Monday, December 26, 2011

Lo! There Shall Come Endings Week: "Riders on the Sky!" by Mantlo, S. Buscema, and Trinidad

Welcome to LO! THERE SHALL COME ENDINGS WEEK, Groove-ophiles! It's the final week of 2011 (can ya believe it?), and we're coming up on a brand new year. Most of us spend the time between Christmas and New Year's looking back. Well, since DotGK is all about looking back, Ol' Groove's thoughts turned to endings, so this week we're gonna take a look at some of the most dyn-o-mite denouements of the Groove Age. Ready? Let's go!

One of Young Groove's fave titles was Skull the Slayer. Skully's been on my mind lately since writer-supreme Victor Gischler recently brought Skull back in all his slaying glory in the pages of X-Men. (Yeah, the author of Go-Go Girls of the Apocalypse got me to buy an X-Men mag, darn him!) Gischler's got Skully back in a lost world and in slaying shape. Mayhap there could be a mini-series in the offing? Who can say?  But until that unknowable time, back issues will have to suffice.

Skull's final ish (#8, August 1976) was a real blast! A Kirby cover. Bill Mantlo writing. Sal Buscema and Sonny Trinidad handling the art. Crazed, wannabe rulers. Savages. Mystics. Dinosaurs. And...Samurai!? Yeah, if you're gonna go out, this is the way to do it...

















5 comments:

  1. I have a real soft spot for the Skull stories. They were so random, so full of wild concepts and with the change of writers every five minutes or so, a short series that swung all over the place.

    But still through it all, it had such a compelling premise that it held my attention.

    It deserved better.

    Rip Off

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  2. And the great Archie Goodwin as editor,to boot.
    Thank you,Mr Groove.
    /Mr Anonymous

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  3. Yet another great Bronze Age series that I completely missed. Looks like a lot of fun - and the art here by Sal and Trinidad is beautiful...

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  4. Man, the little Bronze age intro at the top of the Splash is kinda harsh; seriously, was it necessary to refer to them as four losers? You don't gotta rub it in, knowhutImean?

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  5. Damn, Marvel was so cool in the '70s.

    ReplyDelete

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