Giant-Size Spider-Man #3. Doc Savage

(Cover from January 1975.)

"The Yesterday Connection!"

Written by Gerry Conway.

Drawn by Ross Andru.

Inked by Mike Esposito.

Lettered by Ray Holloway.

Colours by George Roussos.

If ever a story was going to have a tough time making me dislike it, it was going to be this one, for the simple reason that it features 1930s' adventurer Doc Savage. It's not that I love Doc Savage. It's that, the 1970s Ron Ely movie apart, I don't actually know anything about him. I don't even know if he's literally made of bronze. So, anything that allows me to see the legend in action's going to grab me.

From how he goes about things in this tale, with his secret lab, speeding automobile, gadgets and blatant wealth, he appears to have a distinct Bruce Wayne vibe to him. I'm not sure about his seeming army of assistants though. With all of those knocking around, his section of the tale seems somewhat overcrowded. And not a woman among them?

Fortunately, a woman soon appears to fill that particular gap in Doc's life, as a half-naked, light-blue space-babe called Desinna appears in order to enlist the aid of first him and then Spider-Man in dealing with a giant energy being called Tarros.

While Doc Savage more or less falls for the tale Desinna spins him, Spider-Man's made of more cynical stuff and does the exact opposite of what she wants. Enabling Tarros to take the treacherous Desinna back to her own world of Saku. It's a pleasing twist that, when we're expecting Spidey to have a fight with the monster and finish the battle Doc Savage started forty years earlier, instead he helps the thing. Of course, there's the point that Spidey might know Desinna's been economical with the truth but that doesn't actually mean Tarros is a good guy, and Spidey has no way of knowing just what fate the monster has in store for Desinna as he takes her away. Oh well, I suppose we just have to put it down to his spider-sense or something. Or maybe we just have to accept that super-heroes always get things right, despite all evidence to the contrary.

This is the issue where we learn that Spider-Man has a lot more learning than we even knew he had. Not content with being one of the world's great scientific minds, it turns out he can decipher Morse Code and has a knowledge of comparative languages that enables him to get the gist of what the alien Tarros is saying. Loiks, is there anything Peter Parker can't do?

Like Giant-Size Spider-Man #1 where our hero never actually got round to meeting the character he shared the cover with, in this issue Spider-Man never actually meets Doc Savage and his cohorts. Whereas in that earlier tale, the non-meeting was a weakness, here it's a good thing. The only way for such an encounter to happen would've been for time travel to be involved and, for me, Spider-Man and time travel never sit comfortably together. It's fine for the likes of the Fantastic Four or the Avengers but Spidey's world should always be that bit more humdrum than theirs.

Of course, even the chance to learn more about Doc Savage can't blind me to all flaws and there is one quibble. I'm not sure about the fact that, unlike Doc Savage, Spidey sorts out the situation because, unlike Savage, he lives in a time when men know that women aren't always trustworthy. Really? Has he never read any of those hard-boiled detective novels that were so big in Savage's time?

Or what about all those old pulp magazines - you know, the sort that Doc Savage used to appear in - where, whatever else she might be, the one thing the beautiful dame isn't always is trustworthy?

Giant-Size Super-Heroes #1. Man-Wolf and Morbius

(Cover from 1974.)

"Man-Wolf At Midnight!"

Written by Gerry Conway.

Drawn by Gil Kane.

Inked by Mike Esposito.

Lettering by John Costanza.

Colours by Linda Lessmann.

Morbius is back in town - and he's decided to take control of the Man-Wolf.

Why? I couldn't say. While the sight of a vampire and werewolf heading off together down the street's an appealing one, Morbius' plan is to get an ESU professor to give him a total blood transfusion and cure him of his vampirism. Why he needs the Man-Wolf for this, I don't know. Maybe he needs his lupine lackey to distract Spider-Man while he visits the prof but why does he expect Spider-Man to turn up? Spidey wouldn't even have reason to suspect he was in town, let alone that he was about to pay the professor a visit. By blundering around New York at street level, with the Man-Wolf in tow, all he's doing is guaranteeing he'll be spotted.

