Huntsman from Bizarre Adventures

Huntsman

by Archie Goodwin (script), Michael Golden (art), and Steve Mitchell (inks)

from Bizarre Adventures No. 28, October 1981

During its run in the late 70s and early 80s Marvel Preview and Bizarre Adventures customarily published standalone, tryout stories. So it was that the October, 1981 issue gave us 'Huntsman', written by Archie Goodwin, with art and inks by Michael Golden and Steve Mitchell.

Goodwin borrowed elements from the 1976 film Logan's Run, with the 'huntsmen' substituting for the 'sandmen' who were featured in the film. For all that, the storyline holds together, and the artwork showcases lots of Zip-A-Tone, which I'm always fond of........

Tired of Slaving Over a Hot Stove ?

Tired of Slaving Over a Hot Stove ?

from the July, 1974 issue of National Lampoon

Litton Industries, Inc, introduced here yesterday a new microwave oven with a variable cooking control that matches power levels with various cooking tasks. It enables the user to vary power from 65 to 650 watts. The new counter top unit, produced by Litton's Microwave Cooking Products division, will carry a price tag of $469.

-The New York Times, September 20, 1974

In '74, microwave ovens still were too pricey for most households ($469 was a lot of money in 1974 dollars. A gallon of gas was 53 cents, a gallon of milk $1.57, and a first-class postage stamp 8 cents), but dropping prices would make them commonplace in many households by the decade's end.

Leave it to the National Lampoon to satirize this new cooking technology, in a gruesome fashion...........   

Like an Eagle by Dennis Parker

Celebrating Pride Month, June 2022

'Like An Eagle' by Dennis Parker

Here at the PorPor Books Blog, we like to observe Pride Month by reviewing media that celebrates the LGBTQ Experience.

For June, 2022, we're going to take a look at an iconic actor and singer, Dennis Parker (the stage name of Dennis Posa) who came to fame in the 1970s as an adult film star, and the singer on one of the greatest disco albums of the era, Like An Eagle (1979). It's a strange and peculiarly melange that could only have come about in the 70s.

Dennis Posa was born in 1946 and grew up in Freeport, NY. After graduating high school he studied at an art college in Philadelphia, became interested in acting, and supported himself in a variety of odd jobs.

By the mid-1970s Posa, now using the stage name 'Wade Nichols', was working as an actor in adult films.

Wade Nichols (Dennis Posa / Dennis Parker) in a still from the 1977 film Punk Rock.

The apogee of Nichols's porno career likely was the 1979 film Love You, which was directed by John Derek and starred Annette Haven. According to Derek's wife Bo, she was responsible for almost all aspects of the production aside from directing. 

In the summer of 1976, Nichols was one of a number of adult film actors and actresses in New York City who signed up for an 'erotic' photo shoot organized by film producer Ed Rothkowitz and photographer Joseph Del Valle. Looking to cash in on the success of the book The Joy of Sex, Rothkowitz assembled the photos into a book, titled Joys of Fantasy: The Book for Loving Couples, which was published by Stein and Day in 1977. 

Rothkowitz combined the photos with 'sensual' poetry and prose from a number of contributors, foremost among them Civ Cedering Fox. Fox (1939 - 2007) was born in Sweden and later moved to San Francisco, where she grew up. She gained notice as a poet, novelist, children's book author, artist, and songwriter during the 1970s and 1980s.

Civ Sedering Fox, 1970s

Below, I've excerpted some of more tame images from Joys of Fantasy. There is the classic 70s emphasis on soft focus', widely used in that era as a means to reduce the sleaze factor in favor of imagery that was considered 'artistic'. It's Nichols / Parker / Posa sporting the quintessential 70s mustache in the photos below.

Circa 1976 Posa caught the eye of the French producer and music magnate Jacques Morali, who was always looking to transform his boyfriends into disco singers. Unsurprisingly, in 1979, Posa, under the name 'Dennis Parker', recorded Like An Eagle, a disco album, on Casablanca Records. The title track was released as a single and made into a video. 

The song is pretty good, if you ask me. And indeed, the entire album is an overlooked gem of Disco Dynamite ! I defy you to listen to it and yet resist the overwhelming urge to boogie.

Also in 1979, Nichols / Parker / Posa got a mainstream role as a supporting character in the soap opera Edge of Night, and discontinued his porno career. 

Sadly, in the Spring of 1984, Posa's health went into decline and he eventually had to leave the show. He died on January 28, 1985, at age 38, from AIDS-related causes.  

Book Review: SF:UK

 Book Review: 'SF:UK' by Daniel O'Brien

2 / 5 Stars

'SF:UK' was published in 2000 by Reynolds and Hearn, UK. It is a tie-in to the 8-episode series that aired on Britain's Channel Four in 2001.

The Channel 4 series can be accessed via YouTube here.

'SF:UK' , covers sci-fi film, television, and comics and is organized into four, roughly chronological, chapters starting with Shakespeare's 1611 play 'The Tempest', which the author argues is the foundation of British sci-fi, up to the late 1990s and TV series such as Ultraviolet and the film Gods and Monsters. The book is copiously illustrated with black and white photographs.

Comparing the book with the television series, it's clear that the series was unable or unwilling to get approval from the copyright holders for many properties, so is forced to make do with filler footage. 

For example, in episode 5, 'Trips Through Time and Space', a discussion of the Dr Who series is obliged to rely on still images, and footage of narrator Matthew De Abaitua touring a museum of memorabilia and props, giving a running commentary while pointing to portraits of the actors. I cheerfully acknowledge knowing very little about the interrelationships between the various UK television broadcasting companies. But I assumed there was sufficient comity between Channel 4 and the BBC, that the former could be allowed to run excerpts of Dr Who for documentary purposes. But perhaps this was not to be for 'SF:UK'.  

And episode  6, 'Ultra-Violence', opens with a discussion on the film A Clockwork Orange, but in lieu of footage from the movie, substitutes underlit, grainy footage of De Abaitua sitting ringside at a boxing match; archival footage of soccer - er, football - hooligan riots; and footage of men posing in impromptu Droog gear. So perhaps Warner Bros. wouldn't permit excerpts of their film to appear on Channel 4 unless money exchanged hands...........

Anyways, the best part of the book 'SF:UK' is the Introduction, by British pop culture stalwart Kim Newman. His essay is fast-moving and drops plenty of witty observations. 

Unfortunately, the remainder of the book is a disappointment, mainly because author O'Brien adopts an uneasy middle ground between a Scholarly approach, and a casual approach, to the material. Some segments of the book are quite dense in terms of a pedantic prose style and exposition, while others are less formal and as a result, a bit easier to take in. I found myself wishing that O'Brien had adopted the narrative style of the late Australian historian and commentator Peter Nicholls, particularly that displayed in Nicholl's 1984 book Fantastic Cinema / The World of Fantastic Films.

While any book dealing with centuries of British sci-fi necessarily will be an assemblage that reflects the attitudes of its author, another problem with 'SF:UK' is 'O'Brien's decision to offer overly lengthy exegeses on selected topics, notably 'The Tempest', 'Frankenstein', the TV series The Prisoner, the 'supermarrionation' of Gerry Anderson, Dr. Who, and the TV series Red Dwarf. 

The attention paid to these subjects inevitably leads to neglect of other features of British sci-fi. It's hard to justify devoting four pages to The Prisoner, which ran for only 17 episodes, all of which (at the risk of angering devotees) tended to be remarkably static and boring, while (for example) nothing at all is said about the impressive sci-fi comics of the postwar period. I much would rather have learned (learnt ?) more about 'Dan Dare', 'Garth', and 'The Trigan Empire', than the psychosocial implications of selected episodes of The Prisoner.

Scattered throughout the pages of 'SF:UK' are hidden gems of anecdotes that will be informative to American readers, in particular, but finding these requires plodding through material, such as the casting changes made to Red Dwarf, that will appeal to die-hard fans of the show, but which I didn't find very engaging.

The overriding theme of 'SF:UK' is that Britain's vision of sci-fi is more downbeat and skeptical than that of the U.S.A., an argument that I don't dispute. Indeed, it was that attitude that made British sci-fi so forward-thinking and imaginative in the late 1950s and early 1960s, when the genre was stagnating in the USA. 

Summing up, I'm comfortable with assigning 'SF:UK' a two-star rating. I finished the book thinking that the TV series, whatever its disadvantages in terms of presenting copyright- and license-holder material, is more informative, and I thus direct curious readers to that portal.

Playboy June 1973

Playboy magazine, June 1973

Let's take another trip back in time courtesy of Playboy magazine, and travel 49 years to June, 1973. 

This issue has a massive 254 pages. It's crammed with full page, and half page, and column-sized advertisements. 

The cover girl, and Playmate of the Year 1973, is Marilyn Cole, a British girl who was the first woman ever to appear in the magazine while displaying full-frontal nudity. She was featured in a December, 2021 article in The Daily Mail.

Back then, getting a suntan was a priority and Coppertone was there to help........

Playboy can't be said to have been a showcase of diversity back then. Looking at the list of contributors, there is heavy representation by white, Jewish, and Protestant males. A couple of women, including Joyce Carol Oates, get admitted to the boy's club, but that's about it in terms of Inclusion and Equity.

A fashion features on men's swimwear makes clear that wearing these trunks magically will  grant you the embraces of bare-bottomed chicks, who are just lolling on the sand, eager to make your acquaintance !

If it's not beachwear you're interested in, well, Tom Seaver, star pitcher for the New York Mets, can show you some fine, polyester dress shirts to wear to the office:

There are plenty of wholesome, early 70s girls with long, natural hair (no lacefront wigs, no weaves, no extensions) posing in the pages of this issue......

This cartoon would not go over well nowadays........

The 'On the Scene' feature mentions an up-and-coming British rocker named David Bowie.

And guys are encouraged to ditch 'the wet look' and go with the 'Dry Look' by using hairspray - err, excuse me, 'hair control', from Gillette !

Despite problems with inflation, those were halcyon days, with a gallon of gas costing 39 cents, a gallon of milk $1.31, and a six-pack of Ballantine beer set you back 99 cents......... 

There you have it. June, 1973.

Atlantis by Donovan

Atlantis
by Donovan
from the album Barabajagal (March, 1969)

A great example of hippie mysticism, 'Chariots of the Gods' ideology, and plain, unadulterated coolness..........

'Atlantis', released as a single in the US in March, 1969, was a track from Donovan's album Barabajagal, also released in 1969. 

The continent of Atlantis was an island

which lay before the great flood

in the area we now call the Atlantic Ocean.

So great an area of land, that from her western shores

those beautiful sailors journeyed

to the South and the North Americas with ease,

in their ships with painted sails.

To the East Africa was a neighbour, across a short strait of sea miles.

The great Egyptian age is but a remnant of The Atlantian culture.

The antediluvian kings colonised the world

All the Gods who play in the mythological dramas

In all legends from all lands were from fair Atlantis.

Knowing her fate, Atlantis sent out ships to all corners of the Earth.

On board were the Twelve:

The poet, the physician, the farmer, the scientist,

The magician and the other so-called Gods of our legends.

Though Gods they were -

And as the elders of our time choose to remain blind

Let us rejoice and let us sing and dance and ring in the new

Hail Atlantis !

Way down below the ocean where I wanna be she may be,

Way down below the ocean where I wanna be she may be,

Way down below the ocean where I wanna be she may be.

Way down below the ocean where I wanna be she may be,

Way down below the ocean where I wanna be she may be.

My antediluvian baby, oh yeah yeah, yeah yeah yeah,

I wanna see you some day

My antediluvian baby, oh yeah yeah, yeah yeah yeah,

My antediluvian baby,

My antediluvian baby, I love you, girl,

Girl, I wanna see you some day.

My antediluvian baby, oh yeah

I wanna see you some day, oh

My antediluvian baby.

My antediluvian baby, I wanna see you

My antediluvian baby, gotta tell me where she gone

I wanna see you some day

Wake up, wake up, wake up, wake up, oh yeah

Oh glub glub, down down, yeah

My antediluvian baby, oh yeah yeah yeah yeah

Book Review: Slugfest

Book Review: 'Slugfest' by Reed Tucker

5 / 5 Stars

'Slugfest' (276 pp.) was published in October, 2017 by De Capo Press. Author Tucker is a New York City-based author who has written hundreds of articles for print media outlets such as Esquire and USA Today. 

'Slugfest' was made into a documentary, available on the Roku Channel.

'Slugfest' is a history of comic books from the 1950s up to the late twenty-teens, as seen through the competition between the two biggest publishers, Marvel and DC.

I first began reading and collecting comics around 1967, when I was 7 years old. In my small town in upstate New York, there were two drugstores that had comics, displayed on spinner racks. One drugstore sold DC, the other, Marvel. I learned early on that I much preferred Marvel. Indeed, I didn't pay much attention to any DC titles until the early 70s when I took a liking to their science fiction comics, such as Strange Adventures. I also took in the Neil Adams Batman comics, and then Jack Kirby's stuff like Kammandi and The Demon and OMAC. 

So by the time I began discontinuing my interest in comic books by the mid-70s I was a fan of Marvel, but not to an exclusive degree.

'Slugfest' doesn't take sides, but brings a humorous attitude to the topic, and as a result is an easy and entertaining read. While author Tucker necessarily covers some of the same ground about Marvel comics as did author Sean Howe with his Marvel Comics: The Untold Story, 'Slugfest' has lots of observations and anecdotes about the staff, artists, and writers of DC, a subject with which I was much less familiar. 

For example, I didn't know that DC editors Mort Weisinger, Robert Kanigher, and Julius Schwartz were utter pricks, who screamed abuse at their employees on a daily basis. I also didn't know about the shenanigans of the illimitable Bill Jemas, who during his time as the Marvel president went out of his way to insult the competition (the 2002 series Marville, written by Jemas, was one long rude and mocking jibe at DC). Nor did I know that in 2011, Marvel tried to blunt the sales of DC's 'Flashpoint' crossover by offering retailers a 'special variant cover edition' of the Marvel title 'Fear Itself' issue No. 6, in exchange for the submission of 50 covers ripped off of 'Flashpoint' comics.

The closing chapters of 'Slugfest' deal with the transition of both DC and Marvel to corporate properties, a transition that has major implications for the future of the medium. Nowadays the competition between the companies has moved from print media, where it is increasingly an afterthought, to the movie and television realms. 

It's also clear that as of May 2022, graphic novels are driving consumption of comics by the public, according to this essay by comics retailer Brian Hibbs. And here, things are not looking promising for either DC or Marvel. 

Can the competition between the companies still have relevance when the top 5 best-selling graphic novels of 2021 are 'Dog Man' (1,295,470 copies of 'Dog Man: Mothering Heights') and 'Cat Kid' titles from Dev Pilkey ? 

'Dog Man: Mothering Heights' sold 1,295,470 copies, while the top-selling graphic novel (48,000 copies) for DC was Teen Titans: Beast Boy, a Young Adult title. And the only graphic novel from Marvel that sold over 10,000 copies (10,066 to be exact) was The Infinity Gauntlet, by Jim Starlin and the late George Perez, a compilation of comics first printed in 1991.............

Whether or not the competition between DC and Marvel continues, 'Slugfest' is a recommended read for comic book fans, and fans of American pop culture of the postwar era.