1970s – Page 3 – Comics Archeology

This one was its own anniversary, as the hundredth issue of the Italian reprint.

Thor #100 (1974)
Published by: Corno

You can’t tell it’s an anniversary from the cover. It just gives the title “Under the shadow of Magog” and advertises “Here stickers!”.
Lots of Corno books had stickers! As you can imagine, they’re very sought after by collectors and an issue that still has its stickers can be worth a lot. I’ve never actually SEEN one myself.
Also, since I didn’t mention it for other Thor reviews: the book costs 250 Lire, which in 2024 would be about 2 dollars.

Journey Into Mystery #83 (1962)
by Stan Lee, Larry Lieber & Jack Kirby

And that’s why I already reviewed this one.

Historical significance: 7/10
Silver Age-ness: 8/10
Does it stand the test of time? 4/10
For the reason behind those scores, see the actual review.

Personal significance: 2/10
This was the ONLY Corno issue I owned (before becoming a regular reader) that included the secret origin of a character.
Even without a comparison with better origins, I didn’t care for it.
In fact I didn’t even remember I read this one until I checked what would be included in the retrospective!
I do remember finding it odd that Thor looked so much different from the other stories.

Thor #195 (1972)
by Gerry Conway & John Buscema

Corno’s habit of removing the speech bubbles from the cover strikes again.

We are in the John Buscema era now. The comparison with Jack Kirby is inevitable and not really fair to Buscema, since at the end of his run Thor was easily the most Kirby book. I would argue even more than Fantastic Four.
But I think Buscema still does a good enough job of giving the book its own distinctive look.

Unfortunately I can’t really say the same for the way Conway writes the book… I don’t think Thor and his world play to any of Conway’s strengths as a writer.
He does have fun with it, though.

One of the things that make this run kind of insufferable for me is the constant, and I do mean CONSTANT unnecessary drama.

I mean couldn’t Odin just say to Thor “I need you to find this enemy of Asgard and beat him” instead of being so dramatic?
And I know these are gods who do everything larger than life, but it’s exhausting.

Speaking of insufferable: Sif.

Come on, you’re a goddess! Show SOME dignity!!!

It’s particularly insulting because this run has to introduce Hildegarde, a big muscular Valkyrie (not the same one who joins the Defenders) to take care of her because Sif is too whiny.

Can you tell Hildegarde is immediately my favorite character in the story?

Sif… WILL YOU SHUT UP???

Meanwhile, Thor and the Warriors Three are on their own boring quest.

I normally like the Warriors Three. But in the Conway run they’re also annoying.

So what’s the reason behind this quest? It’s because the last time Odin banished Loki…

…he just gave him the way to free the super-demon Mangog.

Mangog is so grateful for being freed from his prison that he gives Loki one of his own.

Mangog is bad news, since he’s an Odin-level threat. So Odin rallies the Asgardian troops to go after him.

I can’t imagine why he didn’t just rely on the Warriors Three.

We do get a bit of action, as Thor and his friends are attacked by the trolls from the cover.

Volstagg does get ONE kind of funny moment.

Thor ends up befriending a troll that he saves from quicksand.

And we close the issue with Mangog reaching Asgard. What was the point of Odin rallying the troops if we don’t even see a battle???

Historical significance: 4/10
This eventually leads into the giant battle around issue 200 and one of the first Ragnaroks we get to see.

Personal significance: 0/10
I didn’t remember ANY of this. Mangog looks kind of cool, but the comparison with the force of nature that was Surtur was not kind.

Silver Age-ness: 6/10
Nothing particularly insane for a Thor story, but several points for everyone being so ridiculously melodramatic.

Does it stand the test of time? 3/10
Let’s start with the positives: John Buscema is drawing.
That’s about it.
This was sooooooo boring. Conway is typically a fantastic writer, but his Thor run is an incomprehensible mess. He tries to replicate the epicness of earlier years, but no matter how hard he tries he doesn’t seem able to pull it off.
Sif’s treatment is an embarrassment. I would expect this kind of characterization from the 50s or in the early 60s, but in the early 70s it’s just inexcusable.

Not Brand Echh #3 (1967)
by Stan Lee & Jack Kirby
cover by Marie Severin and John Romita

Since this was the anniversary issue, we get the Thor spoof from the aggressively unfunny Not Brand Echh series.

I hate reviewing comedic stories… since comedy is subjective, it doesn’t leave me much to say beyond “this is not funny”.
So maybe this works for you, but… for me, it is ASTOUNDING how unfunny this is.

I think the problem I have with it is that it tries too hard and it does too many things; everything changes too much between panels.
You CAN do a funny story based on pure chaos… this is clearly trying to imitate the style of the MAD magazine… but that’s the catch: it has to be funny to work!!!

Once the “story” calms down a little, there are some things that kind of work as a spoof of Thor’s origin. Like the ridiculously easy way Don Blake… or in this case “Darn Bloke”… ends up in the hidden cave.

The ONE joke that made me chuckle: Thor isn’t speaking Ye Olde Englishe, he just has a lisp.
That’s kind of funny.

Needless to say, the Italian version has to rewrite every single wordplay because almost none of it works in Italian.
It’s still dreadful stuff, but I would argue that some of the jokes worked better. For example, the Thor parody is called “Roth” (which sounds close enough to rotto, meaning “broken”) which I think is slightly closer to being funny than calling him “Sore”. It’s not even an anagram!

Also, the Odin parody is uncreatively named “Shmodin” here.
In the translation he’s Comodino, which might sound completely random because it means “night table”, but it’s a wordplay with Odin’s Italian name of Odino.
Again: still not funny, but slightly better.

One of the advantages of this story when compared to other from Not Brand Echh is having Jack Kirby at the pencils, so we get a bit of fun pointing out his ridiculous overdesigns.