Marvel Comics Presents #3 (1988)

We open with a small plane arriving at the Freedom Science Studies Institute that we learned a little bit about last chapter.  A gurney is rushed off the rig and rolled into a waiting ambulance.  On the gurney?  Well, it’s our believed-to-be-dead Senatuh Wycombe… and he don’t look all’at hot.  In fact, he’s about to be injected with a shot of whatever the hell “Project: Glamour” is all about.  Meanwhile, in the swamp… Man-Thing is absolutely smothered in precious narration panels.  Woof.  He’s trying to cope with his new lot in life.  If you recall (though, I might not be the best “tour-guide” for this story), our hero “merged” with one’a dem crispy critters… and was left looking much worse (and weaker) for wear.

Now comes… well, a lot of exposition… not all of it interesting.  First, we meet a reporter named Mick Ditillio who is interviewing another Senator about Wycombe’s “murder” and the nebulous “Project: Glamour”.  This new Senator (Miller) doesn’t have much of a comment… but hopes Mick uses a bit of discretion when it comes to putting together tomorrow’s newspaper headline.  We follow Mick home, where he’s trying to connect the dots… while his very, uh, “perky” girlfriend tries to entice him into maybe putting work aside for a bit.  They must keep the apartment pretty chilly, I tell ya what.

Next, we meet Colonel Jody Choate, who is on the phone being sinister as all get-out… talking about a Demon (that he’s totally not scared of!) and everything.  His wife pops her head in to check on him… and we learn that he’s doing… whatever it is he’s doing… for “freedom”.  So yeah, it looks like we might be getting one’a those stories.

Back to Man-Thing.  He shambles through the swamp, before coming upon a… I dunno, witch’s house?  Whatever the case, she’s just about to sacrifice a puppy dog when our Muck Monster bursts in the place.

The art doesn’t really convey this… nor, unfortunately, does the story (unless I’m just completely dense), but I believe this scene wraps up with Man-Thing and Voodoo Mama Juju making a “deal”.  She’ll fix him up in exchange for a “path to Hades”.  Alrighty then.

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Y’all remember that little run on Swamp Thing that Alan Moore had back in the long ago?  Ehh, probably not… it’s kind of obscure and nobody ever talks about it.  It certainly didn’t inspire a whole crop of writers to explore deconstructing superheroes or anything.  Of course, I’m being facetious… 


I remember the first time I read that stuff.  Sure, there’s a whole lot of “heady” concepts in it… but, it never felt (to me) like it was trying to be smarter than I was.  It was just a well-told story, that felt accessible and inviting, regardless of how “heady” the concepts became.


Gerber’s Man-Thing?  Not so much.  This is a story that is begging you to tap out.  It wants you to know that it is so much smarter than you (or at least, me).  The storytelling is really weird… and, at the risk of sounding like a complete jackass, “insists upon itself”.  The precious and few scenes where our titular hero actually shows up are the worst of all!  I think I’d have gotten more out of his scenes if they were completely “silent”!


As for the rest… ehh, government conspiracies… some “good ol’ boy” doing what he’s doing in the name of “freedom”.  A reporter hot on the trail of the hoo-doo.  Nothing we haven’t seen before, and presented here with the subtlety of a sledge hammer.


The art still continues to impress!  Really excellent stuff here… even if, in more esoteric scenes, it’s really hard to follow.

We pick up three days after the attack on Xiao’s home and the abduction of Leiko.  Our man, Shang-Chi is pounding the pavement looking for answers… but ain’t getting none.  He doesn’t seem overly trusting of the Hong Kong citizens… nor should he, the answers he gets seem dodgy at best here.  He next heads up a hill to Xiao’s final resting place.  Black Jack Tarr is there paying his respects… and openly questions whether or not he’s got it in him to be a leader of this little group of anti-radicals, or whatever.  Shang-Chi takes a seat and they begin a weird, and somewhat contentious chat.  Tarr takes this odd tack of trying to get Shang-Chi to work for him… by more or less blaming him for everything that’s gone down during the past couple of chapters.

Our hero doesn’t really initially address the accusation… he’s still lost in thoughts of Leiko.  Here, Tarr, finally gives us the meat-and-potatoes of this whole deal.  Ya see, Hong Kong will soon no longer be under British Protectorate… and, as such, rival terrorist organizations have combined forces to kind of stake their claim(s) on the place.  We also learn that Tarr n’ the Gang are doing this job gratis.  Xiao came to them with a story… but no shekels.  Since these mercs really believed in this endeavor, they took the gig for free.

