Merry Christmas Eve, Groove-ophiles! While you're waiting for Santa to sneak down your chimney (if ya have one--how does he get in for those of us without chimneys?), has Ol' Groove got a massive (I'm talkin' 'bout 64 ho-ho-honkin' pages plus a cover, baby) post for your dazzling day-before-Christmas! Y'see, back in Christmas 1977, DC gave
Wonder Woman fans a most superior Christmas gift in the form of
DC Special Series #9, aka
Wonder Woman Spectacular 1978! With Lynda Carter's
Wonder Woman TV series still on the air (the series had moved from WW II and ABC to 1977 and CBS in the Fall of 77, so
WW Fever was still running wild (should I have saved that phrase for the
Incredible Hulk?), therefore the powers-that-were saw fit to fan those flames of --er--fandom! So here we have a comic that came out in 1977, dated for 1978, set in the 1940s (and Earth-2, natch)...whew! It's a time warp, baby! Anyhoo,
Wonder Woman Spectacular 1978 just goes to show that you don't need a year-long series with a hundred cross-overs to produce an epic story! With "The Cosmic Quest for the Disc of Mars!", Jack C. Harris, along with artists Jose Delbo, Russ Heath, Dick Ayers, Steve Ditko, and Vinnie Colletta gave us a monumental WW II saga, complete with the gods of Olympus, and then tossed in a new Nazi bad-guy (
The Red Panzer), a new "good-guy" (
The Bombardier), and even Adolph Hitler! For one measly buck! (Oh, how I loved the Dollar Comic format, didn't you?) Snuggle up by the fireplace, but don't hit the egg-nog too hard, as you savor..."The Cosmic Quest for th
e Disc of Mars!"
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| Cover art by Jose Luis Garcia-Lopez and Dick Giordano |
For those of you dying to know who-drew-what, according to Grand Comics Database: Jose Delbo drew pages 1-9, 15-17, 28-32, 35-37; Russ Heath penciled 10-14, 45, 60; Steve Ditko drew (and inked) 18-23, 33-34, 43-44, 47; Dick Ayers penciled 24-27, 38-42, 46, 48, 49-59, 61-64; and Vinnie Colletta inked everything but the Ditko pages! Merry Christmas, baby!
