Monthly Archives: November 2010

Day 43: The Mother Box!

by
Posted in Apokolips, Day Entries, Heroes, New Genesis, The Forever People #1, Weapons & Devices.

It’s difficult to find the proper words to express my enduring admiration for this wonderfully resonant Kirby koncept, the Mother Box. She — never, never “it”! — is a living mechanism, a sentient computer, a machine with a soul who performs many, many tasks for her possessor, among them the abilities to sense danger, relieve torment, create protective barriers, sooth pain, transport her charges to another dimension, make friendships, scold sonically, navigate the cosmos, and being alive, she can be hurt, tortured and killed. But most of all she is capable of love, the power Darkseid fears the most.

In our story at hand, Mother Box is guardian of The Forever People; “The Mother Box protects us all,” are her protector Vykin the Black’s first words in the saga. In this incarnation she is a red rectangular cube, maybe 18-inches high, 10- or 12-inches wide per side, with a lens (or is it a screen?), a carrying handle and she emits sounds, “pings” in various tones, depending on her comfort or distress. (Apparently she can even apologize, or so says interpreter Vykin.)

Her main role in this premiere Forever People chapter is for Vykin to release her to levitation mode, as the Gravi-Guards are closing in, and for the boys to lay their hands on her for what Kirby might have called “The Great Interdimensional Swap!!!” (Oh, fear not, effendi! All will be revealed in the days to come!)

Back to the overarching Fourth World concept of Mother Box. She exists on both New Genesis and Apokolips, most prominently assisting these super-kids, Mister Miracle and Orion, the latter two who possess smaller “shoulder harness” versions, no less powerful or affectionate. (As I recall, I don’t think any version appears in the earthbound tales of Jimmy Olsen.)

Mother Box, we will discover, is the invention of Himon, scourge of Darkseid, roamer of the universe and mentor of Young Scott Free who created the device in the slums of Armagetto on Apokolips (and also, by the way, pioneered The Boom Tube). In the “Great Scott Free ‘Bust-Out'” issue of Mister Miracle, #9, the portly savior explains, in one of the most powerful single pages in the entire opus, that Mother Box is linked to The Source (a Great Good where resides the Meaning of It All). Simply put, Mother Box channels the good that is The Source into her user.

Himon says, “The Source! It lives! It burns! When we reach out and touch it — the core of us is magnified! And we tower as tall as Darkseid!” Scott Free, just beginning to see the supreme power that is love and now understanding his destiny, responds, “Then Darkseid fears us all! He fears what he can’t control!”

There is nothing I can add to this magnificent and portentous moment in Jack Kirby’s chef d’oeuvre. The deeper and deeper one delves into The Fourth World, greater and greater rewards are unearthed. We can argue all day about whether his work is genius, perhaps, but we can’t deny he was a Good Soul, Jack was.

Day 42: Darkseid’s Faithful Gravi-Guards!

by
Posted in Apokolips, Day Entries, The Forever People #1, Villains.

For, I believe, their singular appearance in the Fourth World opus, up from the underground come the magenta-colored Gravi-Guards, those who “transmit gravity waves from heavy mass galaxies” strong enough to “hold any super-being!” And the particular super-being enduring their crushing weight and obnoxious boasts? Why, Superman, of course!

Our tale thus far: Upon seeing evidence of Supertown and listening to Jimmy Olsen’s description (heard from Bobby the shutterbug) of The Forever People, Clark Kent steers the cub reporter out the door, changes into the Man of Steel and takes to Metropolis skies “…to find those kids!” Inter-Gang agents in a helicopter spot Supes and, sensing a threat to their mission, contact Darkseid, who orders them to attack with their Sigma-Gun.

Just as the super-hero lands to introduce himself to Big Bear & Co., Sigma-blasts zzzaps and zzzaarraaps him and he flings a telephone pole that destroys the chopper. The youngsters think Supes is a fellow Supertownie and explain their intent on rescuing Beautiful Dreamer, and he ponders, “I must gain the confidence of these super-kids — if I ever hope to achieve what I came for!” The Last Son of Krypton senses a trap but the Forever People rush in and poison gas envelopes all. Superman creates a mini-twister, dispersing the vapor, and suddenly the yellow-helmeted Gravi-Guards (clad in fetching gold-and-purple trunks) lunge from out of the ground!

