Jack Kirby Collector #20 by TwoMorrows Publishing

$5.95

In The US

A “King”-Size 68-page ISSUE on JAck’s Female Characters!!

Issue #20, JUNE 1998

A Rare 1975

Kirby Interview Interviews with

Dave Stevens & Lisa Kirby Unpublished Tenpage story from

True Life Divorce A Close Look At

Romance Comics Jack’s original screenplay for

Captain Victory Doublecenterfold of

Galaxy Green Special Features:

Jack’s Women From The ’40s To The ’80s including Pencil pages Befo re They Were Inked, And Much Mo re!!

Nominated Fo r Two 1998 Eisner Awards Including “Best Comics-Related Publication”

1998 Harve y Awards Nominee “Best Biographical, Historical or Journalistic Presentation”

Artwork © Jack Kirby & Ken Steacy

Unpublished Art

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FAIRLY FEMININE FELLOWSHIP FOR A FABULOUSLY FINE FELLOW! ITEM! TJKC was honored once again this year with a HARVEY AWARD NOMINATION for BEST BIOGRAPHICAL, HISTORICAL, OR JOURNALISTIC PRESENTATION. Plus, we chalked up TWO EISNER AWARD NOMINATIONS (for BEST COMICS-RELATED BOOK for our COLLECTED TJKC, VOL. ONE trade paperback, and BEST COMICS-RELATED PERIODICAL for TJKC itself)! We’re pleased as punch to be honored again this year, and want to thank everyone for supporting TJKC over the years, and helping keep it in the public eye. ITEM! Although the above-mentioned Vol. One is sold out, our colossal 160-page COLLECTED JACK KIRBY COLLECTOR, VOLUME 2 (our new TRADE PAPERBACK COLLECTION reprinting TJKC #10-12 plus over 25 NEW pages of Jack’s pencils) ships in July! Our supply will be pretty limited, so to ensure you get a copy, you should order immediately. It’s only $14.95 postpaid in the US ($16.95 Canada, $24.95 elsewhere).

ITEM! The first issue of our new publication COMIC BOOK ARTIST was a sell-out in stores across the country! Right now, TJKC’s Associate Editor, Jovial JON B. COOKE is hard at work on CBA #2, featuring MARVEL COMICS: THE SECOND WAVE (1970-77). Behind a new GIL KANE cover, there’s new interviews with GIL, STAN LEE, BARRY WINDSOR-SMITH, and features and unpublished art on such greats of that era as FRANK BRUNNER, GENE COLAN, JIM STARLIN, MIKE PLOOG, P. CRAIG RUSSELL, JACK KIRBY, and many others! Plus, Rascally ROY THOMAS has concocted another 16-page installment of his classic fanzine ALTER EGO for CBA #2, spotlighting more greats of the Golden and Silver Age! It ships in August, and CBA #1 (with a DC theme, featuring plenty of rare art by NEAL ADAMS and others) is still available for $5.95, or you can subscribe for four issues for only $20 in the US! If you want to get involved, submit copies of art from your collection and articles about your favorite comics artists to Jon Cooke, PO Box 204, W. Kingston, RI 02892-0204. ITEM! Get connected! The TJKC Web Site (maintained by Rascally RANDY HOPPE) is at www.fantasty.com/kirby while the official Web Site of the Kirby Estate is at www.heavypen.com/theking And be sure to join the KIRBY MAILING LIST by sending an e-mail request to kirby-l@fantasty.com. Start typing, Kirbyheads! ITEM! We’re gearing up for another sojourn to COMIC CON INTERNATIONAL: SAN DIEGO, August 13-16 (and the EXPO August 11-12). The TJKC BOOTH will sport a new look this year, with the addition of COMIC BOOK ARTIST to our publishing schedule (CBA #2 will debut at the con), so be sure to stop by and say hello! (Thanks to Magnificent MIKE GARTLAND for helping JON B. COOKE run our booth at this year’s RAMAPO CON!) See ya there! ITEM! We’re sad to report that the special display of Jack’s work planned for this year’s SAN DIEGO COMIC-CON won’t be happening, due to a lack of sponsors to offset the costs of security, etc. Maybe next year! ITEM! If you haven’t checked out STERANKO: GRAPHIC PRINCE OF DARKNESS (the recently-published autobiographical docu-comic), you owe it to yourself to find a copy right away! Besides being profusely illustrated with some of Jim’s finest work (much unpublished), you’re treated to some amazing tales of Steranko’s life and career. This book is a must for fans of Steranko and comics in general, and is available through comics shops, or for $4 ($5.50

JOHN’S JUKEBOX You’ve probably heard people say Jack didn’t draw very beautiful women, or that he cared much more about the testosterone-pumping males in his books. So I guess it shouldn’t surprise me that, as near as I can tell, less than one percent of TJKC’s readership is female. Why is it more women aren’t interested in comics, and Jack’s work in particular? I’m not sure how to answer that question (although joining FRIENDS OF LULU might help change the situation; see info below), but I hope this issue will change people’s opinion about Jack’s women. As we’ll show, he drew a wide variety of females in his books; some strong, some sexy, and all done with the utmost respect for the fairer sex. But we mustn’t forget that they were all drawn through the perception of a man (and one who grew up in the early part of this century). So what I’m after this issue isn’t a Feminist viewpoint on Jack’s characters; quite the contrary, I wanted a look at Jack’s female characters from the perspective of his readers, who are overwhelmingly male. I’ve resisted the urge to make politicallycorrect changes to any of the racier articles (or Jack’s art, for that matter). The end result is, hopefully, an issue like Jack’s female characters: A little bawdy, a little sexy, and one that can hold its own alongside any other. Now turn the page to see if we succeeded! Long Live The King!

