Monthly Archives: August 2005

A reprint of the 1965 published X-MEN #11, this story has the X-Men responding to Professor Xavier’s detection of a potentially powerful new mutant, who turns out to be the alien Stranger.

Of course Magneto also has an interest in powerful mutants, and he gets to the Stranger first. After various battles, we end up with Quicksilver and the Scarlet Witch renouncing their allegiance to Magneto (setting up their membership in the Avengers) and the Stranger takes off with Magneto and Toad as samples of mutants to study, never to return (well, never or six months).

Bit of an anti-climactic conclusion to Kirby’s last full-pencil issue of X-MEN, but a lot of nice scenes in here. Chic Stone inks the 20-page story and the interior reprint of the original cover.

Published 1995

Kirby took the last step on making MISTER MIRACLE more of a super-hero book following the cancellation of its companion books by introducing a kid side-kick for Scott this issue, Shilo Norman. Shilo, a witness to the gangland killing of his brother, is giveb to Scott to protect, but he escapes (as Scott knew he would) to take revenge on his own, and Scott and Barda follow.

While this last year of MM lacks the cosmic punch of the earlier stuff, it’s still a lot of fun, and has some great visuals (Big Barda crushing a canister supposedly containing Scott in a giant nutcracker? Ouch). On the other hand, there were a few more pronounced weaknesses in the script, like the villain Mister Fez (who wears a fez…) with his “Super-cats, eh? I’m too hip to buy that kind of jive”.

Mike Royer inks the 20-page story and cover, and in the letter column Steve Sherman answers a few questions on the end of the other books.

Published 1973

A 7-page Kirby/Ayers reprint from STRANGE TALES #100 (1962) in this story, featuring a failing amusement park owner who designs an impossible to solve maze in order to prop up his business. There are some neat little visual bits in the designs inside the maze, although really, they’d have been pretty expensive to build for a failing amusement park. Trap doors, upsidedown rooms, optical illusions. The door giving off an electrical shock would also seem to be a health code violation.

Eventually he kills a reporter who threatens to expose him, and then confronts the owner of a rival maze (were mazes really all the rage back in the 1960s?), who turns out to be…

Well, the story (in both the original and reprint) say the rival is “Fate”, but some of the lettering and art on the last page looks to be changed, so I think it was originally supposed to be something more demonic, maybe “Satan”, and changed at the last minute.

Visually a very fun story, especially the weird maze on the first page and all the weird perspective bits inside the maze.

Published 1974