left the watch in place at the bank and Ponse would have proof of time travel and could have invaded history. Man is it a good thing none of that happened. And
also how do Ponses scientist come up with time travel when it was made clear that technology has become stagnant.

Well those are my thoughts. Still no heat here.

John

p.s. I forgot to mention that another thing that I liked was the Bridge theme going all through the book. Some of my friends and I love Bridge. We used to play when I was in college and now we all live far away from each other, but whenever we meet up in NYC or Baltimore we'll play for hours. I even play with one of my friends online about once a week to stay sharp. But I understand that if you don't know Bridge parts of the book might make less sense.

Does anyone know if Heinlein played?

Spectacular Spider-Man 1-16

Originally posted Dec. 13, 2008

Spectacular Spider-man. I've always thought of these as B-Sides compared to ASM. But PFJ inadvertently caused me to start reading my copy of Spectacular Spider-man Essentials Vol. 1. So here are my thoughts

The first issue features the Tarantula, it is sort of an unremarkable start. Tarantula and Kraven team up in issue two and it was kind of fun to see them bicker. And there is a new villain named Lightmaster in issue 3. I guessed who Lightmaster was from the start.

I thought Issue 4 was a great issue, maybe my favorite of this whole bunch. The villain is the Vulture. Issue 5 has the Vulture again but also a Punisherish character named the Hit man who I didn't think much of, but Issue 5's Cockrum's cover is great.
Issue 6 is a reprint of a Spidey and Torch team-up against Morbius story from MT-U 3. Which turns out to be a warm up for a new Morbius story in 7 and 8, where Morbius has been taken over by an Empathoid from another dimension or something. These two are okay. The art is great, the story is just kind of flat. How many times can a super villain just happen to capture one of Spidey's close friends? (this time Glory Grant) I do like that Spidey beats the Empathoid with quick thinking.

Considering I was reading an Essential, I love the irony of the cover of issue 9 which says brags that it's the first time the White Tiger has been seen in color!

Anyway the story in this one made very little sense to me. The President of the university is this racist guy that shuts down ESU's night school and the African American and Latino community protests. However, they come off as just as racist when Hector Ayala tells Peter Parker the protest isn't his concern because he's white. So all white people are rich and don't need night school?

Then they talk about the Erskine Manuscripts. The school got a bid for a million dollars to sell them. I guess someone thinks the secret to the super soldier formula is in them. Anyway the important part is that the manuscripts plural suddenly become one book when the White Tiger fights Peter Parker (he forgot to change to Spidey)and steals the lone volume.

Then the story becomes more convoluted at the end when it is revealed that an Ethics Studies professor impersonated the White Tiger and stole the volume. Then how did he trash Parker without Super-strength?

Issue 11 is by far the worst of this bunch. I expected much more from Chris Claremont considering his ggreat run on MT-U. This issue is all downhill after the trippy splash page. Spidey needs some kind of serum to help a man that saved Pete and Mary Jane from being hit by a Rand/Meachum truck outside of Central Park. How this guy's reaction time is better than Spider-man's who knows?

The serum is apparently very complicated so it was made somewhere else and was coming to the hospital in an ambulance. That makes sense until you find out the somewhere else was somewhere in the vicinity of Coney Island! Have you ever been to Coney Island? Not a scientific Mecca by any stretch of the imagination. Spidey goes to check on the ambulance just in case. Turns out the ambulance was attacked by Medusa. She stole the serum and Spidey and her fight in and around Coney Island. Spidey keeps pleading someone is going to die unless I have that serum. but Medusa doesn't seem to care. Finally Medusa reaches the rest of the Inhumans, it turns out they needed the serum to save the whole world by disarming an anti-matter warhead. But of course there turns out to be enough serum to save the guy in the hospital too.

One of those issues where if the characters just stopped fighting and talked, the issue would have been 3 pages long!

Issue 12-15 is a four part story featuring Flash Thompson. (who is so far the only real recurring supportive character for Spidey in these issues) The four parts are all good because the story keeps changing, first Spidey is fighting Brother Power and Sister Sun, then Razorback who turns out to be an ally, than it turns out the real villain is the Hate Monger. Then it turns out to actually be Man-Beast.