John Morrow, Editor • 1812 Park Dr. • Raleigh, NC 27605 • (919) 833-8092 • FAX (919) 833-8023 E-mail: twomorrow@aol.com P.S. TJKC #1-12 and our first Trade Paperback are sold out, but don’t forget that next month we’re shipping our second Trade Paperback, which reprints #1012. Supplies will be limited, so order yours right away to assure availability! Canada) plus $1 for shipping from: VANGUARD PRODUCTIONS, 170 Wildwood Avenue, Montclair, NJ 07043 or call 973-744-1135. (A signed edition is also available for $10 plus $1 shipping.) Get it while it lasts! ITEM! FRIENDS OF LULU needs your support! It’s a national organization aimed at promoting and encouraging more female readership and participation in comic books. Annual dues are only $25 for adults ($5 for under 18 Jr. Lulus), and you get a nifty membership card, a subscription to the FOL newsletter, a tax deduction (they’re a nonprofit organization), and the joy in knowing you’re helping the comics industry reach new readers. Send dues to: Friends of Lulu, 4657 Cajon Way, San Diego, CA 92115. ITEM! BIG BANG COMICS is working on a great tribute to Jack’s FOURTH WORLD books, featuring their female character VENUS. We’ve seen the penciled pages, and this homage is dead-on! BIG BANG is from IMAGE COMICS; look for it in comics shops soon! ITEM! Have you checked out HOGAN’S ALLEY? It’s a beautifully-produced magazine with something for every fan of comic strips, comic books, animation, & more! Each 100+ page issue is chocked full of features, interviews, reprints, appreciation and analysis. The fifth issue (which is on sale now) includes a special section showing how BARRY WINDSOR-SMITH puts together an issue of his critically-acclaimed STORYTELLER (including plenty of rare art)! We here at TJKC can’t recommend it enough, so give it a shot. Four issue subscriptions are $18.95 ($27.95 overseas) from: HOGAN’S ALLEY, PO Box 47684, Atlanta, GA 30362 or sample them online at www.cagle.com/hogan

KIRBY COLLECTOR CHECKLIST These Issues Of TJKC Are Available – See Page 66 THE COLLECTED TJKC, VOLUME TWO: (NEW!) A whopping 160-page trade paperback, reprinting the soldout TJKC #10-12, plus over 25 more pieces of Kirby art NEVER BEFORE PUBLISHED in TJKC (many are fullpage repros)! Features interviews with JACK & ROZ KIRBY, STEVE GERBER, JOHN BYRNE, MARK EVANIER, ROGER STERN, MARV WOLFMAN, RARE KIRBY ART and more! $14.95 postpaid ($16.95 Canada, $24.95 elsewhere). SHIPS IN JULY — ORDER NOW! SORRY, VOLUME ONE of our TRADE PAPERBACK, plus TJKC #1- 9 ARE SOLD OUT!! TJKC #10-12 ARE SOLD OUT!! But they’re reprinted in the new TJKC TRADE PAPERBACK, Vol 2! (See above — It ships in July — Order now!) TJKC #13: 52-page SUPERNATURAL theme issue! An interview with Jack and Walter Gibson (creator of The Shadow), unpublished 7-page mystery story, DICK AYERS interview, THE DEMON, BLACK MAGIC, SPIRIT WORLD, ATLAS MONSTERS, published pages before inking, and more! New Kirby/Ayers and Kirby/Bissette covers. $4.95 ($5.40 Canada, $7.40 elsewhere) TJKC #14: 52-page THOR theme issue! Interviews with CHIC STONE and WALT SIMONSON! Also, Jack’s uninked pencils to JOURNEY INTO MYSTERY #101 and others, unused THOR #169 art, pros and cons of Vince Colletta, and more! New Kirby/Stone and Kirby/Simonson covers. $4.95 ($5.40 Canada, $7.40 elsewhere) TJKC #15: 52-page SCI-FI issue! A rare Kirby interview, AL WILLIAMSON and MIKE THIBODEAUX interviews, the story behind SKY MASTERS, ETERNALS, MACHINE MAN, CAPTAIN VICTORY, 2001, STARMAN ZERO, SILVER SURFER GRAPHIC NOVEL, Jack’s uninked pencils and more! New Kirby/Williamson and Kirby/Austin covers. $4.95 ($5.40 Canada, $7.40 elsewhere) TJKC #16: 52-page TOUGH GUYS theme issue! A rare interview with Jack, interviews with WILL EISNER and FRANK MILLER, a look at Jack’s tough childhood, features on IN THE DAYS OF THE MOB, BULLSEYE, THE FLYING FOOL, WAR AND WESTERN BOOKS, 1950s COMIC STRIP IDEAS, unpublished art, Jack’s uninked pencils and more! New Kirby/Miller and Kirby/Kesel covers. $4.95 ($5.40 Canada, $7.40 elsewhere) TJKC #17: 68-page DC theme issue! A rare KIRBY INTERVIEW, interviews with NEAL ADAMS, D. BRUCE BERRY, 1997 Kirby Tribute Panel, features on KAMANDI, MANHUNTER, FOURTH WORLD, CHALLENGERS, SANDMAN, unpublished art, Jack’s uninked pencils & more! New Kirby/Royer and Kirby/Rude covers. $5.95 ($6.40 Canada, $8.40 elsewhere) TJKC #18: 68-page MARVEL theme issue! A rare KIRBY INTERVIEW, interviews with STAN LEE, ROY THOMAS, JOHN ROMITA, JOHN BUSCEMA, MARIE SEVERIN, HERB TRIMPE, FLO STEINBERG, GEORGE ROUSSOS, features on ANT-MAN, THE ETERNALS, BLACK PANTHER, unpublished art, Jack’s uninked pencils & more! New Kirby and Kirby/Sinnott covers. $5.95 ($6.40 Canada, $8.40 elsewhere) TJKC #19: 56-page ART theme issue! Interviews with JOE KUBERT, KEVIN EASTMAN, Marvel art controversy discussed by KIRBY, MILLER, EVANIER, GERBER, and GROTH, thesis by GIL KANE, ins & outs of collecting Kirby art, tribute to ROZ, unpublished art, 6-page color section (with Jack’s paintings) & more! New Kirby/Alex Ross cover. $5.95 ($6.40 Canada, $8.40 elsewhere) TJKC POSTER: See pg. 66. $7 ($8 Can., $10 elsewhere) AND DON’T FORGET: COMIC BOOK ARTIST #1: 100-page DC Theme, with ADAMS, INFANTINO, KUBERT, CARDY, KIRBY, GIORDANO, and more! See the ad in this issue. $5.95 ($6.40 Canada, $8.40 elsewhere)

Issue #20 Contents: Lisa Kirby Interview . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .4 (the “Kid From Left Field” speaks) Soiled & Sweet & Sometimes Green! . . .9 (S&K’s women of the Golden Age) Those Marvel-Ous Kirby Women . .1 3 (fun and frolic in the ’60s) SUE’s ’DOs Contest . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .14 (how many did she have? Enter and you could win a free issue!) Gender Relations In The Kirby Pantheon . . .1 8 (from the Fourth World to Eternals) An Oddball Kirby Comic . . . . . . . . .23 (a dreamy visit with Doris Nelson) Dave Stevens Interview . . . . . . . . . . .2 4 (a very revealing discussion with Dave) Romantic Worlds of Sci-Fi . . . . . . . . .3 0 (romance where you’d least expect it) Uncle Carmine’s Fat City Comix . . . .3 1 (Kirby goes underground) Double Centerfold: Galaxy Green . .3 2 (the two unpublished pages at last!) Kirby’s Romance Women . . . . . . . . .3 6 (were they tough enough? Richard Howell tells us) An Exercise In Realism . . . . . . . . . . .3 8 (exploring S&K’s romance books) “True Life Divorce” . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .4 0 (a shocking, unpublished 10-page story from 1970, still in pencil stage!) Jack Kirby Interview . . . . . . . . . . . . . .5 1 (Jack and Don Rico discuss WWII, the Mafia, Watergate, and comics) Captain Victory & the Lightning Lady . .5 7 (the unseen original screenplay that was the basis for the comic book) The Newer Gods . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .6 2 (Jack’s final females take a bow) Flowers for Miss Conway . . . . . . . . .6 3 (a love note to Mr. Edge’s secretary) Collector Comments . . . . . . . . . . . . .6 4