Then again, Morbius isn't the only one acting irrationally. Spider-Man clearly realises Morbius wants the professor to cure him. At this point, anyone with a functioning brain and sense of social responsibility would offer Morbius all the help he could in order to end the threat his vampiric state poses.

So, what does Spider-Man do?

Everything he can to wreck Morbius' plan! And then, when he succeeds, he seems to think he's achieved a victory, happily ignoring the fact he's preserved the existence of a menace and guaranteed that more innocent people will die.

It's not the first time our hero's acted like this. He did the same when confronted by the Molten Man's attempts to cure himself in Amazing Spider-Man #133. Interesting then that that encounter gets a name-check in this tale. Maybe we have to accept Spider-man really is as big a menace as J Jonah Jameson has always said he is.

The story's entertaining enough but it seems to me the main problem is that its "Giant-Size" tag's completely unearned. The story's too short. When it comes, the ending really is abrupt. It seems like we're about to get another ten-or-so pages of action, as Spidey tracks down and defeats Morbius - and the Man-Wolf, but, instead, from out of nowhere, we get an epilogue. The end of the tale came as such a surprise I genuinely had to check I hadn't turned two pages at once and missed something. Nothing's resolved and the tale seems to serve merely as a means of bringing back John Jameson's furry alter-ego. While I've no objection to his return, the fact he's shown as a mere patsy for Morbius, and no great threat to Spider-Man, does mean you're given no reason to feel excited that he's back.

Speaking of mysteries, I'm still baffled as to how Morbius worked out from a story in the Daily Bugle that the Man-Wolf is in fact John Jameson, and it does seem a remarkable feat for him to just happened to have found the only drunk in New York City who saw the climax of Spider-Man's first fight with the Man-Wolf. In the next panel, Morbius says that finding the gem that causes Jameson's condition was the only bit of luck he needed in the whole plan. Really? Some might say that finding the only person, in a city of some ten million people, who happened to have the information he needed took a fair bit of good fortune.

It's hard for me to comment on the artwork. It's by Gil Kane so I assume it's fine but I'm using a copy of Essential Spider-Man Volume 6 and the quality of reproduction's terrible. It genuinely looks like the it came out of a fax machine. I know the Essentials are supposed to be cheap and cheerful but you can't help feeling it wouldn't have killed Marvel to have got someone in to touch-up the inking so it at least looked publishable.

Giant-Size Spider-Man #1. Dracula

(Cover from July 1974.)

"Ship Of Fiends!"

Written by Len Wein.

Pencilled by Ross Andru.

Inked by Don Heck.

Lettered by John Costanza.

Coloured by Glynis Wein.

In 1971, Roy Thomas wanted to pitch Spider-Man up against Count Dracula but Stan Lee stopped him, arguing that if Spider-Man were to come up against a vampire it had to be a super-villain vampire. Thus was Morbius born and thus did Dracula avoid the indignity of getting a face full of webbing.

Clearly, by 1974, Lee's leash on events had grown somewhat looser because we finally got it. Spider-Man finally came up against the Prince of Darkness.

Actually he didn't. Despite John Romita's dramatic cover to Giant-Size Spider-Man #1, at no point does Spidey come up against Dracula. Peter Parker bumps into him in passing, at one point, but that's the limit to their encounter. Instead they merely happen to be on an ocean liner at the same time as each other, and neither finish the story in any way shape or form aware that the other was around.

The story is that Aunt May's bucking the trend of a lifetime by being at death's door. She's got the flu, and the only person with a vaccine is a doctor travelling on an ocean liner. So Spidey sets off to find that doctor and get that vaccine.

Unfortunately, he's not alone, as both Dracula and a Maggia hood called the Whisperer are after it too. It's clear what the Whisperer wants with the vaccine - money - but it's somewhat more nebulous as to why Vlad wants it. We're told its existence threatens his plans. What his plans are and how exactly a flu vaccine threatens them is never explained. Needless to say, good wins out and Aunt May can look forward to many more years ahead of being at death's door.