Superman being crushed, Gravi-Guards descending on them, The Forever People call upon a maternal device to unite them as one…

Day 41: Sigma-Gun!

by
Posted in Day Entries, Earth, Weapons & Devices.

No, I’m really not going to wax on poetic about a nondescript weapon, such as Inter-Gang’s Sigma Blasters, except to say these are legitimate creations of Jack Kirby, however detailed or not. I mean, the light sabers conceived of by George Lucas: You tell me what their value is today…

Instead allow me to take this space to yet again marvel over Jack’s depiction of the Man of Steel, who in only a couple issues of Jimmy Olsen and (especially) this debut appearance of The Forever People thus far, the artist/writer imbued the super-hero with a new personality trait (quirk?), one of dissatisfaction and yearning. Superman on Earth was now, suddenly, disaffected, a Stranger in a Strange Land, and with the creation of New Genesis he was blessed with instant aspiration. Supertown was a potential home, populated with folks as incredibly-powered as himself, and the growing conflict, with good and evil so clearly delineated, was certainly a fight worthy of the Last Son of Krypton. Jack’s set-up was beautiful.

Superman’s discontent was perfectly matched for the era, when youth and middle-aged alike — think Easy Rider and Save the Tiger — began to question who they were and where they were going on this earthly plane. And what if you were a miracle man who could fly, was invulnerable and was hero to an entire planet? If you didn’t have the inclination to subjugate said world and just wanted someone, anyone, to relate to, wouldn’t you just want to get away and find solace among your own “kind”?

About the design aspect of Jack’s Supes: I’ll not go down the obvious critical road of commenting on the pasted-on drawings of Jimmy Olsen and Superman by Al Plastino and, later, by Murphy Anderson. Frankly they are as offensive as Vince Colletta’s inks on a good half of the books… they are what they are, we’re stuck with them, so why complain?

Anyhoo, I’ve spent my life arguing who is the best Kirby inker and the meaning of Jack’s peculiar art motifs and just getting excited all over again about the visual bombast of his stuff; but, now, I’m becoming more and more engrossed about Jack the writer and, my friend, there is so much to discover!

Day 40: Supertown!

by
Posted in Day Entries, Locations, New Genesis, The Forever People #1.

What else does one call the residence of the gods of Highfather’s world, domicile of those fantastically-powered humanoids who go about their daily routine doing fantastical things? Word is that Jack originally intended to call the megalopolis floating high above the pristine and virginal planet, Supercity, but the New York office nixed it for the more humble appellation. And that works better, I think, bestowing it a more ironic, playful name that also gives it a more homey, welcome designation, where friends and family reside.

Supertown is the wildly futuristic capital of New Genesis, homestead of the New Gods (the good ones, anyway), including The Forever People. And its discovery by Superman, using his microscopic vision to deeply “enhance” Bobby’s photo of a fading Boom Tube (now that’s some high-definition camera!), gives the Man of Steel pause to consider there just might be a sanctuary of equals for him to feel at home.

Supes sees evidence of a towering golden metropolis and, having just pondered his intense loneliness as a minority of one on earth, he yearns to find out if it really exists. The marvelous conurbation, he will later learn while visiting in a forthcoming issue of Superman’s Pal, Jimmy Olsen, is very real indeed, graced with massive memorial statues of departed gods (commemorating the fallen of the first New Genesis-Apokolips war), sprawling council halls, magnificent fountains, rich and fragrant gardens, and spires that reach for the heavens.

Perhaps Supertown represents young Jacob Kurtzberg’s view of the midtown Manhattan of the 1920s and ’30s, Gershwin’s sparkling, glowing urban center, with the majestic, newly constructed Rockefeller Center (with its massive, gloriously gold statute of a Titan), the grandiose heights of the just-built Empire State Building, the Great White Way’s promise of love and riches and happy endings, and the “young gods” toiling in the resplendent edifices rising from littered avenues to better their lives and improve the world in spite of the Great Depression crushing down on the nation.

As the Fourth World unfolds, we’ll be spending more time in the awe-inspiring principality of Izaya the Inheritor, but it’s fun to note our first viewing is a mere glimpse from a microdot in a photograph, a tease and promise of a place where dreams and miracles are made real.

Day 39: Rocky the Champ!

by
Posted in Day Entries, Earth, Supporting Characters, The Forever People #1.