Issue #20, June 1998

The Jack Kirby Collector, Vol. 5, No. 20, June 1998. Published bi-monthly by & © TwoMorrows Advertising & Design, 1812 Park Drive, Raleigh, NC 27605, USA. 919-833-8092. John Morrow, Editor. Pamela Morrow, Asst. Editor. Jon B. Cooke, Assoc. Editor. Single issues: $5.95 ($6.40 Canada, $8.40 elsewhere). Six-issue subscriptions: $24.00 US, $32.00 Canada and Mexico, $44.00 outside North America. First printing. All characters are © their respective companies. All artwork is © Jack Kirby unless otherwise noted. All editorial matter is © the respective authors. PRINTED IN CANADA.

Front cover painting: Ken Steacy Back cover inks: Richard Howell Back cover color: Tom Ziuko Photocopies of Jack’s uninked pencils from published comics are reproduced here courtesy of the Kirby Estate, which has our thanks for their continued support. COPYRIGHTS: Captain Victory and the Lightning Lady, Farrah, Friends of Fandom art, Galaxy Green, Insectons, Klavus, Orca, Sky Masters of the Space Force, Warrior Woman © Jack Kirby Estate. • Love Problems © Harvey Publications • Agatha Harkness, Alicia Masters, Ardina, Betty Ross, Bucky, Captain America, Crystal, Deviants, Don Blake, Doris Nelson/Wilson, Dorma, Enchantress, Eternals, Hela, Hercules, Human Torch, Invisible Girl, Jane Foster, Karnilla, Loki, Margo Damian, Marvel Girl, Medusa, Mr. Fantastic, Red Skull, Scarlet Witch, Sersi, Sharon Carter/Agent 13, Sif, Silver Surfer, Steve Rogers, Tana Nile, Thing, Thor © Marvel Entertainment, Inc. • Beautiful Dreamer, Bernadeth, Big Barda, Count Dragorin, Dr. Bedlam, Granny Goodness, In The Days Of The Mob, Jimmy Olsen, Kanto the Assassin, Lashina, Laura Conway, Lupek, Mad Harriet, Mister Miracle, Orion, Scott Free, Stompa, Superman, Tigra, Toxl the World Killer, True Divorce Cases, Virmin Vundabar © DC Comics, Inc. • Amazon Women, “Back-Door Love”, Blue Bolt, “Different”, “Gang Sweetheart”, Green Sorceress, “Mama’s Boy”, Mother Delilah, Sandra Sylvan, Stuntman, Stuntwoman, “The Girl Who Tempted Me” © Joe Simon & Jack Kirby.

The only ’ zine authorized by the Kirby Estate

The Kid From Left Field Jack & Roz’s youngest daughter Lisa interviewed by John Morrow (Lisa Kirby, whom Jack dubbed “The Kid From Left Field” in the Jimmy Olsen #133 text page, was born September 7, 1960 in Brooklyn, NY. As the youngest of Jack and Roz’s four children, she grew up during her father’s most prolific creative period in comics. She now serves as Co-Executor— with cousin Robert Katz—of her parent’s estate, overseeing usage of Jack’s creations. This interview was conducted by phone on April 6, 1998.)

They thought it would be better to move to a warmer climate. TJKC: I don’t know if you realize it, but indirectly, you’re responsible for the San Diego Comic Convention! (laughter) Fans should be grateful to you for getting your dad out there where they could meet him. LISA: I never thought of it that way. (laughter)

THE JACK KIRBY COLLECTOR: What do you remember about living in New York? Did fans stop by the house at all? LISA KIRBY: I was so little... I’m sure they did. My dad always had people in and out. I remember more from when we moved to California; when we lived in Thousand Oaks, I always remember people being there. It was kind of a constant thing; it was the norm for me. TJKC: The story we’ve all heard was that you had asthma problems, and that’s why the family moved out to California. Is that correct? LISA: Right. It was really bad; I was a really sickly kid, actually. I was in the hospital a lot, I missed a lot of school. My mother had asthma too.

Lisa’s proud parents in the 1990s.

TJKC: How old were you when you moved to California? LISA: I was about eight. TJKC: Did the kids at school know who your dad was, and what he did? LISA: Yeah, it was really neat. I have fond memories of it. He always came to my classroom. When we had parties, he’d draw. He’d take the letter of a child’s first name, and turn it into a super-hero. (laughter) Everybody was enthralled; it made me a very popular kid, (laughter) which was great because I was sick all the time, and I was really shy. I never uttered a word to anybody. I don’t know what happened to me; now I can’t shut up. But in the early years, it really helped me, because otherwise I probably wouldn’t have had any friends! (laughter) It made me really popular. He always did that, even as I got older. I was a preschool teacher for awhile, and he came to my classroom, and did the same thing. So there’s some parents out there with very valuable momentos! (laughter) I wonder if they know they have them. He was always really good about giving back, y’know? TJKC: Did your classmates pester you, wanting to know, “What’s your dad going to draw next issue?” LISA: Everybody would always ask me, and what’s so funny is I never really knew that much. I lived with it, but I never knew that much about what he was doing, I guess because it was just something Dad did; it was his job, and I thought of it that way. Everybody was like, “Were you in your dad’s studio? What is he doing?”(laughter) To me it was like, “Who cares? (laughter) Daddy’s working.” I had a different view, I guess. We just did everyday kid things. I didn’t think anything of it. I saw my father, and I knew that was his job, that’s what he does. I knew it was definitely different than someone else’s father, (laughter) but I just had the attitude of “That’s what he did.” Then I got older and went, “Wow, look at this stuff!” Even today, I’m going through all this work, inventorying everything, and I’m just in awe. I’m almost ashamed of myself; I can’t believe what I missed and did not pay attention to.

Pencils from a FF Annual #5 pin-up. Note Stan Lee’s misspelling of Crystal’s name. 4

TJKC: I take it you weren’t a comic book reader. LISA: No, I wasn’t at all. In fact, I didn’t really get into it until I was older, and noticed, “Wow, this is really good stuff!” When I was younger, it just really didn’t appeal to me that much.