Despite the potentially pleasing irony of Spider-Man and Dracula never actually meeting despite being on the same boat and hanging around the same set of characters, you can't help feeling cheated by it. I mean, that's what we're promised on the cover and, without that encounter, what we've basically got is Spider-Man on a boat, up against the sort of ten-a-penny crooks he can take out in his sleep, and Dracula on a boat, up against the sort ten-a-penny crooks he can take out in his sleep. There's no real threat to Spider-Man. There's no real threat to Dracula, so what exactly's supposed to keep us glued to the edge of our seats? There's a nice twist at the end as regards the doctor's identity but also a cop-out, as a character we're told at the beginning is terrified of flying, shows no reluctance to get in a plane and fly off, making you wonder why that character was travelling by boat in the first place. All in all, the events inside aren't really substantial enough to justify this being marketed as some sort of special event. The truth is that Dracula could be removed from this tale and it'd make no difference to anything.

The artwork's a bit of a let-down too. The thing's drawn by Ross Andru with his usual style but inked by Don Heck. With Don Heck you're never quite sure what you're going to get but, on this occasion his inks are OK. They aren't great and in some places he's clearly doing more than just the inking but it doesn't hurt your eyes even if it's not an artistic combination you'd particularly want to see again. It's just that Heck and Andru aren't as a good a combo as we're used to from the monthly comics and, for a Special, you sort of assume you're going to get something better than the norm, not something slightly inferior to it.

The writing's also a bit off in places. Spidey seems to lack his usual ready wit, and Len Wein's dialogue for Dracula feels somewhat laboured, lacking the class we're used to from Marv Wolfman. Frankly, early on, Dracula seems somewhat ineffectual and possibly even a little silly. He's also a right grumpy guts all the way through the tale.

Because it never lives up to - or even tries to live up to - its potential, this is clearly somewhat inferior to the other Giant-Size stories I've been reviewing lately and certainly wouldn't go on my list of must-have Spider-Man tales. There's nothing offensive about it but you can't help remembering that, for the 50 cents it would've cost, you could have got two normal-sized comics. And with titles like The Fantastic Four, The Mighty Thor and The Avengers also on the news racks, you could've spent that money far more wisely.

Giant-Size Spider-Man #4. The Punisher and Moses Magnum

(Cover from April 1975.)

"To Sow The Seeds Of Death's Day!"

Written by Gerry Conway.

Pencilled by Ross Andru.

Inks by Mike Esposito.

Lettering by Joe Rosen.

Colours by Stan G.

Will heroes never learn a good villain's not dead until you see him being buried, with a huge lead weight on top of his coffin just to make sure he can't pop up out of it? Probably not. And will the Punisher ever give it up and get a life?

If there's one thing you could guarantee at this point in Spider-Man's history it's that, if there's to be a series of Spider-Man Specials, the Punisher's bound to be in at least one of them. And, hey presto, here we are.

Normally this'd make my heart sink sink faster than a rock in a bathtub. Well, maybe I'm just getting resigned to it or maybe his appearance in this tale isn't as bad as usual but, this time round, I can actually live with his presence.

In truth, my increased tolerance is probably down to the fact that, for once, Castle doesn't try to kill Spider-Man. At last he seems to have learned his lesson and remembered from previous encounters that Spider-Man's a good guy. Needless to say, this doesn't stop him trying to shoot everyone else in sight.

This time they're up against Moses Magnum who might be named after an ice cream but there's nothing sweet about him. He's running a prison camp in Latin America, in which he uses American kidnap victims to test out his nerve gas. Happily, at the end of it all, he gets a taste of his own medicine, at which point the Punisher declares him to be 100% guaranteed dead-certain dead. Needless to say, Magnum later turns up in various other comics, even taking on the X-Men. I said those heroes never learn.

As for the tale itself, it's nothing special but it breezes along nicely and does give us an unmasking scene in which we get to see Peter Parker wearing a face only a mother could love and only a criminal mastermind could think was genuine. It being a Special, it operates in a little bubble all its own with nothing of Peter Parker's personal life and none of the usual supporting cast. As the soap elements were what made Spider-Man great, this is a loss but not as great a loss as you might expect. As with his Giant-Size Shang-Chi team-up, this DC-ization of our hero works fine for a one-off tale, although it would've quickly grown tiresome if tried in his monthly mag.

