So, bringing people up to speed from yesterday: in my formative years, I wasn't much of a Marvel fan. For many years, I actively decried the Marvel output. And these comics are why.
The seventies weren't the best time for comics overall. The number of venues carrying the books was dropping, the printing was often, at best, lousy, and the page counts were dropping (at the low point, a new comic only contained 17 pages of story). At certain points, cost-cutting measures were employed, such as having the artists draw a page sideways on the board, and then printing it as a double-page spread (with oversized lettering compared to the rest of the book and thick inking that was intended for greater reduction, looking as though it had been done with a stick.)
Even in the best of times, THOR can be a difficult sell. And 1975 wasn't really the best of times. Attempting to cash in on the barbarian fad in comics started by CONAN, THOR often vascilated between trying to look like a sword-and-sorcery comic and a super hero comic--largely to the indifference of both readerships.
Here's what I wrote about THOR #233 a couple years ago:
Much like Captain America #183, which came out at the same time, Thor #233 was one of my early purchases which made me, for a long time thereafter, an avowed hater of Marvel Comics. And, unlike Cap #183, even today it's not very good.
Thor is a series that, in my opinion, experienced a long creative nadir following the departure of artist/plotter Jack Kirby and then writer Stan Lee. It went from being a series packed with startling vistas, compelling concepts and sweeping epic scope to something more akin to a boring, tepid pseudo-barbarian comic. Maybe this shift in direction was partly due to the tremendous success of Conan in the early '70s. But in any case, the incredible played as the mundane on too regular an occasion.
This issue is no exception. Written with a pretentious tone by scribe Gerry Conway, the story concerned an attempt by Loki to gain his revenge on Thor by invading Earth with a legion of his troops while Odin has mysteriously vanished. Gerry tries to make this seem weighty and important--in fact, he tries too hard, and the result is long passages of text or dialogue that are difficult to get through and even more difficult to care about. Gerry's written some excellent comics in his time, but Thor always seemed to fit badly with his approach.
The artwork by the always-at-least-competent John Buscema is similarly hampered by incompatible inking by Chic Stone. Stone's bold, direct, simple linework was an ideal match for Jack Kirby's stylized, impressionistic figures and compositions in the '60s, but atop Buscema's more lyrical illustrations, the effect is rather crude and unattractive.
Both this issue of THOR and yesterday's CAPTAIN AMERICA were the end product of hit-and-runs: my father was a heavy smoker, and so would regularly be heading over to the 7-11 to restock his favorite brand. And whenever we'd go there, I'd inveigle him into buying me a comic. With these two books, however, we were in something of a rush, so he dashed into the store, grabbed the smokes and the book and came back out to the car, so I wasn't actively involved in the purchase.
Afterwards, I lectured him repeatedly about the fact that I didn't like Marvel comics--that they stunk. I was so adamant about it that the whole argument came back to bite me in the behind a few years later, when I started reading the Marvel books--he would parrot my own comments back to me. Had he lived long enough to see me actually working for Marvel, it would have been a source of never-ending amusement for him.
More later.
Tom B
Here's a question... Was there an extended, well remembered Thor run between Kirby and Simonson? Thos are the only two runs I know.
Posted by steve wacker on 2007-01-23 16:38:38
One man's poison? I have found these two 'Bad Comics I Bought' posts quite interesting, not because they shed some light on what many seem to consider a bad period in Marvel history, but because both comics mentioned are ones that I am very fond of. The same comics that turned Tom into a temporary Marvel-hater(tm) were among those that made me a True Believer!
And in answer to Mr. Wacker, I remember every issue of Thor between Kirby and Simonson's runs as being quite pleasant, with the possible exception of several of the issues written by Moench and Zelenitz. I think it is very difficult to judge Thor by the art - the characters have such specific visual designs that, at least in my opinion, they do (and should!) look very similar regardless of who is pencilling them.
Posted by Adrian J. Watts on 2007-01-23 17:34:05
Good runs of Thor We all look back on the comics of our youth through rose-coloured glasses, but I'm very fond of Thor 218-220 by Conway and Buscema. I re-read them recently and they survived a cull. The concepts included are hardly new to SF readers, but I'd not encountered them before, so there was a gosh-wow factor. Who on Earth was the old sailor type accompanying Thor at this time?
Posted by globber on 2007-01-24 04:35:10
Thor made me hooked on Marvel Thor 270-271 got me hooked on Marvel comics. Drawn by Walter Simonson, no less! It started with a great battle between Thor and Blastaar, and ended with a teamup with Iron man to wrap up the storyline. The great end splash still resonates with me.
This was followed by a great run by Thomas/Buscema/Palmer from 272-277 that solidified my affinity for Marvel comics.
Posted by Beta Ray Benny on 2007-01-24 10:16:18
How old were at this time Tom? 7, 8? I can only picture a little Tom Brevoort explaining to his dad about how Marvel comics stink.
Posted by IanZL on 2007-01-24 13:47:39
Array
Enter a response to this blog post:
About this blog: Ramblings and musings from the mind of Tom Brevoort. "It won’t be clean. It won’t be fun. It mostly won’t be coherent."
About the author: Tom Brevoort is Executive Editor for Marvel Comics, and oversees such titles as New Avengers, Civil War, and Fantastic Four.
)
save this link
