Echoes Of Love From The Heart Of The Atom!

Under this beautiful Dave Cockrum cover art is a beautiful story of love for Marvel's original misfit monster, the always incredible Hulk. Heat of the Atom collects the Jarella stories from across many years of the Hulk's comic. Jarella is the beautiful blonde princess who loves the Hulk and who he loves too. Their romance is one of Marvel's most tragic.

The saga actually begins as something of a stunt. In the early Bronze Age comics were still groping for relevancy in the broader social spectrum and successful science fiction writer Harlan Ellison added to the cache of the form when he agree to plot some stories for Mighty Marvel. Two stories that he produced ended up as The Avengers #88 which is the first part of a tale that continues into Hulk #140. Roy Thomas wrote both tales.

The Avengers story by Thomas, Sal Buscema and Jim Mooney is not included in this trade, but is summarized in the first few pages of the initial Hulk story lusciously illustrated with Herb Trimpe breakdowns and Sam Grainger finishes. Essentially a monster name Psyclop in service to his other-dimensional masters needs to shrink the Hulk into what we now called the microverse. The Avengers try to stop this but fail and then are removed from the story by the simple trick of mind erasure.

The story continues in a tale titled "The Brute that Shouted Love as the Heart of the Atom!",  which is a variation of the title of a Harlan Ellison short story collection. Roy even goes so far as to include the titles of other Ellison tales in the dialogue and narration of the story itself. As I said, this was pretty much a stunt.

In the story, the Hulk finds himself on the microverse world where the lovely and exceedingly green Princess Jarella rules the kingdom of K'ai. After defending the city from giant warthog-like monsters the Hulk is hailed as a hero and soon enough becomes the consort of the Princess herself, who has an eye to making him her hubby. Needless to say, the Hulk who has his raging mind calmed by the magics of Torla, Holi, and Moli (three wizards) is rather happy to stay.

But Psyclop has other plans and the Hulk is ripped from his potential  happiness. Psyclop is defeated of course but the Hulk has seemingly lost paradise.

Some time later through magic Jarella comes to Earth but is followed by an assassin. She finds the Hulk again, but once again the pair are parted before they can find happiness. This is neat little story by Archie Goodwin, Chris Claremont and the awesome Herb Trimpe and John Severin team.

Then thanks to Goodwin and Trimpe and the science of Hank (Ant-Man) Pym the Hulk returns to the Microverse world to battle himself as it were in defense of the Kingdom of Ka'i and to protect his Princess. That it doesn't end happily is likely not much of a spoiler.

The Hulk ends up in the Microverse again thanks to Len Wein and the absolutely fabulous art team of Sal Buscema and Joe Staton. To be honest it was the art of these two working in tandem which got me over on this trade. I love how Staton's finishes add an almost luminous luster to Buscema's breakdowns and on whiter paper the art looks even better than I remember. This time Hulk finds Jarella again, just in time to save her from the clutches of a revived Psyclop.

The pair survive and actually arrive on Earth where (spoiler alert) poor Jarella dies to save an innocent life. The Hulk needless to say is a tad upset and goes on a classic rampage.

The Defenders step in and help slow him down, at least long enough to come to terms with his grief, at least a bit. The saga of the Hulk and Jarella seems to finally be over.

But then Bill Mantlo writes up a neat little tale expertly illustrated by Sal Buscema, which has the Hulk take Jarella's body back to the Microverse where he finds a devestated land. After battling the Gardner, Jarella is laid to rest at last and one of the great Marvel love stories comes to an end.

There is a What If which postulates what might've happened if Jarella had lived. It's clever enough, but sadly doesn't have the emotional punch I'd have expected of a story like this. Written by Peter B. Gillis and drawn by Herb Trimpe the story follows the Hulk as he becomes a hero of the world of K'ai and saves the world. I have to confess the John Buscema cover showing Jadejaws in full-Conan mode might be the best thing about this humdrum little outing.

The Hulk found a profound peace when he was with Jarella. That was comforting not only for him, but for his fans who from then on knew it was possible. Sadly, that peace was all too brief, but then that's what great stories are made of.

This post is dedicated to the late great Herb Trimpe. 

This Post is a Revised Dojo Classic. 

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Groo The Wanderer!

(Groo can only dream of being Frazetta's Conan.)

And then there's Groo the Wanderer! He debuted in (of all places) Destroyer Duck #1, the original comic dedicated to raising funds for the legal case of one Steve Gerber as he battled Marvel for the rights to Howard the Duck. A few pages in the back and we had on our hands one of the most successful and durable comic book characters of all time.

Created by MAD man Sergio Aragones, the wildly talented humor artist, Groo tapped into the then-popular sword and sorcery lore which permeated comics like the seminal Conan the Barbarian among a multitude of others such as Warlord, Red Sonja, Arak, and many others would-be barbaric contenders.

(First Groo Story!)

Mark Evanier is the Groo-whisperer, a longtime writer for TV and comics who adds words to the stories that Aragones develops and draws. This team along with letterer Stan Sakai and colorist the late Tom Luth have been at the wanderings of the boobish Groo for a great many moons now. Generations have come and while Destroyer Duck and other shiny objects of the Indie wave have diminished into the West, still the moronic Groo abides. He was the "Dude" before the Dude. 

