Posted By Dan Greenfield on Nov 9, 2023 | 3 comments

The beloved writer was born 72 years ago, on Nov. 9, 1951…

By CHRIS RYALL

I’ve been re-reading a lot of Bill Mantlo comics of late. In part, because I often revisit his stuff. Bill always told fun, accessible, and consistently interesting stories in the superhero comics he wrote. But he also had a great handle on bringing in science-fiction elements that further enhanced and informed his comics.

After Marvel’s very welcome announcement earlier this year that, decades after both series last saw print, my beloved Rom, Spaceknight and also Micronauts – both brought to comics and written by Bill – were finally going to be collected in deluxe omnibus formats. (Marvel asked me to write introductions for each volume.)

Rom Omnibus, George Perez cover

So I had an excuse to re-read both series, not that I ever needed one. I used this research to also put together 13 FAR OUT ROM COVERS for 13th Dimension back in May, and in my Micro-Omnibus piece, I mused about all the great Michael Golden covers (far more than 13!) that the artist created for the Micronauts series.

My original intent today, seeing how Nov. 9 is Bill Mantlo’s 72nd birthday (he was born in 1951), was to offer up 13 good examples of covers from each series. But not only does that run the risk of being repetitive, it also doesn’t provide a proper look at so many of the other great series Bill has written.

And so, instead, here are 13 GREAT BILL MANTLO STORIES — along with their covers. (All are from Marvel):

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0. Tales to Astonish #90. OK, I know I tend to bend the “13” rule as much as I can when I do these tributes but there’re just so many good comics to show. This one doesn’t necessarily count as one of the 13, especially since I’ve never read the comic itself, but also because it’s not a comic that Bill wrote. However, it is the right starting place since this issue’s letters page features a letter from fan, not-yet-pro, Bill Mantlo. And it’s fitting that Bill’s letter focused on the Hulk story since he went on to write so many great Hulk comics over the years.

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1. Rom, Spaceknight #32. I know I said just above that I wouldn’t focus on only Rom and Micronauts and yet, my first pick is a Rom cover (to be followed by a Micronauts cover). Just getting it out of my system. And this comic isn’t one I featured before, but it is an important one, since it’s the issue where Evil Mutant Rogue kisses Rom’s living armor and manages to absorb some of his inherent goodness. Which sets the character on a totally different, and better, redemptive path in future issues of Uncanny X-Men. And while Chris Claremont is the writer who really guided Rogue into the light for years in that book, it was Bill’s comic here that first set her on the right path.

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2. Micronauts #41. It’s not the greatest Gil Kane cover, and Gil was always a sorta-odd fit for this title, but the cover does feature some solid floating-head work, always an approach I like. But I picked this one not for the cover but for the story, which is a great example of something Bill always did well. Bill was occasionally the go-to fill-in writer on various series written by others, I’m sure for his speed but also because he was always adept at telling stories and writing characters that fit perfectly with what other writers were doing. He did so here by revisiting “Liddleville,” a tiny town built by Doctor Doom in John Byrne’s Fantastic Four #236. And not only did he pick up the story in a smart, fitting way for this series that also featured tiny characters, but he ended it by handing the baton back to Byrne with a development that Byrne would run with in Fantastic Four #246, too.

They didn’t make my cut here but another example of Bill filling in for another writer in convincing fashion was his work dialoguing X-Men #96, very early on in the “All-New, All-Different” era, and again in Issue #106.

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3. Invincible Iron Man #103. Bill came aboard this series a few issues prior, and he did steer Issue #100, which features an amazing Jim Starlin cover. But this issue stood out to me more for two reasons: one, Bill brought in his creation, Jack of Hearts, as he often did every chance he got. Jack was a fun and visually interesting character and Bill did all he could to make the character into something special.

This issue also starts a multipart story that really allowed Bill to do what he did well, which is move things along while also managing a broad supporting cast. In this case, Whitney Frost and Jasper Sitwell finally had big things to do in the series. And so began the last great storyline in this book before Michelinie and Layton took over a year later.

As for Jack of Hearts, well, Bill did get to spin the character off into his own miniseries a few years after this issue, and even now, the character has become an important part of Rainbow Rowell’s She-Hulk run. Bill did finally manage to make “fetch” happen after all!

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4. The Human Fly #1. “The Wildest Super-Hero Ever—Because He’s Real!” proclaimed the cover. Well, maybe not quite, not as portrayed here, but The Human Fly is certainly an interesting comic for something licensed from a real human, the mysterious daredevil called the Human Fly. One of ‘em, anyway.

Bill did all he could with this somewhat one-note character, integrating him into the Marvel Universe and also introducing a supporting cast who, like the title character, transcended their various physical limitations, which was an important thing for kids to see in such a front and center way. Marvel, if you ever do finally collect these 19 long-out-of-print issues into an omnibus, I’d be happy to sing this series’ praises, too.

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5. Marvel Team-Up #41. Marvel Team-Up, in an effort to fulfill its mission to constantly rotate its cast, most often pairing someone new with Spider-Man every issue, tended to stick to one- or two-part tales. But this issue kicks off a great multipart storyline that spans from the Salem Witch Trials of the past to various points in Marvel’s future, all tied together in a way that never felt forced. Before the great Claremont/Byrne run on this series that would come, this was, and still is, one of my favorite issues and Team-Up storylines.