Yikes, it’s been a little over a week covering the characters, concepts and contraptions of The Forever People #1 and we’ve hardly alluded to the actual plot of the comic book. Allow me to play catch-up for those anxiously awaiting an opening synopsis:

The four male members of The Forever People arrive on Earth via Boom Tube aboard their Super-Cycle, in search of the fifth member, Beautiful Dreamer, who has been kidnapped from Supertown by Darkseid’s minions.

A young motoring couple, Bobby and Laurie, swerve to avoid the team, crash through a guard rail and off a cliff, only to be saved by the miraculous technology of Vykin the Black’s Mother Box. Reassured by the New Genesis kids of their peaceful mission, Bobby grabs his camera and takes a picture of The Forever People. Bobby notices an eerie light in the distance, which Vykin identifies as an oncoming Boom Tube, and he and Laurie, sensing a scoop, rush off to investigate, the latter mentioning that their pal “Jimmy Olsen will eat this up!”

Suddenly Serifan, making telepathic contact with Beautiful Dreamer, collapses in an open-eyed coma, as the unwitting crew is in the gunsights of Inter-Gang agents. The henchmen connect with Darkseid, who orders them to follow — and not kill — the kids.

Meanwhile, back in Metropolis, Clark Kent (alter-ego of Superman) is interviewing Rocky the Champ, a stereotypical boxer, one who laments he can never be the best “with Superman in the picture…” and, while we never again see the pugilist in the series, he serves as an important catalyst for the Man of Steel to ruminate about the loneliness being a super human in a non-super world.

Day 38: Inter-Gang!

by
Posted in Day Entries, Earth, Inter-Gang, The Forever People #1, Villains.

It’s appropriate that Jack, who had lived in the realm of real-world hoodlums as a kid growing up on the vicious mean streets of New York’s Lower East Side, had his greatest cosmic villain, Darkseid, not only ruling an entire planet of evil, but also serve as head gangster for an earthly crime organization, Inter-Gang. It brings the salient point home that despots and dictators are nothing but puffed-up gangsters, no matter what the fashionable accouterments or lofty-sounding rhetoric. Jack linked a high-tech Mafia to the dark god’s malevolent empire, expressing a fear-filled image that among us lurked an underground Apokoliptian Fifth Column, its rosters filled with thugs betraying their own planet motivated by (doubtless empty) promises of wealth and power from the Master of the Holocaust.

Yes, these are the same scoundrels Jack has portrayed since his beginnings in the art form, whether in Captain America Comics, “Newsboy Legion,” Justice Traps the Guilty, Fighting American, “Green Arrow,” or his innumerable Marvel tales: tough-talking, mean-natured, shallow, and murderous mobsters, a scourge to civilized life, grabbing what is not theirs and killing anyone who gets in their way. In other words, Jack always stuck with the Warner Brothers stereotype and, I strongly suspect, had real-life archetypes to contemplate, as a career in crime was a serious option to young Jacob Kurtzberg and the other youthful denizens of Manhattan’s slums.

Inter-Gang (International-Gangsters? Intergalactic-Gangsters?) was particularly active in the early issues of the Fourth World tetralogy, and as hackneyed and cliché as some of the goons are portrayed, they are all deliciously cruel and (of course) ill-fated in that indomitable Kirby style.

Jimmy Olsen had Ugly Mannhiem and the nameless killer of Jim (the original Guardian) Harper — and don’t forget the Scottish field office with Felix MacFinney and his “daughter,” Ginny; Mister Miracle had Steel Hand and even a secret Inter-Gang missile; The News Gods featured Badger, Sugar-Man, Country Boy and Snaky Doyle; and The Forever People? Well, they had this unnamed squad of Darkseid-connected racketeers, every-ready to to murder the unaware Super Kids and take out a certain Superman.

Want to get an inkling of Jack’s world view, at least a good portion? Load up your Netflix queue with the following Warner Brothers gangster movies (and then go read In the Days of The Mob as a chaser)… it’s all in there, pal:

Little Caesar (1931), The Public Enemy (’31), G Men (’35), The Petrified Forest (’36), Angels With Dirty Faces (’38), They Drive by Night (’38), Each Dawn I Die (’39), The Roaring Twenties (’39), High Sierra (’41), and White Heat (’49).

Non-WB productions, but well within the spirit (and they might have well been released by Jack Warner), include the must-see flicks: Scarface (1932) and Dead End (’37).