Issue 16 turns out to be a surprise gem by fill-in writer Elliot Maggin. The story concerns a risk taking cop Macone. the story shows that he is a true hero too, but it seems to come with a price as his wife is seen possibly leaving him at the end of the story because he continues to "take too many risks." The story is so good, you almost forget how lame a villain the Beetle is.

Spectacular Spider-man # 17-31

Originally posted Dec. 16, 2008

Like everyone promised me, I think PPSSM really started to find itself in these issues and I really enjoyed the majority of the stories.

One of the things I noticed is that in the beginning it seemed like PPSSM couldn't figure out if it was something new or a second Marvel Team-Up. For instance issue 17 and 18, which resolved the Champions storyline had absolutely nothing to do with ongoing storylines and come off as Angel team up issues.

The series gets back on track with issue 19 which is nostalgic because it features the Enforcers. There were so many great bits in this issue, like the new Ox saying "Take away your fancy costume and then what are you?" and Spidey quipping, "I don't know naked?"

At the end of the issue Lightmaster sees Hector Ayala coming out of the diner after the fight and assumes he's Spider-man. I was happy to see Lightmaster return. I was afraid he was a one shot villain. Issue 20 was great, Lightmaster captures Ayala and his identity as the White Tiger ends up revealed to the public. This was a twist I was very surprised by. It seems like Bill Mantlo used the White Tiger as a parallel to Spider-man. By seeing what happens to the White Tiger when his identity is revealed we kind of see what would happen if Spider-man's identity was revealed. I kept waiting for an old villain of the Tiger's to put one of Ayala's family in danger, but it didn't happen in this volume.

Issue 21 was a Scorpion stand alone story with fantastic art by Jim Mooney. I find it kind of sad that after more than 10 years of issues the Scorpion still hasn't told the world why he hates JJJ.

The next two issues are again reminiscent of a MT-U issue as both feature Moon Knight, before he had his own series.

Issue 24 is definitely the clunker of this bunch. Peter Parker goes to a disco and fights the Hypno-Hustler. I looked at the cover and knew it wasn't gonna be pretty. The guest art by Frank Springer was great. The first few pages where Peter nabs some muggers on the subway were amusing. It started making no sense when you meet the villain who has some sort of Hypno powers, but also has three back up singers with the same powers. Spidey beats him by making him listen to his own back up singers.

But fear not from here on out it's top notch issues.

Issue 25 starts the Carrion/Maggia saga. The reader is left to wonder who this new villain Carrion is, all we know is that he hates Spider-Man. Then the Maggia and their leader the Masked Marauder rob a bank and when Spider-man tries to stop them he gets blasted by a opti-blast, which makes him blind. This all leads to an awesome team up with Daredevil, where Spidey bitches and moans about being blind and worthless never suspecting that his pal Daredevil has been blind all along. I kept wishing that Daredevil would take Spidey down to meet Stick who could teach him to listen to his senses, but alas Stick had not yet been created. Issue 27 and 28 feature art by Frank Miller!

At the end of issue 28 we find that Carrion definitely knows Peter's secret identity and the reader is in great suspense as to how he knows.

Issues 29-30 feature a lot of action. Carrion is an excellent villain because he has interesting and different powers. He can kill with a touch but he is so insane that he endlessly toys with Spidey. The stakes of the battle are high since he knows Parker is Spider-man and could reveal it to the world at anytime. The only thing I didn't like about these issues is that Carrion constantly calls Spider-man Parker, but the White Tiger never seems to hear that even when they're in the same room. I guess he was too busy fighting Carrion's lackey, Darter.

Issue 31 ends the Carrion saga. The spider Amoeba thing he creates is just kind of odd. To me this issue wasn't as good as the build up.

Spectacular Spider-Man 32-42 and Annuals

Originally posted Feb. 19, 2009

Issue 32-34

Coming off the great Carrion storyline (despite a lackluster final issue) Bill Mantlo starts from the beginning again, in that he sets this series up with a whole new cast of supporting characters. This issue does a great job of setting that up, we see all the old characters Flash, Sha-Shan, Glory, Hector, etc. so at least they get a nice send off.

Once again the primary focus of the title is the ESU College. However, Peter Parker is starting graduate school and is now a Teacher’s assistant and so the new cast is the other TAs, the Grad secretary Debra Whitman and Grad professors Sloan and Curt Connors. (It’s about time he officially joined the supporting cast.) All of these characters help to give Spectacular a distinctive feel.