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6. Super-Villain Team-Up #12. This series was, admittedly, a bit of a mess. I think the series’ first four issues were written by something like a half-dozen writers (only a slight exaggeration), and one of its issues was even drawn by Marvel EiC/non-artist Jim Shooter(!). Yet it was one of the first series I ever dug into as a kid, so I loved it then and still have a fond spot for it (as you’ll see later in the month when one of this series’ splash pages appears in a Keith Giffen birthday celebration).

As often happened, Bill came in off the bench to give a somewhat unsteady series the stability it needed. And the best of what he did in this series happens in this issue. I’d describe it in more detail but the gist of it is, a brutal, last-man-standing battle between the Red Skull and Doctor Doom on the surface of the moon. Truly, a ‘Nuff Said description of a compelling comic, I think.

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7. Fantastic Four #172. This issue is another great example of how Bill could step into another writer’s storyline in a way that never felt anything less than cohesive to fans. At the start of what would become a big Galactus/Counter-Earth storyline written by Roy Thomas, Roy took a break here and let Bill get the team off-planet and propel the story along. It surely helped that the issue featured great George Perez art but Bill’s script never missed a beat, either.

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8. The Incredible Hulk #261. I considered featuring Hulk #270, which brings Bill’s co-creation (with Keith Giffen), Rocket Raccoon, into the series, but I prefer this issue and it’s oddly compelling Frank Miller cover. (And I did find a way to give a little love to Hulk #270 at the end of this piece, too.) The Hulk washes ashore on Easter Island and runs afoul of a barely-with-it Absorbing Man, who ends the issue in an even worse place than it started. One trivia note: In talking to him for a deluxe collection of his best Hulk stories, artist Sal Buscema once told me that this was also his single favorite issue of his time on the series.

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9. Peter Parker, The Spectacular Spider-Man #72. Bill wrote a great many issues of this ponderously named comic, and many were more serious, and maybe technically “better” than this one (like Issue #64, where he introduced Cloak and Dagger), but this is my favorite issue in the run. It makes Doctor Octopus both menacing and a goof, as we meet a kid who emulates Ock and ends up running afoul of Spider-Man in a toy store. It’s a lot of fun, and the Ed Hannigan art (which features little cameos from Frank Miller, squatting on a rooftop near a Miller-esque water tower, as well as the Rom, Spaceknight toy) is a joy to behold. Hannigan contributed some amazing covers for the series and this one is the best of ‘em all.

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10. Marvel Super Hero Contest of Champions #1. Marvel’s first-ever limited series, where Bill had a chance to write a huge array of Marvel characters, no doubt because he was so good at capturing so many of their voices. He also included some new international characters that are maybe, uh, a bit facile, let’s say, but at least Marvel tried to make this series more broadly inclusive. And one more Rom trivia note: The character appears here in a single panel (flirting with the robot Jocasta, it looks like) but doesn’t get any play in the series beyond that moment.

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11. Rocket Raccoon #1. Bill and young artist Mike Mignola took what was a bit of a silly animal character and really brought him and his world to life in this fun miniseries. Mignola certainly wasn’t the artist we love from Hellboy yet but I have such a fond spot for the work he did with Marvel during this period. While he certainly got even better, you could tell from every page of this series that he was already something special.

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12. Cloak and Dagger #1. Like Rocket Raccoon, C&D were characters Bill co-created who were then elevated to their own miniseries. This series, and a follow-up by the same team, features one of the best pairings of writer and artists in the form of Bill and Rick Leonardi and Terry Austin. A really gorgeous series.

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13. Swords of the Swashbucklers. Part of Marvel’s oversize Marvel Graphic Novel line, this one is a high-adventure story by Bill and Jackson “Butch” Guice, and it’s also just beautiful to look at and fun to read. I also could’ve included any number of great Micronauts covers that Guice created when he and Mantlo were paired up on that series, but this cover deserves the spotlight.

Still, if you do want a look at Butch Guice’s Micronauts work, here’s one additional image to celebrate Bill and to show off Guice’s great stuff: It’s not cheating since this is the back cover of Micronauts #58, Bill’s final issue on the series and a fitting note to (almost) end on here.

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One final note in Bill’s honor: After I produced the Sal Buscema Hulk book that I mentioned above, I got a copy to Bill’s family and they presented it to him in his long-term care facility. (For those who don’t know, Bill was the victim of a hit-and-run in the early ‘90s that left him with permanent, very serious brain damage. Bill’s no longer intellectually a functionally capable adult, leaving left the man who was so good at putting words in characters’ mouths functionally speechless, a really heartbreaking turn.) They sent me the below photo of Bill holding the book and smiling, which will forever be one of the all-time best moments I’ve ever experienced working in comics.

Happy birthday to you, Bill! And thanks again for the inspiration and all the great comics.

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MORE

— Classic ROM Returns to MARVEL With OMNIBUS Collections and Facsimile Edition. Click here.

— First ROM, Now MICRONAUTS Is Getting MARVEL OMNIBUS Collections. Click here.

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Chris Ryall is the co-owner/publisher of Image Comics imprint Syzygy Publishing. His latest series is Tales of Syzpense, out now. Subscribe to his Substack of the same name!