Day 37: Serifan!

by
Posted in Day Entries, Heroes, New Genesis, The Forever People #1.

ser·aph (sĕr´əf) n., pl. -aphs or aphim (-əfĭm) or aphin (-əfĭn). 1. A celestial being having three pairs of wings. Isaiah 6:2. 2. One of the nine orders of angels. See angel. [Back formation from plural seraphim, from Middle English seraphin, Old English seraphin, from Late Latin seraphim, seraphin, from Hebrew Sərāphīm, plural of sārāph.] —se·raph´ic (sī-rāf´ik), se·raph´i·cal adj. — se·raph´i·cal·ly adv.
— American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language

In 1950, Harvey Comics published the third issue of Boys’ Ranch, Simon & Kirby’s legendary Western comic book, a kind of continuing John Ford movie in four-color newsprint, which featured the exploits of adult Clay Duncan and three adolescent cowboys. Therein contained what Jack later called one of his favorite stories, an episode titled “Mother Delilah.”

“Mother Delilah” certainly is a remarkable tale, focusing on the most original member of the group, golden-locked, ornery orphan Angel, who boasts an angelic visage with long blond hair and itchy, lethal trigger-fingers. (Think the face of Kamandi.) The gun-totin’ melodrama is about saloon “girl” Delilah, who has a crush on Clay, who in turn has no time for fraternizing with lady folk — “Helping the boys run the ranch is a full time job, Del!”

Piqued by Clay’s rejection — there is an intimation that they may have been, umm, initmate at one time; though unspoken in this kids comic, Delilah is obviously a “soiled dove,” a prostitute of the prairie — Del schemes to get back at the rugged cow-puncher by appealing to Angel’s need for a mother figure.

Angel is one angry youngster, described as “that lead-slingin’ imp of Satan,” bitter and unhappy and quick to spew rage, but he does feel a kinship to his fellow Boys’ Ranchers and the kid’s loyalty to Clay is unending. But Del cracks Angel’s tough veneer and, for a time, whore and orphan play their respective roles as loving mother and devoted son (“I’m your maw… You’re my boy,” Del coos, Angel’s upturned jaw in her palm). For a brief spell, Angel experiences a maternal tenderness, a feminine kindness he always yearned for but never experienced…

Angel’s long golden hair is his trademark, a Samson-like source of strength, but Delilah charms the lad, “lulling Angel’s fears with motherly persuasion — using the mother love for all it is worth — knowing it is the one thing that can bend the boy to her will,” and the boy submits to the shears of the “daughter of sin.” In a shocking, wordless panel, jaw open, eyes wide Angel views the haircut’s damage in a hand mirror: a hack-job, cowlicks sticking out every which way. Then Delilah cackles in triumph, having emasculated Angel (and, by proxy, Clay Duncan), laughing manically as the sobbing boy, consumed with shame and hurt, bolts out the door.

Gunplay ensues with badmen, Angel’s hair grows at an unusually fast rate with his marksmanship skill recovering in pace, and, one fateful day at the Last Chance Saloon, Del, in a redemptive final moment, rushes to protect Clay, and (alas) is struck down by a dirty, lowdown sidewinder’s bullet. It is the final, lyrical panels that make the story a classic:

Holding the departed Del in his arms, Angel weeps over her corpse, as the town Virgil (named Virgil), recites: “And, thus it ends. But ever to repeat again and again in reality and rhyme — Love’s ever new — as morning’s dew — and hate is as old as time.”

Okay, so what the heck does a tearful, resonant 1950 cowpoke story with Old Testament allusions have to do with the shortest member of The Forever People? Well, I’m convinced that Serifan is really the Angel of New Genesis.

Jack describes Serifan as a “Sensitive” in the first issue, one who “turns on with fantasies” and drops into an open-eyed coma when making telepathic contact with Beautiful Dreamer. While he doesn’t possess the cowboy’s bitterness or predisposition to kill people — these are the peace-loving Forever People, after all — Serifan does share a similar forlornness and angst with the Old West youngster. While the character certainly has moments of levity, I detect a perpetual sadness about the Super-Kid, one that was never fully explained.