TJKC: Would it be a fair assessment to say your dad was always working? LISA: Oh, yes. He worked all the time. He wasn’t the kind of dad who took us camping or things like that. He was a workaholic. As I was growing up, I was involved with horses; I went to horse shows, and he always came to all my horse shows. He was always really supportive of what I did. But his schedule was: He woke up late, and I’d see him for a little bit in the morning, and then the afternoon hit, and he was working. He was in “the room.” (laughter)

The digital painting that graces this issue’s front cover is by Ken Steacy, based on a Kirby pencil drawing. Ken also did this inked version; if anyone out there has the original pencils to this piece, Ken would be most interested in purchasing them! Please contact TJKC if they’re for sale.

TJKC: So he was home all the time, but you didn’t see a whole lot of him? LISA: No, unless I went in to see what he was doing. He’d come out every so often, but he worked quite a bit. He worked all night long; he’d work till 2:00 in the morning most of the time, then sleep, then start work again at 1:00 or 2:00 in the afternoon. TJKC: Did he work on holidays as well? LISA: No, we always had pretty good family gatherings. I’m sure he probably worked part of the time, but we usually had company and relatives. He was a pretty social guy, so he definitely participated during that time. TJKC: Did all the relatives gather at your place on holidays, or did you take trips? LISA: Once in a while we’d take trips upstate when we lived in New York. When we moved to California, we didn’t have that many relatives in California at the time. Everybody kind of took turns. TJKC: Was it really tough being the youngest child? LISA: Not really, because I was a spoiled brat. (laughter) I think I was “Daddy’s Girl” to tell you the truth. I hate to admit it. He was very overprotective. I was the baby. TJKC: Which of you four kids was the most into what your dad was doing? LISA: Probably my brother [Neal]. My sister Susan was a singer, and she was always involved in music, and traveled around a lot. But my brother was home a lot, and he probably read more comic books than any of us. I think he was more into reading them, and got into the whole thing more than the rest of us.

really notice. I think they thought it was really cool. They’d come over and say, “Wow, this is what your dad does? Can I see the studio? Can I meet your dad?” We’d go in there, and of course my dad would go into his stories—you know how he is. They’d go into, like, some kind of hypnotic state. (laughter) They’d hang out in there for a while, and it was neat; then they’d come out. But as I got older, my boyfriends started to venture in there, and I’d never see them again—then I got a little resentful! (laughter)

TJKC: Roz talked about how often you had people over. LISA: (laughter) We always had people over. She forgot me at school once because there were people over. (laughter) They were just really good that way; they’d open their doors to everybody. TJKC: Didn’t that get really annoying for you as a kid, to constantly have strangers over? LISA: I guess I was just content. It was something that was always there and that I was used to. It didn’t really matter to me; I was always out riding my horse, and had a lot of friends I hung out with. I just got used to people coming in: “Oh, who’s here today?” (laughter) Then my friends would come over and disappear into “the room” and I’d never see them again, either.

TJKC: What did your dad think of your boyfriends? LISA: In the era I grew up and started dating in—the late ’70s—most of them had long hair and were kind of hippie-ish. He made the comment: Why couldn’t I meet someone that had shorter hair? (laughter) I heard that a few times. They were really good about my friends. Sure, they got scrutinized, and before I went out, they had to know where I was going, and what time I’d be home, and this and that, like any other parent.

TJKC: Was anybody ever friends with you just to meet your dad? LISA: I don’t know. It could’ve been that way, but if it was I didn’t

TJKC: Was your mom more strict with that kind of stuff than your dad? 5

The good, the bad, and the ugly: The women of Simon & Kirby’s crime comics. the kitchen,” and employ a rough and tough female fighting force to make it stick! Naturally, the boys show the ladies that not all men are hopeless, but have to escape the isle in a hail of gunfire! A post-war comics bust spelled doom for the Harvey titles. By the time the dust had settled, Jack was back to the drawing board to begin one of the most productive periods of his career.

these stories. The other-worldly tales of suspense offered little else for them to do. Much less complex or layered than the other S&K titles, most of these brief tales had an interesting beginning, a short middle, and a snap ending. Kirby’s ladies had to stand aside in the rush; but the new decade of the ’50s offered up one lady who wouldn’t stand aside.

“Oh How I Hate Thees Man”

Mean. Scornful. Fearful in her wrath. And beautiful as any Kirby woman, patterned after any film star you can imagine. Davis? A touch. Crawford? More than a little. Dietrich? Right out of Destry Rides Again (’39). She is Mother Delilah from Boys’ Ranch #3 (Feb. 1951)—one of the most celebrated stories from that series, and rightly so. Another ‘kid-gang’ with an adult guardian (Clay Duncan) set in the Wild West—sure, more kids with guns, but also with much more depth than previous S&K kid-gang strips—the basic elements that had made the romance and crime books so thematically strong were applied here as well. Boys’ Ranch became a multi-leveled experience, with plenty of rootin’-tootin’ twogun fun for fans of the genre, mixed with strong storytelling. Mother Delilah stands as one of the strongest. The epic unfolds Mother Delilah. like a John Ford western, introducing all the main characters and conflicts in just a few panels. Clay’s rebuff of saloon hostess Del triggers a plan meant to hurt the frontiersman via the young Angel. (Spoiler Warning: The ending of “Mother Delilah” is told here!) She mothers the boy, and the relationship softens both of them. Clay confronts Delilah with demands that she stop seeing Angel, and she decides to play dirty. She cuts the trusting boy’s long hair off. (When she does, Kirby shows her in turmoil, reluctant but determined.) When Angel sees her work, he runs off as her laughter fills the panel. Strong stuff. Angel regains his self-respect as his hair grows back, but Delilah finds her own redemption only by dying. She saves Clay from an ambush and leaps in front of bullets meant for him. As the saloon “poet” speaks her eulogy, Angel kneels over her body. In truth, her type died with her. She was the culmination of over ten years of the developing Kirby Golden Age female. Although the romance and suspense titles would continue for a couple more years, that particular style of Jack’s art would continue to develop, and by the mid-’50s, the way he drew women would change again. The Golden Age gave way to the Silver Age; the end became a new beginning; and Jack was there for that beginning as well!♥

“Better To Be Scorned Than Dead”

