Un-StarWars Un-Comics - Part III: The Final Fury!

Continuing from this morning and this afternoon...

Pizzazz only lasted another seven issues, so the next tale never reached completion. At least, not within the pages of Pizzazz.

But, still - it's another 21 pages from a Star Wars that never existed. So i suspect it'll show up here even without an ending.

pages from Pizzazz #s 7-9 (1978)

Un-StarWars Un-Comics - Part II: A Matter Of Monsters!

Continued from this morning's post...

Concluded this evening...

pages from Pizzazz #s 4-6 (1978)

Un-StarWars Un-Comics - Part I: A New Strip

It's time for some more Un-Comics!
For those who've not encountered the term here previously, un-comics are what we call comics that come from places other than comics - from magazines, convention programs, books, etc.,.

Today, we're looking at un-comics from a Star Wars that never was. Way back in 1977 when there was only one movie with an uncertain future, Marvel's Pizzazz magazine picked up the adventure right where the movie left off.

Now, i'm going to admit a bit of heresy here...
 I never really got into the extended Star Wars universe. I watched the movies, but that was about it. (Not counting things like being suited as a wookie for early Star Wars performances and things like that. Still got the wookie sounds down pat.) So, i'm sure that these have probably been either reprinted in comicbook version, or reformatted into a single story at some point. But, perhaps not?
After all - the licensing rules have changed dramatically in the intervening years.

Either way, i'm going to re-present them here in the original form. After all - it's Roy Thomas, Howard Chaykin, Tony DeZuniga, Marie Severin, Archie Goodwin, George Roussos, Jim Novak...  quite a cast of creators laying out the new tales in 3 page chapters.

In keeping with tradition, we'll be presenting the first story arc in three parts, but we won't make you wait years between releases; we'll get it all done today.

We pick up shortly after the medals awarding ceremony at the end of the first movie...

Continued in today's midday post.

pages from Pizzazz #s 1-3 (1977)

Bestest Beginnings

Finally!
I'm missing the first part, but knew i'd seen it in one of the archives to which i have access. But small and arcane university archives can be torurous to search at times. We're talking internet access that was established before the Web took over the Internet. One had best be familiar with FTP and willing to digitally walk through obtuse data mazes laid out when directory names were limited to eight characters.
But at last, chapter one is here and we may proceed...

Way back at the dawn of the Groovy Age there was a young guy who loved comics.
Actually, there were a lot of guys like that at the time, but we're talking about one in particular who would go on to be one of the writers with the biggest impact of the decades to follow. But back in 1961 he didn't have anyone to draw his stories when he decided to put out his own fanzine.

That didn't stop him. And, Lo - A League Was Born....

Alter Ego was launched, as many of you already know, by Roy Thomas.  CORRECTION/EDIT: Alter Ego was launched, as many of you already know, by Jerry Bails, of Jerry Bails' Collector's Guide fame, with the aid of Roy Thomas.
It went on to become such a legendary fanzine that it was revived as a professional publication in this century by Two Morrows. But back in that first issue, Roy was doing it all  drawing it by himself:

A note before we continue. Way back in those days before common access to Xerox copy machines, we had to use mimeograph technology for duplication. This was rather crude, involving preparing your pages backwards, so the master pages had a carbon sheet affixed to the back to create a reverse image of whatever was typed, or drawn, on the front side. That reversed image was then reversed again during duplication and was prone to fairly rapid replicant fading. For large runs, multiple masters often needed to be prepared. Not a terrible thing for a typed page of text, perhaps, but pretty limited for hand drawn artwork.

Also, the pages printed purple. I considered removing the colour data to allow cleaner preparation of these pages, but decided that the purple look was better suited to this post. I could be wrong, but this is what you get for now -

Yep. Even way back then, Roy was already working to bring back some of those Golden Age greats. Eventually that became something of his trademark at DC, while over at Marvel he's perhaps best known for the epic Kree/Skrull war.

Two issues later...

Now we're talking Groovy! Grass Green drawing Roy Thomas parody of 1963 era FF?
And an actual printer? Distribution must be growing.

Stay tuned for the return of Grass Green!

pages & covers by Roy Thomas for Alter Ego #s 1, 2 & 3 (1961)

Sunday Morning Funnies (King Kirby 048)

The worst thing* about no newspaper these days is no Sunday morning funnies! It's Sunday morning (here), so let's have some Jack Kirby related funnies! Wow! I really seem to be excited about that.
Way back in the first issue of FOOM, Marvel's members only fanzine, they ran a star studded parody of the Fantastic Four:

The following month, the quartet returned to play with another familiar Kirby character:

That was the last we saw from the Frantic Four on the parody front. But soon, another would step up. You may remember Charley Parker from The Origin Of King Kirby which we pulled from FOOM #11. In FOOM #4, this ominously appeared:

It wasn't until issue #8 that the Doctor made his true debut:

Dr. FOOM returned in #9...

...and in #10, we got not only Dr. FOOM And Captain Applepie, but the Eggsmen, too:

The following issue was the big Kirby Returns celebration with the Origin story we already looked at. After that, i never saw Charley Parker again that i recall. I wonder where he went? A mystery for another day...

Meanwhile, here's the grooviest parody of a Kirby character that i remember coming out of FOOM:

My favorite Kirby comedy comics, however, are of a decidedly different vein. And both come from the same person, Roger Langridge -

I wonder if he's done more?

To wrap up our Sunday Morning Funnies, let's go back to Marvel.  After Not Brand Echh went under, Marvel eventually realized that they were competing against black & white newstand magazines, so maybe they should try that instead - and so Crazy was born. (Crazy was the next synonym on the list after Mad and Cracked, you see) In #82 in '82, Jack Kirby parodied by Jack Kirby, with poor Mark Bilgrey begging the man not to take revenge upon him:

various comics by Roy Thomas, Len Brown, Gil Kane, Wally Wood, Charley Parker, Roger Langridge, Marc Bilgrey, and Jack Kirby with Steve Ditko(sweet!) from FOOM #s 1,2,4,8,9, & 10, Internet, and Crazy #82 (1973-5,????,1982)

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*(Y'know - aside from that whole collapse of local news and absorption into conglomerate structures undermining basic functions needed for the survival of a healthy republic, leading to the diminishment and eventual destruction of a free society thing.)