Another clue to the Angel connection is certainly Serifan’s Western garb and predilection for cowboy-and-Indians teevee shows (and use of the word “pardner”). But the New Genesis Kid’s gambler hat is decidedly different from Angel’s in that its hat band contains “cosmic cartridges”… we’ll get into the specifics of those metallic beauties under their proper entry to come, but sufficient to mention, them little pills can lead to mind-blowing experiences!

One final observation: When Darkseid zaps Serifan’s fellow group members with “Omega Effect finder beams,” but reprieves the cowboy copy-cat (out of atypical sympathy?), we see the sobbing boy from the back, as he laments “the fast fading vestige of all that was dear to him!” It is a visual echo of the final panel of “Mother Delilah,” where we observe the back of Angel as he kneels before the still figure of his “mother.”

“And it came to pass afterward, that he loved a woman in the valley of Sorek, whose name was Delilah. And the lords of the Philistines came up unto her, and said unto her, Entice him, and see wherein his great strength lieth, and by what means we may prevail against him, that we may bind him to afflict him: and we will give thee every one of us eleven hundred pieces of silver. And Delilah said to Samson, Tell me, I pray thee, wherein thy great strength lieth, and wherewith thou mightest be bound to afflict thee.” — The Bible, King James version, Judges 16:5-7

For the Love of Jack!

by
Posted in Bonus.

If I may be allowed this indulgence…

I dunno if it’s the specter of death flittering about the edges of my psyche in these colder, decaying days of mid-autumn and on the down-side portion of my life, but I’m a little more jumpy lately. A few minutes ago, a leaf falls on the ground, I see it land from the corner of my eye, and I’m a little startled. An imagined “meow” seems to emanate from the back seat as I drive yesterday, and I’m like, “Huh? Wazzat?” Last night, just absentmindedly staring at the license plate on the van in front of me, I am filled with this slightly creepy feeling that some little mistake is going to lead to some big, dreadful event. It’s only a minor paranoia, a small uneasiness, but it’s now a constant and, inevitably, it leads to the realization that my time on this earthly plane will have an inevitable conclusion. Finito, the end, that’s the whole enchilada, buddy-boy.

The zeitgeist deems my wife and I are members of the “sandwich generation,” a phrase I’ve been reluctant to embrace, like au courant “comfort food,” but the term is so apt these days, expertly describing the unfolding reality of our lives. Without yammering on too much of my personal life — this is, after all, a blog about a comic book artist and his work — it should be enough to say the grown kids don’t appear to be leaving Casa Cooke any time soon and in-law misfortune adds an entirely new and unexpected dimension to our daily regimen as a 23-year-old married couple. Days are filled with obligations and chores, and surprises young sons give their parents sometimes seem perpetual, so the word “hectic,” overused and by now a cliché, is still the one best characterizing these time for Mr. and Mrs. Cooke.

And so what? Life could be far worse, pressures much more pressing, happiness utterly extinguished because of health and financial catastrophes. I mean, I’m not disadvantaged like so many on planet earth; we both work at good jobs and no one we support suffers from material want. But, still, my contemporary reality gives pause and invokes in me a certain jitteriness regarding the future. My mom will tell you I’ve always been this way, restless, and she says I’m just itchy.

And I am purposefully itchy these days, at least about this, the Fourth World blog and assorted other things Kirby, and it’s a heaven-sent urge to scratch that is transforming my life. Despite chimeras of doom nibbling away of the borders of consciousness, I’m experiencing a great awakening, coming to realizations about my role in life and what comics mean to me in the final analysis. Ask anyone I’ve associated with and I think, to a person, they’ll tell you that Jon B. Cooke is a little crazy (though more than one might leave out the qualifier!). Obsessions have ruled my interests since probably Day One, and among them, obviously, is my passion for Jack Kirby’s masterful storytelling. Such preoccupations have also led me far astray, and all too often, to isolation and avoidance, when I would indulge in any number of manias, among them certain disparate subjects as Gerry Anderson teevee shows, the JFK assassination, Alfred Hitchcock anthology paperback collecting, Doctor Dolittle, national politics, running and an unhealthy fixation on the Holocaust. And, it’s funny, these engrossments very often coincide with the advent of fall, a time when, I suspect, I suffered seasonal depression.

In other words, consumed with guilt of neglected obligations and riddled with despair that it was all “too late” to make amends and set things right, I delved into distractions becoming increasingly void of meaning. Yes, I was learning more than your average Joe about Kristallnacht, the “magic bullet,” and Joe 90, but it was becoming (pardon the term) just mental masturbation, empty of any use and serving nothing but my increasingly nonsensical immersions. Just another cycle of dysfunction adding to a life filled with seemingly endless rotations of self-absorbed inanity, looping like the seasons every year.