The Simon & Kirby team’s new home was Crestwood Publications, where a favorable financial share of the profits provided extra incentive to produce hits—and they did! In a handful of titles, S&K rolled out romance, crime, and magic. In all, women found new levels of importance. While serving in the military, Joe Simon had come to the realization that traditional super-hero/funny animal books were just not enough to appeal to all types of readers. He made some notes and sketches for a new type of comic, and filed them away until after the war. The romance comic was the result. Since you’ll find an in-depth study of the romance titles elsewhere in this issue, we’ll move on with just this: Kirby’s women now became central characters with no costumed hero to run off with the story, or no cute kids with Tommyguns on hand to blast the bad guys. Stories became finely structured, talky soap operas in an old-time romantic tradition; and if it worked in romance comics—why not in crime comics? Justice Traps The Guilty and Headline took that romance formula and added guns and gangsters. Women found themselves trapped in a dark world of noir-ish nightmares—not only as victims, but also as first-person narrators of sordid stories of sin. Sometimes they were dark-haired, steely-eyed firebrands, packing guns, leading gangs, robbing stores, and breaking bones in insurance scams. Other times they’d be sticky-sweet, the sister of a kid gone wrong, or the naive childhood sweetheart of a confirmed heel—always caught between the law and their heart, or just plain greedy. Jack’s art by this time had found new levels of craftsmanship. The plot-driven narrative called for slick page layouts to keep the reader interested. Explosive fistand gun-fights were bracketed by melodramatic build-ups. Dialogue spouted from figures frozen mid-motion, or posing in pin-up-like display. The women became reflections of their souls: Cold eyes, chiseled, severe faces for the “bad girls”; blonde-haired, wide-eyed, round faces for the “good girls.” Most were dressed in the period-style of the story, clothes hanging drape-like with weight and folds sharply shaded. From wild dancehall parties, to saloons, to banks, to common street scenes, Kirby presented the crimes on the scene, and took the ladies along for the ride.

“I Talked With My Dead Wife” By the time Black Magic #1 came out (Oct. ’50), the romance/ crime formula was set, and all that was needed was to plug supernatural elements into the mix. Women again reverted to supporting roles in 12

Those Marvel-Ous Kirby Women by Mike Gartland “Yes, I like strong women. I respect women in general. Women have always had great potential. They’re continuing to become prominent in their own way.” Jack Kirby, Comicscene Magazine interview, 1993

(left) Sue appears brave and strong in FF #1, but faints after battling the Hulk (wouldn’t you?) in #25.

ack Kirby did indeed like strong women, and this does include the ones that he created for Marvel in the ’60s. There are those who dispute this—they criticize the women of Marvel (we’re talking Silver Age ’61-’70 Kirby) for being loaded with stereotypical, male chauvinistic condescension—but as this article hopes to show, it wasn’t as it appeared, as much as how it read. Just as with the majority of the male super-heroes at Marvel at the time, Kirby was responsible for the co-creation of virtually all of the female characters (excluding only the ones co-created by Steve Ditko)— and since Kirby was definitely established as the major character consultant, he probably had some input into the characters that he didn’t directly introduce as an artist (like The Black Widow for example).

did her part as a member of the team. Some people point out that all she ever did was cook, shop, and faint—which she did, too—but these are present-day minds passing present-day judgments on a character created in the early ’60s. Sue is introduced as a socialite-type person; later on she gets married, has a child, and tries to settle down into a family environment. To me, at least, this seems like average, normal behavior for a lady in the early ’60s (people like to shop and cook; what’s so stereotypical about that?). If she fainted, it was generally because she was battling a force beyond her abilities, like the Hulk, for example; if you had to fight the Hulk, you might find yourself fainting too! Readers at the time apparently protested that she wasn’t contributing as a member of the team. Personally I can’t see a reason for it; she prominently adds to the stories in the first ten issues. If anything, I guess it just came down to the fact that there was a predominately male readership at the time (in super-hero and monster comics anyway), and that her three companions were a little more colorful. In the early ’60s there were many blonde personalities prominent on TV and in the movies—Marilyn Monroe, Jayne Mansfield, Connie Stevens, Dorothy Provine, etc.—and perhaps Jack molded Sue after some of them. He certainly drew her from a contemporary point of view, so Jack was obviously keeping an eye on the times; you’ll notice that before she was costumed, Sue was always rendered fashionably. Alicia was introduced in FF #8 and I’m wondering if she was created for the story itself—as a one-time character—or if as the story went on it was decided to develop her as a love interest for Ben Grimm. She Is Alicia (disguised as Sue) using was drawn to resemble Sue Storm some form of telepathy in FF #8? for the sake of the story, but later (below) FF #49, Alicia’s finest hour. developed her own look (of note is the fact that on page 16 she is depicted by Kirby as holding her hands to her head, in a mentalistic E.S.P. fashion, and dialogue is conspicuously absent from the large empty space overhead; was Kirby trying to imbue her with a sixth sense or other power?). Definitely a supporting character, but Kirby never abandons her for too long a stretch, using her prominently in several FF stories—the most famous being FF #66-67, and Alicia’s greatest moment, in FF #49. There’s no mistaking Medusa as anything but a powerful woman; she is tough and comes out swingin’, quite literally, in her first appearance in FF #36. This is a wonderful

Pin-up from FF Annual #1. Evidence on the original art suggests Jack wrote all the copy, indicating his overwhelming conceptual input. Besides creating the major female characters for Fantastic Four and Thor, he also contributed important ladies to X-Men, Hulk, Avengers, Captain America, and Sub-Mariner storylines. Some of these were created as full-blown major characters; others started out as supporting characters whom Kirby would increase in importance as time went on. In researching these ladies it is easy to see that Kirby imbued each of them with their own distinct personality, and it becomes evident that they all start out as strong women—if not physically, then most assuredly characteristically. Whether Kirby used anyone as inspiration, I can only speculate. I would like to stress that in order to see what Kirby may have intended, the reader must not read. You have to review Kirby’s ’60s Marvel comics like picture books, disregarding the dialogue because one cannot be sure if it was following Kirby’s plots. You will then notice that nearly all of the major female characters are drawn as selfassured and level-headed women. This is evident in the very beginning with Sue Storm in FF #1. She appears to be just as strong emotionally as the other three, and this confidence in characterization continues throughout the series. She 13

and value of “manhood” a more pivotal question, in these books than in much of the entertainments contemporaneous to them, with or without Kirby’s byline. Collectively, the themes’ exploration in Kirby’s two best-regarded opuses seems to address concerns that were central to him as both an artist and a citizen.

