"The Trio of Terror" ( The Marvel Family #21, March 1948): Beck returns as artist for this Otto Binder-penned "Shazam at the Circus" tale, in which the dastardly Dingling Brothers conjure up terrible beasties to headline their new tent show.
But the dragon people are still menacing, despite the fact that you'll initially want to laugh at their appearance they prove worthy adversaries for Captain Marvel while giving him an opportunity to show off his fantastic abilities. And it's no wonder, with titans Joe Simon and Jack Kirby at the helm, that this story is so wildly entertaining, covering all kinds of story beats with the endearingly stubby artwork of the Golden Age. "" ( Captain Marvel Adventures #1, 1941): It's difficult to resist a story as exuberantly insane as this one: Captain Marvel journeys "a billion miles away" to save the enslaved citizens of Saturn from a race of marauding dragon men. Sivana for the first time, is more charming and conventional superheroism, although Beck continues to impress with the dynamic motion with which he imbues the Big Red Cheese. The second half of the story, in which Captain Marvel confronts his nemesis Dr. Beck's artwork, which takes full advantage of shadow and smoke to create an atmosphere of sinister foreboding in the underground caverns. The story by Bill Parker is timeless, but what really steals the show in this entry is C. "Introducing Captain Marvel" ( Whiz Comics #2, February 1940): We begin with the standard origin story, in which orphaned newsboy Billy Batson meets the mysterious wizard Shazam and is granted all the powers of Captain Marvel by speaking the wizard's name. The sum of the parts being more than the whole in this series, let's take a look at what's inside this volume. I'm impressed, however, at the size of the volume - thirteen stories and 222 content pages, the longest in the series. I'm hoping the volume covers a wide range of interpretations, although I'm dismayed to see that there's nothing from Smith's amazing Shazam! and the Monster Society of Evil. Since KC, I've come to appreciate the treatment of Captain Marvel as a child in a man's body, but I see from Jeff Smith's introduction to Shazam! The Greatest Stories Ever Told that such was not always the case. I was first introduced to Captain Marvel in the Mark Waid/Alex Ross Kingdom Come, which colored my reading of the character from then on, so I entered this volume eager to see what the character was "supposed" to be. Speak his name and we can become the strongest and mightiest in the world - Shazam! Is one magic word all it takes to be the greatest "Greatest Stories" trade? Read on, loyal reader!
0 kommentar(er)