I would, typically, snap to attention with the turn of the calendar page, rush to tidy up and ready my office for the new year, because “this” time,” “this” year, would be different. I’d jump into my mountain of up-’til-then neglected e-mails, fire off apologies and avowals, and promise everyone, “this” time,” “this” year, will be different. But it always ended up the same old, same old. Sure, life was busy and being a son, husband and father was paramount above all else — and will remain, so long as my responsibilities in that department live and breathe — but, it goes without remark, I could have handled it all much better. Verily.

So, here it is again: the frost is on the pumpkin, trees are stripped bare and tonight they’re turning the clocks back for us to have even less daylight in the afternoon. (How is the weather in Sydney these days, mate?) And what makes “this” time, “this” year any different than the past seven or eight years, since I stopped producing Comic Book Artist magazine? Why believe me now?

Believe it or don’t, I’m not one to seek deification or even “sainthood” for Jacob Kurtzberg. My higher power holds reign over heaven and earth, a little bit more than over the comic book page, and I need to remain humble in recognizing that Truth and grateful for that power’s blessings. But Jack Kirby is my comic book god, my king of the funnybooks, and a perennial inspiration in the work I do. I see in the artist a lovely example in how to approach one’s labor — always do your best and give everything your all — and how to treat others, no matter their status — with deference and respect. I perceive in Jack’s art a blinding majesty and import I’ve yet to adequately describe or maybe even fully fathom, but I’m quite convinced his is the stuff of genius, perhaps even touched by divine grace, and I now understand that by recognizing his achievements as such, I have been given a mission (God-given? Dunno ’bout that!) to advocate a greater understanding of the man and his art. My job, as I see it, is to help get Jack the respect I am convinced he deserves.

I had the epiphany early on in this blog’s development, as I was cataloging Jack’s concepts into a database, and the sheer enormity of his accomplishments, if even for a mere 55 issues out of many, many hundreds of comic books he produced in a lifetime, hit me smack square in the forehead. Before this crystalline moment of clarity, I had simply chosen Jack’s Fourth World as yet another obsession to try and satiate my bottomless pit of want; but then, sitting at my desk, plunking away in Excel, inventorying the Boom Tube and Mother Box, I was struck with a sense of purpose and a path to attain a sense of joy in my endeavors. I was shown a way to perhaps dampen inner turmoil and ambivalence. I was endowed with a desire to be of service.

Simply put (if not so simply done), I will seek to help produce as-definitive-as-possible three tasks, besides this miniscule blog, that will do its damnedest to manifest Mr. Kirby’s labors to the greater world: in print, through celluloid, and by event. Sorry to be oblique at this stage but, well, gotta prepare…

Is a revival of Comic Book Artist magazine part of the equation? I don’t know, much as I’d like that labor o’ love to return. The publishing environment is vastly different than last when I was part of it and there are a lot of amends that need to be made, a number of hat-in-hand sincere apologies given, before I jump in again. So, we’ll see. I do know that I’ll be a very lucky hombre if the study of comics will turn out to be my life’s work — and, without equivocation, I certainly intend it to be! I hope I can be an asset, giving more than I get, be an addition to the field and not a subtraction. To make this, for me, a New Age.

I also know I will be completing this life-changing endeavor, what I affectionately call “365JK4W” (ain’t that a cute name?), whether or not my readership dwindles to none. It’s fun, it brings joy to my life, and it’s nice to be back chatting up the stuff I love, so whaddaya want for nothing? I thank you folks for reading these essays and have special gratitude for those who chime in. I’ll also be contributing again to John Morrow’s superb ’zine, The Jack Kirby Collector, and dedicating time to the development of said plans. Thus I’ll be around, Kirbyheads, whether you like it or not.

Believe you me.

The days are getting shorter, and if it is fear of the grim reaper that’s motivating me, so be it. I’m on a mission. I sincerely hope you can participate and I am grateful for your attention. Thanks.

Day 36: Big Bear!

by
Posted in Day Entries, Heroes, New Genesis, The Forever People #1.