The first storyline is about the Iguana! The Iguana is a regular iguana until he gets zapped with Curt Connors’ “Enervartor.” (Reminds me of the Interocitor from “This Island Earth”) The Iguana turns into a man-lizard with a healthy dose of Connor’s memories and the Lizard’s hatred of mankind. The story really picks up when Iggy goes after Connor’s family and Connors decides that the only way to stop the Iguana is to become the Lizard again.

This seems reasonable as long as you don’t think about it too much. The more I thought about it, it’s just as likely the Lizard would say “I hate Spider-Man and I don’t like the Iguana, but I’ll go take over the world and kill whichever of them survives.” But instead the Lizard attacks the Iguana and Spidey goes to Connor’s lab and builds a backpack Enervartor that saves the day! Overall this is a solid arc and probably the best of this bunch.

Issue 35

The cover says off-beat that’s code for guest writer. The issue isn’t so bad, it concerns the Mindworm, who takes Spider-man through some kind of adventure in dreamland. In the end, Mindworm turns out to not be an evil guy, hooray!

Issue 36-37

This is a cool storyline. Prof. Sloan accidentally recreates the villain Swarm. It’s interesting because it’s one of the first times I remember in which Spider-man spars with a villain and almost immediately goes, “okay, this guy is out of my league, can someone get the FF?” I mean Spider-Man goes up against the Hulk every once and a while and doesn’t give up. But the fact that he feels so outclassed makes it even cooler that in the end Spider-man faces Swarm alone and wins.

ASM Annual 13

Okay admit it, when you read the note on the bottom of the cover page that says “Don’t dare peek at the surprise ending” you couldn’t help but peek could you? I know I peeked. I peeked after I realized where they must have been going, I knew they couldn’t have someone out there with Spider-Man’s secret identity.

Anyway, the thing that I really liked about this issue is how Peter goes undercover as a hood. It’s something I’ve seen both Daredevil and Batman and even Sherlock Holmes do from time to time, but I don’t recall Spider-Man ever doing that before. And it was perfect how Doc Ock comes in and immediately recognizes Parker, but just assumes he’s working for the paper.

I loved the villain gallery pages at the end of the annual. I guess a lot of the big name villains like the Green Goblin or Doc Ock were in the gallery of previous annuals and so would have been redundant. So we get Molten Man, The Looter, the Rhino, the Shocker, etc. The one thing that struck me was that the Rhino is thought of as a Spider-Man villain and yet at this point he’d appeared in 2 Spider-Man issues, but 8 Hulk issues. Sounds like a Hulk villain to me. (My comments on the Looter will be saved for his appearance in SSP 41)

SSM Annual 1

Can someone explain to me why Doc Ock is all gold on the cover? I wouldn’t have even known reading the issue in glorious B+W, except that it appears in color on the back cover. The story has to do with a nuclear submarine not gold.

Do you think Bill Mantlo and Rich Buckler who did this Annual talked to Marv Wolfman and John Byrne who did the other Annual? I wonder if it was just, “Okay Marv you write a Doc Ock story where his arm is torn off, but he gets away and Bill, you write one where Spider-Man beats him.” Or do you think it was more collaborative?

I really liked the scene where Peter Parker takes Doc Ock’s arm to the lab at ESU and then it starts beating the tar out of him when the doc starts to give it mental directions again.

The Doc’s Octosphere had a picture of an Octopus on it and that gave me pause for a minute. I was thinking, “That’s more of a DC thing, like something the Penguin would do.” However, then I realized that in the Master Planner storyline of ASM 30-33 Ock had an underwater base. I’d never put two and two together that Ock had a whole underwater theme going on. Shows you how much I pay attention sometimes. Also I want to state for the record that the Doc only has 6 arms and so Marvel isn’t helping children learn to count by associating him with an octopus.

I liked the ending where it really looked like Doc Ock died. He didn’t appear in Spider-Man for 2 years after this so I’m sure a lot of folks at the time may have believed he was gone. I think it’s a good strategy to not overuse the guy that might Spidey’s arch-foe. Keep him in reserve so all his appearances seem more significant.

Issue 38

Another Morbius issue. I know there are people that like Morbius, but I don’t. I think he’s a cheap Marvel Universe attempt to cash in on the popularity of Dracula and Vampires. Oh and it just so happens to be a Halloween issue too; get it, vampires on Halloween. Arg!!