Neither Jack’s Women Nor Yours:

Clash Of The Titans

Gender Relations in the Kirby Pantheon, by Adam Sternberg McGovern

Fans are justly fond of comparing and contrasting the Fourth World titles and The Eternals. They are Kirby’s two crowning attempts at epic storytelling and universal artistic statement. Each are impressive syntheses of heroic lore and personified values recurrent throughout history and across cultures. The differences are readily discernible— Fourth World’s inspiration was more Biblical while Eternals’ was more mythological; Fourth World’s tone was more spiritual/magical while Eternals’ was more secular/technological; Fourth World’s stated relationship to its sources was more enigmatic while Eternals’ was more literal, etc. Similarly, Fourth World segmented its themes among its three constituent storylines while Eternals compressed all into one. Yet in both sagas we see issues of male/female participation, and examinations of the combative and cooperative sensibilities respectively assigned by history to men and women.

ttuned to pop-cultural currents like few others in either the “folk” or “high” arts of his time, Jack Kirby never produced a comic that didn’t reflect its social moment. But it was never more than in his mythology-based series that he reflected on the issues of the ages. The Fourth World trilogy and the Eternals saga were the principal works in which humankind’s struggle (and indeed ambivalence) between conflict and peace, order and free will, solitude and oneness (both societal and spiritual)—and, to no lesser extent, our mystification with gender—were projected and tentatively resolved. Women are more of a literal and thematic presence, and the nature

Got Any New Goddesses? In a mid-’80s interview (see TJKC #16), Kirby, the master of two-fisted fantasy, remarked curiously and poignantly that “In this kind of an age, I don’t think we can afford power... of any kind.” And in this age, it’s still men who wield the power—along with an occasional handful of women like Margaret Thatcher, whose admission price is equal brutality. As such, the Fourth World’s flagship title, New Gods, was pervaded with what critic Amy Taubin has seen in the films of Martin Scorcese: A “critique of masculinity” (Village Voice, 3/11/98). Reading the series can be a grueling experience of unrelieved combat, showing just how much the cycle’s centerpiece needed the humanizing influence of its satellite narratives The Forever People and Mister Miracle. Epic conflict is a traditionally male domain (in its principals if not its victims), and there is a corresponding scarcity of major female characters in New Gods, as noted by Elayne Wechsler-Chaput in TJKC #6. Nonetheless, a female perspective is present and crucial in the series. Most notably, the women in New Gods act as chorus and conscience, admonishing the male actors (quite possibly in vain) on the desolation —and even doom—of their chosen course. In #7, New Goddess Avia exhorts her husband Izaya to enjoy life rather than relish battle, shortly before she falls in the assassination that will spur him to initiate a martial holocaust and then spend an eternity in penitent pacifism. In issue #8 mortal playwright Eve Donner (significantly, a creator rather than destroyer—Avia’s specific regret had been that she’d never heard Izaya sing) confronts series-protagonist Orion on the suicidal intensity of his righteous vengefulness, first pitying him and finally, as he runs back to conflict, wishing him the peace that may be the one thing beyond his powers.

The Lightray Touch Granny Goodness looks especially ruthless in these pencils from Mister Miracle #8. 18

Elsewhere in the storyline, a male voice is the commentator on Orion’s brand of masculinity. The dashing and comfortably fey Lightray repeatedly reins

in his volatile comrade’s fearsome outbursts, gently rebukes Orion for his cynical dismissal of two overheard young lovers, is solicitous and apologetic toward forthcoming Earth women who don’t get past Orion’s hostile shell, and soliloquizes his mystification at what motivates the contest between males of Earth, New Genesis and Apokolips he sees unfold in the “Death Wish of Terrible Turpin” episode. A native of New Genesis rather than a refugee from Apokolips like Orion (who in #6 laments war’s intrusion upon personalities like Lightray’s, thereby implying his own emotional limitations), Lightray’s rejection of machismo (at least in principle) is complete. It is clear that New Genesis embraces the equality principle; though Orion’s personal life is devoid of the comforts and counsel of women, he adheres to his adoptive society’s codes, fully involving secretary Claudia Shane in the operations he undertakes with his other human allies, and exhorting one of them (accountant Victor Lanza) that Lanza’s wife (who theretofore has apparently been kept in the dark) is welcome to share the secrets of the Apokolips/New Genesis war.

Woman and Superwoman n The Eternals, Kirby found himself confining a tale of the Fourth World’s epic scope to a single title; the thematic strands which could be comfortably dispersed among that cycle’s three books here had to be woven into one. Consequently, woman were front-and-center from The Eternals’ earliest days.

The Good... Margo Damian is the first we meet, part of a father-daughter archaeologist team which has stumbled upon evidence of prehistoric alien visitors to the Earth. Upon the return of these “Space Gods” (who genetically engineered the human race, the super-heroic Eternals, and the malevolent “Deviants” from primordial apes), a force-field cordoned base of operations is set up from which they will render a 50-year judgment of their ancient handiwork. When the elder Dr.

Father Knows Best? True, in #6 Orion (with no contradiction from Lightray) practically orders the young Lynn Sheridan (who has earlier expressed dismay at her hawk father and dove brother’s mutual animosity) to fly Orion’s “astro-harness” away from a gathering battle when she begs to stay by her father’s side. It’s a scene which will be echoed in Eternals #3 (see below), and exhibits some of the ambiguities which would never be fully resolved in Kirby’s oeuvre. After the death of his son, the father has slipped into traumatic dementia and awaits what he imagines to be his real-life WWII enemies, thereby introducing a theme of crazy old men making their suicidal decisions while young women escape and live on. In this light, Lynn’s compulsory departure can be seen as sexism on Orion’s part, or can be interpreted as a kind of blunt manumission (or womanumission). Paradoxically, the act represents a man breaking through a woman’s socially-conditioned sacrificial deference—though to do it, he himself declines the sensitivity traditionally relegated to the female realm, and assumes the authority to dictate a woman’s behavior “for her own good” (not a quote from the story).

Our Mother, Who Art In A Box Of course, beyond New Gods’ narratively marginal (if thematically pivotal) female characters, there is a female essence which figures prominently throughout the Fourth World cycle. Most protagonists use, and in an oblique way commune with, their “Mother Box,” a bizarre talismanic palmtop which links them to the wisdom of their ancestors and has ineffable protective (and even therapeutic) properties. “She” is a high-tech stand-in for the intermediary role between humanity and divinity played by a host of male and female spirits in the Jewish Kabala belief system, and by the Virgin Mary in Catholicism. Orion’s Mother Box charitably “re-shifts the atoms” of his face to resemble a native New Genesis visage, but when his ferocious temperament disrupts the introspective depth needed to connect with the device, a resurgently grotesque exterior manifests his other nature, his Mr. Hyde masculinity.

