Comics Corner: Marvel Fanfare 2

   

Title: Marvel Fanfare
Issue Number: 2
Release Date: May 1982

Highlights

• Al Milgrom returns in a single page story to continue discussing the all-new Marvel Fanfare series
• Both Angel and Spider-Man are turned into horrible creatures
• Karl Lykos absorbs the mutant transformations done to Spider-Man, Angel, and Tanya Anderssen (not a typo), transforming him again into Sauron
• Back-up story featuring Fantastic Four

Low Points

• There's no happy ending to the story arc which began in issue 1 - Karl wasn't rescued by Tanya, instead, he once again became a villain
• Savage Land stories are never all that good
• Marvel Fanfare is not a series that intrigues me enough to get further invested

Oddities

• None

Rating (based on a 1 through 5 Stans grading system)

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Comics Corner: Marvel Team-Up Annual 2

   

Title: Marvel Team-Up Annual
Issue Number: 2
Release Date: October 1979

Highlights

• First appearance of Nikolai Kutzov, and Colonel Alexei Vazhin
• Last appearance of Cissy Ironwood
• First appearance and death of Daniel Ironwood
• Cissy and Peter are dating - Well, for this issue anyway

Low Points

• Boring

Oddities

• Editor's Day Off: Spider-Man's parachute backpack disappears from his back in multiple panels -While he's parachuting
• Editor's Still Off: Several panels with Spider-Man's eye lenses colored red

Rating (based on a 1 through 5 Stans grading system)

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Comics Corner: Marvel Two-In-One Annual 2

   

Title: Marvel Two-In-One Annual
Issue Number: 2
Release Date: May 1977

Highlights

• First appearance of Master Order and Lord Chaos
• Reference is made to The Avengers Annual 7
• Has a foreshadowing vibe of The Infinity Gauntlet, which wouldn't come for another twenty years

Low Points

• None

Oddities

• None

Rating (based on a 1 through 5 Stans grading system)

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Comics Corner: Peter Parker, The Spectacular Spider-Man 2

   

Title: Peter Parker, The Spectacular Spider-Man
Issue Number: 2
Release Date: January 1977

Highlights

• First appearance of Richard Gorman
• Additional cameo appearance of Lightmaster, from his original cameo in Peter Parker, The Spectacular Spider-Man issue 1
• Reference is made to The Amazing Spider-Man 54, 111, 156, and 164
• Something is wrong with doctor Curt Connors - Is he changing into the Lizard again?
• Peter helps to get his neighbor, Gloria Grant, a job as J. Jonah Jameson's new secretary
• Because of his numerous defeats by Spider-Man's hand, Kraven the Hunter has been forced to lower his fees as a mercenary
• Hostess Fruit Pies ad starring the Incredible Hulk
• Spider-Man and Captain America in a Ricochet Racer toy ad

Low Points

• None

Oddities

• Editor's day off: "Surrender now, I perhaps you may still survive."

Rating (based on a 1 through 5 Stans grading system)

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Comics Corner: Giant-Size Spider-Man 2

   

Title: Giant-Size Spider-Man
Issue Number: 2
Release Date: October 1974

Highlights

• Reference is made to Bruce Lee
• Reference is made to Master of Kung Fu 15, 18, and Daredevil 112
• Spider-Man uses Thing's catch phrase, "It's clobberin' time!"
• Lots of action
• Issue contains a second story, which is a reprint of The Amazing Spider-Man Annual 3

Low Points

• Multiple use of racial slurs for Asian people - Not cool, Marvel

Oddities

• None

Rating (based on a 1 through 5 Stans grading system)

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Comics Corner: Marvel Team-Up 2

      

Title: The Amazing Spider-Man
Issue Number: 2
Release Date: May 1972

Highlights

• Spider-Man teams up with Human Torch
• Appearances from Annihilus, Sandman, Trapster and Wizard
  

Low Points

• Spider-Man spends most of the issue in a trance - Though he does get to beat the stuffing out of Human Torch while in it
• Better than the first issue of Marvel Team-Up, but still feels like it's missing the depth that makes The Amazing Spider-Man a better title
• After reading it, I still don't understand exactly what the Wizard's whole plan was
  

Oddities

• None

Rating (based on a 1 through 5 Stans grading system)

 

 

 

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Comics Corner: Watchmen 2

Title: Watchmen

Issue Number: 2

Release Date: October 1986

Highlights

• First appearance of the original Minute Men
• Flashback sequences during Blake's funeral give us more insight to him as a characters
• First appearance of Moloch

Low Points

• The Comedian tries to rape Sally Jupiter

Oddities

• Having seen the movie first, it's difficult to accept the original source material as the way the story was intended vs. what I saw on the big screen

Rating (based on a 1 through 5 Stans grading system)

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Comics Corner: The Long Halloween 2

Title: Batman: The Long Halloween

Issue Number: 2

Release Date: January 1997

Highlights

• Intriguing entry that makes you want to keep reading, but...

Low Points

• ...Felt short, and nothing really got accomplished
• Story doesn't feel like it's advancing
• Cover is misleading - Solomon Grundy is neither predominant nor relevant to the story

Oddities

• Harvey Dent got blown up, and there's not a scratch on him, yet his wife is covered head to toe in bandages in a hospital bed

Rating (based on a 1 through 5 Bat Symbols grading system)

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Comics Corner: The Amazing Spider-Man 2

Title: The Amazing Spider-Man

Issue Number: 2

Release Date: May 1963

Highlights

• First appearance of Vulture
• Peter Parker sells his first photographs to J. Jonah Jameson at Now Magazine
• Spider-Man makes adjustments to his belt and web launchers to hold more web fluid
• First appearance of Tinkerer
• Panel highlighting how Spider-Man's web shooters work

Low Points

• Spider-Man only goes after Vulture to get more photographs to sell, not because he necessarily wants to stop him from committing a crime
• Tinkerer is an alien from another planet, working with others in his species from a radio shop

Oddities

• Vulture tells the police his plan before executing it
• When behind bars in prison, Vulture is still in his full costumed garb, instead of a prison uniform
• There's no point to the Tinkerer's story because we never learn what the alien's plan was to begin with
• Tinkerer and his species give up, leaving Earth and destroying all of their monitoring devices immediately after Spider-Man thwarts them

Rating (based on a 1 through 5 Stans grading system)

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