The best thing I can say about this issue is that it sets up the next issue where Spider-Man faces his friend Chip Martin that has turned into the Schizoid-Man. Oh also it’s great that Morbius is turned back human, too bad he doesn’t stay that way.

Issue 39

Kind of a weird issue, it spends so much time setting up the next issue’s Spider-Lizard storyline, previewing the Frightful Four storyline, and explaining how Chip Martin became the Schizoid Man, that it doesn’t have much time to get off the ground. Plus Spider-Man is acting a bit out of character because of the influence of the Lizard DNA. So all in all an okay issue, but one that is really rushed. If they’d taken more time with it Chip might have made a more interesting villain instead of a throw-away.

Issue 40

Spider-Man has become a Spider-Lizard and he stalks the city. This is more like a 50’s Marvel Monster story or an issue of the Hulk then an issue of Spider-Man but it works because Doctor Connors who we so often see turning into the Lizard and being saved by Spider-Man anchors the issue and is given his chance to be a hero and save Spider-Man for once.

When Spider-Man is changed back he hides his face from Connors and asks about his mask. This makes Connors looks really dumb because he should be able to recognize Peter Parker’s voice by now. Then Spider-Man webs his face, making a web mask. This mask is interesting because sometimes it seems like you can see all of the features of Peter’s face making the mask useless, Other times it seems that you can’t see anything through the mask, which leads me to wonder how Spider-Man can see through it. Plus, the fact that at one point Spider-Man lifts the web mask just over his lips so that he can give Connor’s mouth-to-mouth. Wouldn’t a web mask be really sticky and hard to take off?



Issue 41

Another fill-in story. This one belongs firmly in Marvel Team-Ups since it features Spider-Man teaming up with Giant-Man aka Black Goliath aka William Foster.

The villain is The Looter aka Meteor Man. He’s the one Ditko era villain that really never got off the ground. He’s kind of the one that got away. Like Calendar Man for Batman or Miracle Man for the FF.

The issue starts off with Spider-Man sneaking into one of his professor’s office and slipping his late paper into the prof’s pile. (Of course the paper is still stick with webbing) This goofy scene fits in fine with the wacky theme of the rest of the issue.

I thought about this issue about a day after I read it because I realized that Meteor Man really is insane. He got super-strength from a meteor and all he can think about is finding other meteors so he can get stronger.

What about using the strength you already have to do something? How strong will be strong enough? Do you have any other goals to speak of? What kind of a life’s goal is finding more strength from more meteors? When does the cycle end?

I do like the scene where Spider-Man and Giant Man look at Meteor Man’s equations and immediately says, “this guy’s math is crazy.” It’s not every super-hero that has Graduate or Doctoral degrees.

Terminator Salvation

---Spoilers---

Terminator Salvation despite a horrible title, returns the Terminator franchise back in its rightful place as a great action series.

Audiences were finally given what they really wanted; the movie finally focuses on the post "Judgement Day" story. In a way it's been a 3 movie long tease. All we got before this were brief glimpses of the post apocalyptic future and the war of man vs. machine.

Some fans were worried that director McG would do the franchise a disservice and make the movie into some kind of Charlie's Angels meets Terminator disaster. Thankfully this did not come to pass. Salvation was gritty and dirty and thankfully absent was the rapid-fire editing (a technique I can't stand) that has lately become omnipresent in recent action movies.

Some people might be upset that after all the controversy, (his onset freak-out and his arrest for assaulting his mom and sister) Christian Bale, the marque name draw for the movie, isn't really the focus of the film. His character, John Connor is still the machine's public enemy number one, but Bale's one note , angry soldier characterization isn't the movie's central story.

Instead, it is Marcus Wright (Sam Worthington), the death-row inmate turned sleeper-agent -Terminator who is the true protagonist of the film. This is the story of his redemption; Skynet may have created him as the ultimate double agent, but the whole point of the movie is that though he was programmed to be evil and though he was a "bad guy" in his first life; Skynet failed to get rid of whatever it is that makes us human. Connor at the end of the movie calls it the human heart. I think the heart just pumps blood, but I can accept it as a metaphor for the human soul.

Now for all the things that don't make sense, and there were quite a few:

In the first movie Skynet sends a Terminator back in time to kill Sarah Connor because the machines have lost the war and their last hope is make it so John Connor, the leader of the human resistance never existed. Second movie, same thing only John is now a young teen. Third movie, same thing only John is now an older teen or a 20 something.