Orion’s mother Tigra makes a surprise appearance in Mister Miracle #8. 19

think the mark of the ’70s really isn’t all the crappy scandals we see around us. What I think is happening between ourselves is remarkable. I know on my block, the only way you could make yourself known in any way was in an aggressive way. There was no other way out.

feel that Nixon played that kind of game. He was true to that game, he was consistent. He got paid off and he paid off. Liddy played the game, and he was rough. I’m quite sure he’s done in a few guys. RICO: I covered the Liddy hearings for CBS as a courtroom sketch artist. I had to familiarize myself with his face first so I went to my files and got out the old Liddy photographs—he had a full face, nice smile, and so forth. I then went to the court and set myself up—and in came the most shriveled-up scarecrow you ever saw in your life. His eyes were sunken into his face, bones prominent, no neck to speak of, he was a dead man. He stood at the stand and never moved, just talked. So I made the drawings as I saw him—and I drew a ghost. When they telecast the drawings, I got many letters congratulating me on what I had done. I had shown the effect of what Watergate had done to this man.

RICO: My block was so bad that even the mobsters kept quiet. KIRBY: It was a macho world. The gangsters locked me in a telephone booth—I was about nine years old. They used to hang out in a candy store on the corner. They locked me in a booth and they all began to kick the door at once. That can scare the hell out of you. RICO: We had a more sophisticated group of gangsters on my block. I was about thirteen and I got into a fight with somebody, and I was on top of this guy, beating the hell out of him. A pair of hands reached out and picked me up. It was a guy called “The Ox.” He says (heavy Italian accent used here), “Hey Rico, stop what ya doin’. Whaddaya doin’ that for? Yer an artist, ya got yer hands, get outta here! Don’t hurt yer hands!” He kicked me out, and he beat the guy up. It’s a true story. These guys watched out for their own. If you had a certain kind of talent, they made sure you were all right.

M: Jack, which strip have you enjoyed drawing the most of all those you’ve done? Which do you think is your best? KIRBY: That’s a common question for everybody—you don’t really know. All you can say is that whatever you’re working on, if it gives you enjoyment, that’s it.

KIRBY: Listen, even the gangsters are articulate today.

M: Is there anything you ever did in comics that you’re ashamed of? Something that you did purely for the money and that was just a complete piece of trash as far as your standards were concerned?

M: A lot of the Mafia families turn out decent, law-abiding people who make contributions to society. We know they get what they want, OK? If they would publish this novel just the way you wanted it, would you go along with it?

KIRBY: I did it for the money and I got the money, but the strip lasted one issue: The Red Raven!!! The Red Raven, boy, it was a real dud!

RICO: That’s a good question and I’ll answer it in another way: There are publishing houses owned by the Mafia.

M: It was just the Sub-Mariner with wings, wasn’t it? KIRBY (Breaking up): Gee, I don’t know what it was! It was a guy in red underwear with wings and he looked pretty good to me. Boy, he just konked out in the first issue! And you just sit there wondering what the hell happened. You just can’t explain it. Sure, that kind of thing happens all the time.♥ (below) Unused art from In The Days Of The Mob #2.

HARMON: There sure are. There are publishing companies owned by the Mafia who publish books exposing the Mafia. RICO: Nixon’s father wasn’t a mobster. KIRBY: Some people play a game called “Screw your buddy week.” I

Captain Victory & The Lightning Lady The Original Screenplay © Jack Kirby and Steve Sherman mental draws rapidly closer, it becomes more violent in nature, until we find ourselves swept into its blinding fury. When we are inside its chaotic core, our senses are assaulted by naked light and frightening, unbearable sound. This nightmarish experience ends at its most terrifying peak and, abruptly, we plunge through to face a startled policeman and a crowd of onlookers. The viewer begins to understand what this movement through the barrier represents when we see the policeman confronted by a smiling young man attired in a costume—a costume common to the super-hero genre. Although it is apparently of some kind of fabric, it has a dull, metallic sheen and is molded extremely well to his body. This man is capable of guided levitation and it was his flight through the barrier the viewer experienced. “How did you get in there?” asks the policeman. “How did you get out of there?”

(The concept of Captain Victory began in the mid-1970s as this movie screenplay by Jack and Steve Sherman. This first draft story treatment was initially submitted on March 11, 1977, and while a number of things changed when Jack produced it in comics form, the character of the Lightning Lady is remarkably well-defined. Our thanks to Steve Sherman for sharing this rare gem with us.) he film opens with a weirdly-diffused lighting effect which leaps busily across the screen, accompanied by a soft, droning, musical hum, the strange embodiment of what is happening on the screen. The formless, shifting light begins to resolve itself in more meaningful terms to the viewer. The humming sound has grown louder. It is recognizable as a human chorus imitating the collective buzzing of an insect swarm. In effect, what we are witnessing, as the image is brought into sharper focus, is the human equivalent of a beehive in the heat of furious activity. Men and women, in sharply animated condition, jostle past each other in endless haste to accomplish some nameless task in an alien structure, which is not unlike the natural environment of a bee colony as visualized by the average audience. This, in fact, is just what a larger overall shot of this scene communicates to the viewer, as the sound, having reached crescendo, blends with the devastating impact of the entire image: A sight, similar to the startling and intriguing sensation achieved by one who has sliced away the section of a hive to reveal the massive turmoil within. The people, in a far shot, ape the seething movement of an insect horde, in tightly packed numbers, diligently engaged with some universal purpose, undefinable and alien to the human mind. We begin to rise above this scene, for a larger view of the structure, as it breaks through the surface of the Earth in an ugly lumpish design, like some monstrous mouth emerging from the soil, its giant, bony teeth poking through the cracked surface of the wide circular heap caused by the force of its thrust. On the surface, the buzzing has subsided and become a tolling bell which echoes in the deserted streets of a fairsized town. The buildings and stores look unoccupied. Traffic vehicles are not to be seen. A rooftop shot of the surrounding countryside accents the complete absence of life. It is a place sucked clean of all moving things—an empty husk, a past tense existing in the present. We are now on a road, moving like a car, past billboards leading out of town. It is on the progression of these signs that the film’s title and credits are brought into view. This is accompanied by appropriate music, which increases in pace as the speed of movement accelerates with each passing sign. The last billboard rushes out of view as the road and billboards become a moving blur, hurtling at the audience at breakneck speed. The lighting starts to fade as we barrel through the growing darkness. We hear the roll of thunder, and the first flashes of lightning make an eerie web of the sky. A moment later, the sky becomes alive with the continuous traces of fiery brilliance, which now forms a permanent curtain of lightning across the black horizon. As this ele-

Pencils from Captain Victory #3. 57

Orion for who he is both then and now. In the end, Orion’s real triumph is to leave Apokolips with his rescued mother and Bekka, for “Life beckons.” Perhaps in this new, forward-thinking family unit, this community mostly of women, Bekka will transcend her helpmeet status as much as she’s surpassed Orion’s understanding.

