[net.comics] CRISIS #7 reposting

boyajian@akov68.DEC (JERRY BOYAJIAN) (07/03/85)

[This is being re-posted since the original posting was garbled up.
We were having problems with the gateway between the DEC E-net and
the Usenet and two of my postings got caught in the crunch.]

From:	hou2g!scott	(Scott J. Berry)

> What makes this better than Secret Bores
> (well, at least the most important reason, at any rate) is that
> Crisis is making changes and EXPLANATIONS.

You know, it occurs to me that a lot of what we know as background to the
Secret Wars never actually came out in the comics themselves, but only
through press releases and fanzine articles, etc. I realized this when I
looked at SECRET WARS II #3, and the Beyonder mentioned that the teleporter
in Central Park that grabbed up the various heroes was constructed by
Galactus at the Beyonder's bidding. Huh??!! This was never mentioned before!

But for me, what makes CRISIS superior to SECRET WARS is that I *care*
what happens in the series, to the characters. And not only is CRISIS making
changes, but they'll be *permanent* changes. How many of the changes from
SECRET WARS has lasted? Peter and Kitty are still estranged and She-Hulk is
still in the FF and Thing isn't. Big fat hairy deal.

> I'm kind of sorry to see Kara go. (I wonder if this had anything to do 
> with the poor showing of her movie :-) )

Seriously, Marv says no. He claims that the decision was made before the
movie was even released (of course, DC might have already seen it and knew
it was a dog). The idea is to get rid of all the excess Kryptonian baggage,
so that Superman is back to what he was originally meant to be --- *the*
only survivor from Krypton.

>  I recall the early Linda Lee stories
> with Jim Mooney art (I STILL can't stand that stuff!), and how bad her
> various title and backup features were.  It's too bad the only time she
> got good writing was for her swan song...

Bah! Them's fightin' words! I *liked* (and still do) the Jim Mooney art
on those old Supergirl stories. As for her other appearances, I thought
that Paul Levitz did a good job with her in her recent appearances in
LEGION OF SUPER-HEROES (beginning with the "Great Darkness" storyline).
In fact, there was some indiction that an alternative plan to killing
her off was to permanently move her up to the 30th Century and the Legion.
I wish they had.

> I'm only glad I read the Kal/Kara team-up in DC Presents beforehand--this
> would have spoiled it completely.  And poor Brainiac 5...

Yeah, I *knew* that I had better read the PRESENTS first. It just would've
seemed anti-climactic if I hadn't.

>  - Enjoyed the "older" Supes counseling restraint after Kara's death.

I, too, thought this scene was extremely powerful. It felt to me that if
Superman-1 had the Anti-Monitor in front of him, he very seriously would
have killed him with no remorse, regardless of his code against killing.

>    What is to happen to him, if only one Earth is to be left?  Think
>    he and Lois will go off somewhere together?  Or will DC take advantage
>    of probably their only opportunity to "kill" Superman?

It's been mentioned in various press releases that Superman-2 and Lois-2
will go off into space never to be seen again. I'm surprised, since I, too,
saw this as a chance for DC to have its cake and eat it too by killing off
one of the Supermen. Maybe they felt such would diminish Supergirl's death
by overshadowing it.

> P.S.  No time to review the Superman Annual--I expect JMB or Moriarty
>       to rave as usual about Alan Moore's script (and JUSTIFIABLY so),
>       but did anyone else notice the Monitor among the worshippers of
>       Mongul toward the end?  And isn't it Monghul?

You got us pegged. We already raved about it. And I think it *is* Mongul,
not Monghul. I didn't notice the Monitor, but there was one thing that
really impressed me --- Alan Moore certainly did his homework. I'm not
sure whether I mentioned this in my review, but during Superman's fantasy
sequences, he's married to an actress named Lyla. Those of you who are old
farts may remember a Superman story from circa 1960 called "Superman's
Return to Krypton" in which he went back in time and space to his homeworld
before he was born. In that story, he fell in love and almost married an
actress named Lyla Lerrol (another "L.L."!)

--- jayembee (Jerry Boyajian, DEC, Maynard, MA)

UUCP:	{decvax|ihnp4|allegra|ucbvax|...}!decwrl!dec-rhea!dec-akov68!boyajian
ARPA:	boyajian%akov68.DEC@DECWRL.ARPA
   soon to be:
	boyajian%akov68.DEC@DECWRL.COM

scott@hou2g.UUCP (N. Ersha) (07/08/85)

>>  I recall the early Linda Lee stories
>> with Jim Mooney art (I STILL can't stand that stuff!), and how bad her
>> various title and backup features were.  It's too bad the only time she
>> got good writing was for her swan song...

>Bah! Them's fightin' words! I *liked* (and still do) the Jim Mooney art
>on those old Supergirl stories. As for her other appearances, I thought
>that Paul Levitz did a good job with her in her recent appearances in
>LEGION OF SUPER-HEROES (beginning with the "Great Darkness" storyline).
>In fact, there was some indiction that an alternative plan to killing
>her off was to permanently move her up to the 30th Century and the Legion.
>I wish they had.

I wish they had as well.  Perhaps I was a bit hasty in my evaluation.
The Legion stories were indeed good (in fact, Kara was consistently handled
better by Legion writers, by my reckoning).  I might also add that I enjoyed
some of the early stories after she took over Adventure Comics from the
Legion (What? That was HOW many years ago?).  You'll still never get me to 
admit anything positive about "Moonies" art, though, except that it was 
probably better than the Infantino slop in her recent book.


>Maybe they felt [killing off the Earth-2 Superman] would diminish 
>Supergirl's death by overshadowing it.

Logical.


>> P.S.  No time to review the Superman Annual--I expect JMB or Moriarty
>>       to rave as usual about Alan Moore's script (and JUSTIFIABLY so),
>>       but did anyone else notice the Monitor among the worshippers of
>>       Mongul toward the end?  And isn't it Monghul?

>You got us pegged. We already raved about it. And I think it *is* Mongul,
>not Monghul. I didn't notice the Monitor, but there was one thing that
>really impressed me --- Alan Moore certainly did his homework. I'm not
>sure whether I mentioned this in my review, but during Superman's fantasy
>sequences, he's married to an actress named Lyla. Those of you who are old
>farts may remember a Superman story from circa 1960 called "Superman's
>Return to Krypton" in which he went back in time and space to his homeworld
>before he was born. In that story, he fell in love and almost married an
>actress named Lyla Lerrol (another "L.L."!)

*I* remember the story, though from the first reprint, not the original,
and felt it proper that his "dream" would go this way.


				Not as old as Jerry, but still a fart,

				-SJB