Before awarding Groo his own comic the mavens at Pacific Comics previewed him in Starslayer (another of those straight barbarian types). After getting his own title, Groo plugged along for a cool eight issues before Pacific fell victim to financial woes. Groo though, stronger than the company that nourished him found a momentary footing at Eclipse (where he'd debuted) before finding a rather permanent home at Epic Comics, the Indie brand of sorts for mighty Marvel. There Groo out-lasted nearly everyone and went to bounce around at Image and Dark Horse and all over even down into our modern day. 

I keep an eye out for Groo projects which pique my interest such as his team-ups with Conan the Barbarian and Tarzan of the Apes. Both projects brought in the talent of Tom Yeates to handle the illustration of Groo's partners. 

Here are the covers from Groo's very excellent original 1980's run from Pacific Comics. 

It seems there's no killing this doughty barbarian, as much as we might want that. He's the Energizer Bunny of comics, he just keeps running. I don't have many regrets when it comes to my comic book reading, but not including more Groo might be one of the few. Good stuff!

This post is dedicated to the late Tom Luth. 

This Post is a Revised Dojo Classic. 

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The Savage Sword Of Adams!

For all too brief a time Neal Adams knocked out some outrageously exciting covers for Marvel's sword and sorcery brand. Here are the ones I could gather up. 

Adams had a real flair for this kind of material, his sense of realism was particularly effective in translating the tough nature of these adventures. In particular is art on "Curse of the Golden Skull" stands out from those early days when Marvel still had the Conan license. 

Here's a vigorous Adams illustration for a Supergraphics Portfolio. Other artists featured within are Barry Windsor-Smith, Vaughn Bode, and Howard Chaykin, along with Supergraphics boss Jim Steranko. 

Here are sonic Conan the Barbarian treats. Above is the cover to the Power Records. The Neal Adams cover is outstanding, and the stories are a lot of fun. 

This album features four Conan adventures. This link will take you to them.

As it turns out Power Records also produced "Crawler in the Mists" as a 45 single. Here's a link to this one along with the full comic book which came along with it. 

The artwork is some cool Neal Adams with a lot of help from the Crusty Bunkers over the layouts of Big John Buscema.

This Post is a Revised Dojo Classic. 

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December!

The barbarian welcomes you to the bleak month of December. The year of 2024 has been a memorable one to this point for all the wrong reasons. I want to right the ship and give us all something to smile about. That Neal Adams illustration of Robert E. Howard's famous Cimmerian is a tip off. It's nearly all barbaric action this month -- fantasy with a finishing blow.  

In the somewhat warmer climes of Narnia, we reach the end of that delightful children's saga by C.S. Lewis. For Lewis this all leads to a dramatic final battle which is good news for many of us. 

Frank Frazetta gets represented a few times this month. One is with Thun'da, the one comic book that the great artist illustrated all the way through. That's on tap as well as more recent sequel by other talents. 

Idyl by the late Catherine Jeffrey Jones is poetry. I don't pretend to understand it all, but revisiting these supremely crafted pages which originally appeared in National Lampoon are always intriguing and in the end heart-warming. There are other things from Jones as well such as I'm Age from Heavy Metal. 

And speaking of heart-warming, one needs look no further than Peter Beagle's magnificent and elegant The Last Unicorn. A striking mythology for a modern time sorely in need of it. 

It's the allure of more ancient myths which attract the reader to Poul Anderson's The Broken Sword. This magnificent saga was first published in the same year as Tolkien's great yarn about Hobbits, and some hold it higher regard. 

No wants to see Groo the Wanderer. He's a mental deficient who poses a threat to all those who come in contact with him. He blithely wanders (hence the name) through life creating havoc not only for villains, but heroes and bystanders as well. He's a barbarian they can't kill -- no matter how hard they try. I take a glance at one of the sturdiest barbarians in comics. 

One of my favorite Marvel yarns is when the Hulk got shrunk and found love and courage in a strange sub-atomic world. This turned into a downright saga. I was a downright Hulkamaniac back in the day, and this one always stood proud among the many tales about old Jade Jaws. 

And speaking of shrinking, the master of being little -- The Atom found himself having to retool to survive when he's stranded in a tiny world for a time. He finds adventure and romance in the smallest kingdom on the planet. 

The Viking Prince featured the astounding artwork of Joe Kubert, who caught the feel of the bygone age with a deft but firm touch. These tales are vivid when often comics of the time were quite timid. 

Kubert supplied the covers for DC's Nightmaster stories in Showcase, but it was left to an up-and-coming Berni Wrightson to draw the story. 

But Nightmaster was just DC sticking its collective toe into the Sword and Sorcery genre. In 1975 they took a deep dive when they cobbled together their "Adventure Line" which was filled with vintage crimefighting, prehistoric tales of survival, and scuds of swords and oodles of sorcery. I want to take a look at each of the comics that DC launched in this campaign, and I want to do it in the order they pictured above beginning with The Avenger and Justice Inc and sliding right all the way to Kong. 

This should be a ton of fun and is a project I've been thinking about for quite a while. I just needed a few comics to make it happen and now I have them. 

And I haven't forgotten about Neal Adams who kicked off this introductory post. He'll be popping up here and there as the final month of 2024 tumbles along to its inevitable conclusion. 

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