The Newer Gods By Adam Sternberg McGovern

irby had clearly given the Fourth World’s gender dynamics further thought by the time he revisited it in 1985 with the Hunger Dogs graphic novel. In many ways as haunting a tale as any in the original cycle (notwithstanding a somewhat hurried and contrived last few pages tacked on at DC’s insistence), it finds Orion returning to his hellish birthplace of Apokolips, not for the Oedipal father-son slugfest with Darkseid as “prophesied” throughout the series, but for the love of a woman—Bekka, daughter of Scott Free’s mentor Himon.

You’ve Come a Long Way? Our sociology of the Kirby pantheon wouldn’t be complete without mentioning “Even Gods Must Die,” a frightful rush-job done to fill out the mid-’80s New Gods reprint series and “lead in” to Hunger Dogs. Produced under pressure from DC, Kirby’s dignity should be spared discussion of this travesty, but for one noteworthy (and to some, notorious) scene with Granny Goodness and the Female Furies (minus an M.I.A. Barda). On Darkseid’s new, automated Apokolips, Granny has been demoted from warrior-trainer to petty supervisor of the

The Woman Ahead Of The Man Raised in seclusion and thus still in possession of a moral optimism foreign (though attractive) to Orion, her influence gradually opens his eyes to a destiny other than vengeful martyrdom. Like the Old Testament heroines she’s modeled after in demeanor as well as name and appearance, she’s strong if not active, exercising an independent mind within gender-role constraints which aren’t particularly explained or justified in the text. Bekka rebukes her father for the “foolish”-ness of his desperate acts in these final days of the Apokolips/ New Genesis conflict (a sentiment seconded in Kirby’s own narration); she chides a reunited Orion and Lightray for the “silly games” of their affectionate wrestling (before diverting them with a serving of food!); she counsels Orion in the only moments of doubt and fear we’ve ever seen him express—and, in Kirby’s final scene of sensible daughters outliving doomed fathers, she bravely escapes an Apokolips engulfed in cataclysm at Himon’s dying command, but under her own power.

Orion’s Better Half The change in Orion is profound but convincingly gradual. First, after a monumental battle he barely survives, we see him admitting his “want” for love to Himon (at the same moment that Bekka’s concern awakens her father to the realization of where Orion has found it). Then we see him unself-consciously bidding farewell to Lightray in the language of love poetry: “See, Bekka? How like a wandering star he seems. How like a passing spring which ends its stay in the fading light of dismal times!” Immediately thereafter, he confesses being “afraid” of such times to Bekka, and professes his hatred of war. Hatred or no, he still hasn’t completely renounced it, but he next shows up fomenting rebellion amongst Apokolips’ “lowlies”—in effect, dedicating himself to popular will rather than the top-down (read: patriarchal) concentration of power in one individual, be it Darkseid as despot or Orion as deliverer. At the end of this sequence we even see him praying, in a sense, to the New Gods’ mystical “Source” for mercy toward the spirit of a fallen enemy (the once-idealistic Esak of New Genesis, long-since turned cynical armaments designer on Apokolips). “I understand your torture and pain,” he tells Esak, directly before realizing he must reveal his true face to Bekka, for “There can be no love... unless it can live with truth!” —an insight she had already grasped, accepting

The infamous scene in 1984’s New Gods; button-pushing didn’t agree with these former warriors. 62

technicians who monitor mechanized sentries. These posts are filled by disgruntled ex-Furies, who subject Granny to insubordinate taunts and even physical abuse, and fall to nostalgic brawling (in-between push-button sabotage of Darkseid’s patrols) before being disciplined through remote-control electro-shock by male overseers. This sequence underscores the narrow span of opportunities for women in Kirby’s idea of dystopia (and, consequently, the shades of gray in even the most villainous of the saga’s female characters). Kirby was clearly scarred by his WWII infantry experiences and anxious about Cold War-era militarism, and seemed to associate both with rampant masculinity: A telling coming-attractions caption in

Eternals #16 declares, “In a battle between males, the deciding factor is always an angry woman.” His 1984 comments to Amazing Heroes magazine noted that Barda “was just as important as anybody else” in the original cycle, and promised that in Hunger Dogs “the women are going to be the big surprise. Women are important to my work.” Their level of prominence in the graphic novel didn’t quite match the expectations fostered by Kirby’s remarks, but their importance to his work, either at the center of action or in absentia, was always plain to see.♥ (Thanks to John Morrow for loaners and the lead on Amazing Heroes, and to Robert Alter’s The Art of Biblical Narrative for an insight in Paragraph Two, Sentence Two.)

Flowers For Miss Conway (In which Jimmy Olsen explains why Morgan Edge’s secretary is the greatest thing since Wite-Out TM) by Robert L. Bryant, Jr. Dear Miss Conway—May I call you Laura? Laura, I hope you liked the flowers Clark Kent and I sent you after your... unusual... illness and that whole mess with Count Dragorin and Dabney Donovan’s weird experiment. It was a wild trip!! I know you probably see us as a couple of busybodies—always hanging around your office at Galaxy Broadcasting, trying to pry information about Morgan Edge out of you, trying to make you put us ahead of your duty to your boss. I wouldn’t trust Mr. Edge if I were you—he’s got a dark side you don’t know about. But that’s not really what I wanted to say. Laura, I’ve known a lot of super-women—a lot of 38-24-38 heroines trying to save the Earth from one menace or another. You know how it is when you live in Metropolis; you can’t walk across the street without bumping into a statuesque crusader with a skintight costume and a giant ego. But you, you’re different—you’re the girl next door, you don’t have any of those clichéd old super-powers, you’re not out to conquer the universe. You’re just making a living working 9 to 5. You’re a normal 1971 woman. Wow. You’re a breath of fresh air!! I love your sense of humor, like the time you told Don Rickles you’d do it when he suggested that you “Get yourself a bikini and start a chain of heart attacks at a garden party!” He was right. You do deserve “something better than a typewriter and this sneaky crumb,” Morgan Edge. You should have seen the way you looked when Clark lifted you up in his arms in Mr. Edge’s office after you’d been “bitten” by Dragorin’s long-distance vampire power—you were all arms and legs and flowing hair in a tight red dress—you were so vulnerable and sexy and mysterious, all at the same time! (I hope you don’t mind me saying so. Golly.) Well, it was then that I decided I had to get to know you better. There’s just nobody else like you around here. Anyway, Laura, you think you’d be up for a movie Saturday night? I could pick you up around 7:00. And I don’t like to brag, but I’ve got the coolest car you ever saw in your life! Sincerely,

Jimmy Olsen

Cover pencils to Jimmy Olsen #143; poor Ms. Conway was the first victim of Count Dragorin. 63