However, in this movie Connor is just a soldier. He still has his radio broadcasts where he speaks in corny platitudes like "if you can hear this you are the resistance." And he is regarded by some human survivors as a prophet and by others as a nut-case. He's somewhat mid-level in the food chain of military command, high enough to be granted an audience with the big-wigs on the super secret submarine, but they make it clear to him that he is not in charge.

So my question is- why is Connor Number one on Skynet's hit list already? And why is Kyle Reese (the teen who will be John's father) also a target? Skynet has no knowledge of the past/future at this point and should be unaware of their importance. And yet Skynet says something like, "we've been trying to kill John Connor for a long time"

Point two- Why does the Resistance's central command allow Connor free reign with his radio system? Any real military would have taken over and made Connor a powerless figurehead if his name had cache they needed. But instead they give him complete control and they are surprised when he usurps their power by countering their orders over the airwaves.

-The only other comments I have are:

Connor seems awfully dumb pouring over his mom's recordings for hidden truths. All she says is that you have to send Kyle back in time if you want to exist. It isn't that complicated and doesn't need to be examined like a sacred text.

It made me unbelievably happy to see the Governator in a "Cameo" appearance. Even if it was, as I found out later, just his face CGIed onto some other guy's body. It wouldn't be the Terminator without him.

Report on Big Apple Comic Con 2008 Part 5

First Posted Nov. 18, 2008

As I’m leaving the Jack Kirby Tribute Panel, I ask a guy I’m walking next to, “did you find Chris Claremont?”

“Sure,” he said. “I’m going over that way, I’ll show you.” So my guide walked me through the maze that was the convention and showed me where Claremont was hiding in plain sight. Or to be more specific, he showed me where there was a sign that said Chris Claremont. Below the sign was a table with some Sharpie’s and a pad on it and there was a chair with a coat and briefcase next to the table. I asked the guy at the next table. “Is that Claremont’s stuff?”

“Yes,” he said, “He’ll be right back, nature called.” So I waited for a few minutes. Near Claremont’s table sat Jim Salicrup who was basically doing stylized stick figure drawings for $5. Finally Chris Claremont came back and he signed Marvel Team-Up 63, 64, 100 and Uncanny X-men 200 for me.






Then since no one else was waiting in line to see him, I attempted conversation. I said in Marvel Team-Up 100 there’s a back-up story with Storm and the Black Panther that you wrote. “Did you ever think the two of them would get married?”

He said something like, “I never really thought about it.” Then he started looking at the story from back to front, but he didn’t say anything about it. I felt like all the air had left the room because I was so uncomfortable that he wasn’t saying anything, but I was determined so I tried again. “You wrote the X-men for 20 years, do you think someone will ever be able to match that? I don’t.”

“I don’t know,” he said. “You never can tell, can you?”

Then I asked him how he kept having fresh ideas and he said that he just did. By then I was so uncomfortable, that I wanted to get the hell out of there, I stuck my right hand out to shake his, but he shook it oddly with his left hand. When I left Claremont still had no one on his line. I don’t know why our interaction was so awkward. I really still want to give him the benefit of the doubt. It was the end of the day, I was standing there waiting for him, maybe he didn’t like that. Anyone else ever meet Claremont?

After my experience with Claremont I wandered around again still looking for Walt Simonson and Peter David. Suddenly I saw a sign that said “Peter David” and a guy was sitting under it. So I put my bag on the ground, squatted down, and searched for the Peter David issues I had (the two Spectacular Spider-man issues Buckler had signed earlier). But when I looked up and took a good look at the guy, I realized it wasn’t Peter David. It was just some guy sitting in David’s seat sketching pictures because David never showed. And it was on that note that I left the convention.

However, as I walked to the escalator Peter Mayhew walked past me and I thought “Jim Shooter is tall, but maybe not that tall.” Then as I was riding down the escalator, I looked over and Gloria Hendry was riding up the other escalator. We looked at each other and she smiled at me. Damn! She looks even better now then she did in that movie.

And that’s the story of the convention.

P.S.- Just because I forgot to post them before. Here are a couple of pictures of a bizarre photo shoot that was going on at the convention; obviously something to do with Marvel Zombies, Arthur Suydam the Marvel Zombies artist was the “Guest of Honor.”