Shang-Chi doesn’t agree to help just yet… but, they head back home anyway.  There, Reston… that geek who started smoking to look Hong Kong Cool last chapter, is a few bottles deep… and is wielding a pistol.  After nearly shooting Tarr and Chi, he reveals that someone dropped off a package for the latter.

In it… well, some fish.  Also… a hand.  Leiko’s hand!  With Xiao’s ring still on its finger!  Our hero is unphased, and rather than freaking out at the sight of the woman he loves’ severed mitt, he just asks Tarr if Leiko and Xiao were lovers!  Dude’s got tunnel-vision… though, I guess I “get it”.

We wrap up with our hero finally deciding to at least hear out Tarr’s plan.  He isn’t “all in” with the mission… but, if their gig intertwines with his hunt for Leiko… they may as well have each others’ backs.

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A very “tawky” third chapter… but, I tell ya what… this story needed exactly this!


I remember early on in our Action Comics Daily coverage… when a given eight-pager didn’t make much sense, I would try and wait until we got three-chapters in before making any sort of of sweeping quality-leveling judgment.  Way I looked at it, three anthology chapters were akin to a single issue’s worth of a story.  24 pages, give or take.


Here we are, 24 pages (or one single issue) in on our Master of Kung Fu serial… and, ya know… this is pretty good stuff!  These three chapters would fit nicely into a single issue… get us through all the preliminary exposition… address the threat… give us some tension… set us a goal.  These together would make a fine first issue!  Unlike Man-Thing which sorta leaves us with more questions (and less interest in finding answers), Master of Kung Fu lays a firm foundation to build upon.


Shang-Chi’s obsession with Leiko is interesting… and really helps to depict him as conflicted in his mission.  Really, as we open this chapter, he doesn’t even have a mission, per say.  He’s just looking for Leiko… and screw Black Jack’s gig.  His inability to purge feelings of worry and jealousy aside to focus was really well done as well.  Feeling bad that Xiao was murdered… before remembering that he died at Leiko’s bedside.  Seeing Leiko’s severed hand… and only really being able to see Xiao’s ring upon its finger.  Really good stuff here.


Overall… I’d be more than happy if the subsequent chapters of this feature took a similar “tawky” and “internalized” tone.  This was a pleasure to read… and I’m happy we finally got a little backstory to our setting.

We open with Ben Grimm walkin’ down the street… freakin’ everybody out.  Ya see, this is following his second run-in with cosmic rays (editor’s note missing) that left him far more “spiky” than his initial dose.  So, what we’re getting at here is, he’s even uglier to the folks about town.  He tires of the gawking and decides to give the normies an eyeful.  He tears his trenchcoat off and shows off his new lumpy bod in all its glory!  It’s at this point that our new-ish friend, the Fear Bug, has spied his next target.  Just like with the prior two chapters, we get the “scanning” bit… and the quick ‘n dirty on the character in question.

Ben is suddenly overcome with weird feelings… likely predicated in, ya know, fear.  People run from him, though… honestly, I can’t really blame them.  Dude did just tear off his clothes while shouting in their direction.  Ben collapses by some water, and notes that his reflection has changed a bit.  His spikyness has dulled down to his “normal” Thing look… but, much to his disappointment, that’s where the transformation stops.

He suddenly sees himself surrounded by generic monsters… they all tell him how great it is to be a monster… how he can be the King of Monsters (sorry, Godzilla).  Ben flips out… declaring that he is not an animal monster, he’s a man.  To this, the Fear Eater makes a bit of a pervy face, and changes the monsters to beautiful people.

These beautiful people proceed to pounce on Ben, and beat the hell out of him.  This actually manages to snap our hero back to reality.  He comes to the realization that while he may look like a monster… underneath it all, he’s still a man.

Welp, that’s all the Fear Bug needed to hear before he skidoo’s outta Ben’s craggy hide.  If he doesn’t find some fear to eat soon, poor little bugger’s gonna starve!

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Much as I love the Thing (who doesn’t?), this was a pretty flat story.  Then again, “Milgrom Corner” has been pretty flat overall, hasn’t it?


I mean, what is there to say here?  Ben Grimm learns, for the million-and-oneth time, that he’s still a man underneath his rocky shell.  Um… that’s really all we got.  Nothin’ new, nothin’ novel… at least it looked nice.  Would’a been great if they included a footnote to exactly when Ben got that second dose of cosmic rays though.


Sorry gang, this one was just sorta “there”.

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Credits Page:

 

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Back Cover: