Talking About Comics

 Astonishing Tales #12-13 Originally released in 1972 Written by Roy Thomas and Len Wein Art by John Buscema and Neal Adams I'm looking into the first appearance of Man-Thing that's on Marvel Unlimited, as I don't know much about him.  First appearing in the pages of a series focusing on barbarian hero Ka-Zar, Man-Thing and Swamp Thing were created around the same time, and from what I recall, their creators were roommates at one point, which leaves it ambiguous when it comes to which one came first. Picking up where the previous issue left off, Ka-Zar's sabertooth tiger friend, Zabu, has been caged, and he just broke free.  Ka-Zar stops the situation from escalating, but he's promptly arrested by the police after his declaration of being friends with Zabu is taken as an admission of ownership. Two people from the outside world are with Ka-Zar, and I was surprised to learn that the woman is Dr. Barbara Morse, who would later become better known as the superhero Mock...

 Superman/Spider-Man #1 Originally released in 2026 Written by Mark Waid et al. Art by Jorge Jimenez et al. I'm concerned that I might be overdoing it when it comes to covering these Marvel and DC crossovers, but this seems like a rare event, so I'll take whatever opportunity that I can get to read these.  Unlike the Batman and Deadpool ones (which had one central story and various side stories with subjects from all corners of the Marvel and DC universes), this feels more like a focused anthology that specifically deals with Spider-Man and Superman-related characters. The first story is fairly standard crossover material; while Peter Parker is visiting Metropolis, Doctor Octopus steals some Kryptonite at the behest of Brainiac.  While traveling the cosmos, Brainiac was infected by some sort of mind virus and intends to get rid of it by spreading it to humanity in exchange for letting Doctor Octopus roam the stars as opposed to being confined to Earth. After stopping disa...

 Justice League of America #151-152 Originally released in 1978 Written by Gerry Conway Art by Dick Dillin Gerry Conway passed away today; he had a long and varied history with both Marvel and DC (among others, he created the Punisher and Firestorm), so I wanted to cover some of his DC work since I'm not as familiar with that. (I've read The Night Gwen Stacy Died at some point before, so I wanted to go with something that was new to me) This issue is into the Satellite Era, where the Justice League operated out of (as the name suggests) a satellite orbiting Earth.  Hawkgirl just joined, so thankfully the idea that only one of them could join was removed. (The in-universe reasoning is that they don't want two people with identical powers, but that falls flat when Superman can do everything that Hawkman can and much, much more) The Atom is getting married, so the men are off to a bachelor party, leaving the women on monitor duty, which Black Canary gripes about. Going by the ...

Uncanny X-Men #181-184 Originally released in 1984 Written by Chris Claremont Art by John Romita Jr. Continuing with Chris Claremont's X-Men run, the X-Men arrive back on Earth after Secret Wars, though unlike the Fantastic Four and the Avengers, they don't appear in Central Park.  Rather, they show up in Japan, something that Wolverine figures out almost immediately. When they had left, Lockheed had found a dragon of a similar size to him, but now that dragon has grown to a massive size for some reason and is (of course) attacking Tokyo, seemingly out of unrequited love (she loves Lockheed, he doesn't return her feelings).  As this progresses, Storm runs into a similar conflict to what she had before - she's the field leader of the X-Men, and yet someone else (Cyclops before, Xavier now) is unknowingly undermining her leadership. During the battle, Xavier's legs are crushed by debris, and I almost laughed out loud at the idea that he just got back from Secret Wars ...