2016 Comic Challenge 289 World's Worst Comics Awards #02

TITLE-World's Worst Comics Awards #02
PUBLISHER-Kitchen Sink

Another of my odd finds at the local auction. I had never heard of this comic,which was a bit surprising cause I kept up with what Kitchen Sink was publishing back when this came out.

After a few pages showing how stupid and childish the science in most superhero comics are,the 3 hosts start counting down the top 10 worst comics ever.

Stuff like Dell's Frankenstein comic. Which had Frank as a superhero. And oddball stuff like Super Green Beret or Brother Power the Geek.

Then in the top 3,numbers 3 and 1,are comics I own. #3 is Captain Victory and the Galactic Rangers #7. Which was Jack Kirby's creator owned space opera series from the early 80s. While I own this issue ,I got it recently for cheap,I haven't read it yet. The #1 comic is Neal Adams' Skateman. Yeah the comic about a war vet that becomes a superhero that fights crime while riding a skateboard.

And I thought that would be the end of the issue.but the inside back cover the Siskel and Ebert stand-ins give Todd McFarlane's Spider-man #01 the worst comic of 1990 award. And yeah they picked a good comic. What a piece of crap that was the Todd Spidey comic.

World's Worst Comics Awards #02 gets a  borrow.

2016 Comic Challenge 115 DC Special Blue Ribbon Digest #23

TITLE-DC Special Blue Ribbon Digest #23
PUBLISHER-DC Comics

It was summer of 82. I was with my parents,oddly enough about 40 minutes east of where I live now,visiting some friends of theirs.The county they lived in was a dry county,so all the guys had drove to the nearest wet county to get beer for the weekend. I have no clue why they brought me with them. All I remember was as soon as we went into the country store I headed straight for the magazine rack. Sat down and started reading the above comic. Someone ended up buying it for me. And  read it at least 3 times over that weekend.

This digest sized collection reprints 10 or so Green Arrow stories. Going back as far as the Jack Kirby and Lee Elias stories from the Golden Age.And going forward with a few classic Neal Adams drawn stories. Then best of all Mike Grell drawing and Denny O'Neil writing The Origin of Green Arrow. Plus a brand new wraparound story. Where Ollie is telling some of his past adventures to Dinah.

I like how who ever chose the stories for this digest managed to work in almost every major version of Green Arrow. From the boring stories but good artwork days of Green Arrow being Batman with a bow.To the much much better Denny O'neil stuff.

After I had totally forgotten about this comic,I lost my original copy decades ago,one night while browsing this online comic shop that was ran by the drummer from System of a Down I found a copy in good shape for a decent price. Sure it was a few bucks over what it cost back when I first got it. But it wasn't like I paid $15 for it.

DC Special Blue Ribbon Digest #23 gets a BUY.

Monster Menace 1-4

Monster Menace 1-4

This was a kinda companion piece to Marvel's "Curse of the Weird" 4 issue mini. This series focused on the various Marvel pre-Silver age giant monster stories. This is the place were Fin Fang Foom and Groot showed up for the first time. So highlights from the 4 issues are. "I spent Midnight with the Monster on Bald Mountain" written by Stan Lee and art by Steve Ditko is a great moody story that shows both men at their artistic peaks. "The Terror of Tim Boo Ba" again by Lee and Ditko not only has a monster with a great name,but a fun twist ending that had to be mind blowing to the kids that read these stories many years ago. "When the Totem Walks" starts off the second issue with another blast of pure fun from Stan Lee and Steve Ditko. They take the stupid idea of a killer monster Totem Pole and make it into something believe able for a comic book. "Save me from the Weed" besides the laughable title,is a fun science fictionish story from Stan Lee with Jack Kirby doing the pencils and Dick Ayers on inks.This is one of the many radiation gone wrong stories that were all through out pop culture during this era. "I can't escape from the Creeping Things" is another mortality tale from Lee and Ditko that has a very early ecological slant to the story.Then wrapping up issue 2 is the highlight of the issue. "I fought Colossus" written by Stan Lee pencils by Jack Kirby and inks by Steve Ditko. Another of this era's "The machines are gonna take over " scare tales."I Live again" is the sequel to "The thing from Bald mountain" comic. It has the team of Lee and Ditko again and their talent shines through.Issue 4 starts off with a fun cover by Floyd Hughs. We start off with a sequel to the walking Totem story from a few issues back. "Orrgo the unconquerable" is a amazingly fun tale by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby. Then we get what I consider the highlight from the entire 4 issue series "Rorgg,King of the Spider Men!!". Written I am pretty sure by Stan Lee this has pencils from Jack Kirby and I think Dick Ayers did the inks. Small town gets invaded by a group of aliens that have 6 arms and look kinda like Spiderman when he grew the extra arms. This story was the best way to end what was a decent mini series. I enjoyed "Curse of the Weird" more,mostly cause the Marvel giant monster comics are not some of my favorite stuff. But judging this on all 4 issues "Monster Menace" gets a B.