Nighthawk's Brain! 1/6

[skjam]

Hi, folks!

Given recent Spider-Man events (if you haven't already heard, you may want to come back later) I decided you folks might like to see how this sort of plotline has been handled by Marvel in the past.

In specific, the "Nighthawk's Brain" arc in "The Defenders" starting in #67.



Six pages of eighteen, plus a dessert.





Nighthawk is confronted by the ghostly apparition of Trish Starr, his ex-girlfriend, who lost her arm in an explosion engineered by her father, Egghead, to strike back at Hank Pym. He's then overwhelmed by an ocean wave.



Meanwhile at Coney Island, Valkyrie and Jack Norriss, the man who's married to her body, visit the midway. Jack wins a couple of prizes, which Val doesn't understand the point of. They rehash their relationship problems, specifically that Valkyrie has none of Barbara Norriss' memories and thus feels no particular emotional connection to Jack.

Also, this is the famous "Men killed Bambi's mother!!" issue, but you've seen those pages elsewhere.



There's a nicely sinister line.

In Las Vegas, Oklahoma tourist Charles "Whizzo" Lester is murdered by an elf with a gun.



Not sure I want to know what Doc Strange was up to there.

Chondu nearly blows his cover by recoginizing a statuette of the demon Mantok, and covers by claiming he read about it in National Geographic. But when Valkyrie (and Jack) show up, he decides that it's time to srike.



Chondu manages to ditch most of the Defenders, but Doctor Strange casts him into a pocket dimension where the two socerors battle. Even with the aid of mind-amplifying drugs, Chondu is no match for the Sorceror Supreme.



And thus began when Steve Gerber really started to go to town on Defenders weirdness.


Now, an ad from the issue.



Umm...okay then. Interesting choices by the colorist.



Next time, more mind boggling madness!

Until then, Happy Thanksgiving!


Your thoughts and comments?
SKJAM!

Comments

[ensiform]

"Yes! Let's defeat the Defenders -- by taking over the body of by far the least powerful of their ranks! Surely nothing can go wrong there!"

Snark aside, I enjoyed this a lot. Fast-paced, fairly clever, not trying too hard. Ahh, the comics of the era of my childhood. Not as great as the greats of this era, (like Scalped and Preacher and Criminal) but consistently better than the over-hyped madness that is 90% of modern output.

[skjam]

Nah, Jack Norriss is by far the weakest Defender of this era and one of the most forgotten.

[whoha]

From what I've read of samples of Steve Gerbers work, he seems to be one of the few older comic writers who was able to adapt his writing to more modern times.(before his unfortunate death) Unlike Len Wein, Stan Lee, and Chris Claremont, whose more modern output seems pretty dated and out of place.

[skemono]

Wow. I like a lot of this, but possibly my favorite is how Strange just shrugs off the guy's holding spell. "Ectoplasmic field? Yeah, whatever."

Thanks to you my brain keeps quoting...

[kamino_neko]

'BRAIN AND BRAIN, WHAT IS BRAIN!'

[jkcarrier]

Nice to see this...one of my all-time favorite storylines. Gerber was absolutely *killing* it on Defenders, finding a perfect balance between straight-up superhero adventure and his own surreal sense of humor. Brilliant, brilliant stuff.

[jjgalahad]

Okay, I just have one question - whatever happened to Hulk's deer? I want that deer to become his best friend.

[skjam]

We'll be seeing more of Bambi, I promise. It's actually a pretty important character in this story.

[skjam]

The fight scene makes it clear that the only reason Doc has any difficulty at all is that Chondu looks like Nighthawk. And that Doctor Strange really does think of Kyle Richmond as a friend.

[jjgalahad]

Hooray! :D

[tpsreports]

Agreed! Also I owned Dr. Steel and he was awesome.

[halloweenjack]

Kyle is basically a Bruce Wayne expy, so he's rich.

[halloweenjack]

Indeed.

[halloweenjack]

That action figure ad was penciled by Jack Kirby, or a damn good imitator.

[citygod]

Exactly what I was thinking. Wonder was Jack back at Marvel by then?

[halloweenjack]

I think so; Kirby announced his return to Marvel at a con in the spring of 1975.

[skjam]

Per Wikipedia, yep, Jack Kirby was the artist for the ads.