Many a Kirby group has a tough macho and/or intimidatingly big man, either a Rocky from The Challengers of the Unknown or the Howling Commandos‘ Dum-Dum Dugan, but none are quite like the jovial, happy, rock-em sock-em, red-headed giant of The Forever People, Big Bear. Think Alan Hale (junior, senior — doesn’t matter) only without a whiff of grouchiness and you’ve got the group’s Super-Cycle pilot to a tee. Picture a good-looking Thing but always in a good mood and never in self-pity mode.

I know, I know: I said the group is non-violent, a statement seemingly at odds when we see Big Bear taking on a Justifier, cordially telling the hapless villain, “Big Bear is my name, sir! — and power is my game!! That’s my bag, sir!! I store an excess of free atoms and send them where they’re needed!!” (Yup, he can concentrate his atoms to any area of his body, giving him, for all practical purposes, super-powers.)

Still, he does fret over his rough behavior, lamenting Highfather’s words of “Violence breeds violence,” and, moments later, telling his fellow Forever Peeps, “Well! I thought you’d never get here!! I’m getting involved in all kinds of violence!!”

Big Bear’s head device, framed by a lion’s mane-like flaming red hair, is equipped with head gear, with what appears to be a paper-thin glass mask and ear circuits capable of “instantaneous translation,” which aids in his time-traveling trip to ancient Briton, where the self-described history buff helps a future King Arthur begin his legendary deeds. Cheerful throughout his visit, he later tells the kids, “Darkseid sent me to a place of violence but I had a nice time!!”

One of the most memorable moments of the series is when Darkseid calls the group to attention, berating them as would a drill sergeant, and in a classic scene, tweaks Big Bear’s nose while urging the “baboon” and “clown” to learn discipline. It remains one of Jack’s most humorous panels.

Finally, I just gotta mention Big Bear’s manner of speech, which, at times, is downright incomprehensible. Take this opening dialogue line in FP #2, when the team is looking over an inner-city neighborhood: “”Dig this place! It’s got the ingredients of the cake — but it needs more baking!”

Pray tell, anyone got “instantaneous translation” for that pearl???

Day 35: Vykin the Black!

by
Posted in Day Entries, Heroes, New Genesis, The Forever People #1.

Vykin, somber member of The Forever People, is a “Finder,” one who “has the power to trace and reconstruct atomic patterns,” meaning, I reckon, the guy can sense where things have previously been and is able to detect such earlier presences by zapping beams out of his eyes which create a trace image. Like Mark Moonrider, Vykin also has a latent ability that doesn’t appear until late in the series: Magna-Power, which he uses without so much as a howdy-do against a gunman: it’s a kind of reverse-magnetism force field that repels metal and those that wield same… akin to Magneto, I guess.

Most of all though, Vykin is the loyal protector of the team’s beloved Mother Box (we’ll get to her), a kind of sentient computer that exhibits emotions (via pings) and endowed with the ability to call into this dimension a wonderful, spectacular, immensely powerful being… Fear not, friend, soon you will learn all…

Vykin is also a language major and possesses in his helmet an indicator connected to Mother Box, saying his “mind is so attuned to her waves,” but Vykin can also hear her without the helmet (which also, by the way, contains probing circuits that can detect gold).

The name description: Is Jack really being that blatant, relaying the obvious — Vykin has black skin — or might it be more subtle wordplay off the character’s name, an apparent derivation of “Viking”? I mean, like there’s Erik the Red, Thorstein the Red, The Red Viking (or did I make up that last one as my own comic book character?)… I imagine there’s not too many “…the Blacks” in Norse myth or history…

“Token” black characters were appearing all over network teevee at the time: Bill Cosby in I Spy, Nichelle Nichols’ “Uhura” in Star Trek, The Mod Squad‘s Linc Hayes, a nod by Hollywood towards the civil rights movement, with their otherwise lily-white fantasy world. So, why not comics?

But it’s important to note Jack created the first mainstream black comic book super-hero in this country — The Black Panther in the pages of The Fantastic Four — and he’d go on, in the very pages of The Forever People, to debut the first U.S. Asian super-hero, Sonny Sumo.

Gratuitous? Maybe. I’m more inclined to give J.K. the benefit of the doubt and believe the allusion of color with Vykin the Black is less due to skin pigmentation and more that he was a subterranean dweller on New Genesis before joining the team, from a black world, so to speak. But then, I’m a Kirbyhead, so whaddaya want!