Ross Andru's art's standard for him, which means it's very good but not quite among his better issues. I always feel you can tell how much Andru was getting into a story by how wild the angles get and, here, they're relatively restrained. But I do feel sorry for him. The workload that seems to be have been put on him for an artist who was reputedly not the fastest and, according to Dick Giordano, was forced by an eye defect to draw half of every page twice, seems to have been heavy. They wanted him to do the monthly comics,they wanted him to do the Giant-Size Specials, they wanted him to do Superman vs Spider-Man. At times, the poor bloke must've felt his head was spinning faster than Spider-Man's webbing.

Giant-Size Spider-Man #2. Shang-Chi and Fu Manchu

(Cover from October 1974.)

"Masterstroke!"

Written by Len Wein.

Pencils by Ross Andru.

Inks by Al Milgrom.

Lettering by John Costanza.

Colours by Glynis Wein

Argh! I knew it. Drawn back to the site by my lovely pink award, I can't hold off the temptation any longer. I just have to go on and review all those annuals and specials that came out in the time period I've been covering.

I have to make a confession, my favourite Spider-Man tale of that era isn't from the regular mag. It's not even from the regular continuity. It's from Giant-Size Spider-Man, a title that ran for just six issues but they were fairly belting ones. It's from issue #2 and features Spidey teaming up with one of Marvel's less likely superstars; Shang-Chi, master of Kung Fu.

Now, even I can't deny that, on paper, Shang-Chi's an extremely silly character. For one, he's the son of Fu Manchu, a villain who was arch in more ways than one and, for the other, he was clearly created as a cynical marketing exercise to cash-in on the early 1970s' Kung Fu craze. Thanks to that, he should've ended up as no more than the Rocket Racer of his day but, for some reason, none of that bothers me. No matter the daftness of his origins, no matter that he stalks the New York streets in his pyjamas, no matter that he talks to himself, I have a deep and undying love for the Rising Spirit.

Intercepting some crooks, Spider-Man's told they work for the murderous Shang-Chi who's out to destroy a power station. Shang Chi, meanwhile, intercepts some other crooks who tell him they work for the murderous Spider-Man, out to destroy the same power station. Needless to say, it's mere pages before Spidey and Shangy are going at it hammer and tongs. Also needless to say, it's not long before they realise they've been conned. Together, they soon discover the real source of such villainy and team up to prevent Fu Manchu planting a mind-control aerial atop the Empire State Building.

Highlight of the tale has to be Spidey and Shangy leaping from the 86th floor of the Empire State building, with nothing between them and the ground but fresh air. Long-time readers of the strip will of course need no telling just how they manage to hit the street without going splat.

The truth is, long-time readers'll need no telling how anything pans out in this story. The initial misunderstanding between the good guys is the standard means of greeting for any Marvel heroes. Fu Manchu's exactly the villain you'd expect to be behind the plot. Nayland Smith and Black Jack Tar turn up, just as they do in every Shang-Chi tale. Fu Manchu escapes, and the good guys win. But I don't know what it is, I just love this tale. Len Wein's dialogue is fun, and Spidey and Shangy mesh perfectly as characters. I also love the fact that captions relating to Spider-Man are in third-person past-tense while captions relating to Shang-Chi are first-person present-tense. Such a mangling of persons and tenses shouldn't work - and certainly wouldn't in a novel - but, here, it works beautifully. I have a suspicion the direct insight into the martial artist's head and of what he thinks of his new and unconventional ally may be what makes the tale work so well.

Despite all the corniness and racial stereotyping, Fu Manchu's a great villain, almost the archetypal Marvel bad guy created before Marvel ever existed. The artwork's great too, as good an art job as I've ever seen from Ross Andru. His use of "camera angles" is simply startling in panel after panel, even by his standards.

So, there you have it, my favourite Spider-Man tale from the era in question. It might not be an obvious choice and I have a suspicion no one else in the whole world will agree with it but so what? In the end, I can only go for the story that gives me most pleasure and, in my head, on that occasion when Arachnia met south east Asia, a little magic was woven.