Posted By Dan Greenfield on Apr 7, 2024 | 7 comments

A wonderfully charming series for the kid in all of us…

By PETER STONE

Sometimes you look into a candy store, one of those old ones with the individual candies in clean, glass jars with labels like 5 cents or three for a dime. The person behind the counter will scoop out some of those mouth-watering chocolates or chewy fish and slide them into a paper bag. As a kid, you always go for the really good ones, carefully feeling the coins in your pocket to make sure you have enough. Then, you see it… the most wonderful candy you could imagine. It’s a small container of Swiss chocolate, made by the best in the world. It won’t last long, but it’s spectacular while it melts in your mouth.

That, to me, was what Homage Comics’ Leave It to Chance was.

In 1995, WildStorm Productions created the Homage Comics imprint to focus on more writer-oriented series. The imprint fell under the umbrella of Image Comics but featured some diverse and unique titles — like Leave It to Chance, written by James Robinson and co-created and drawn by the famed X-Men artist Paul Smith.

The series protagonist was a precocious 14-year-old girl named Chance Falconer, daughter of a famed paranormal investigator and all-around magic wielder, Lucas Falconer. In the classic young-adult adventure style (Hardy Boys, Nancy Drew, Treasure Island, Harry Potter, Percy Jackson), Chance gets drawn into danger through her own “investigations” in Devil’s Echo, a city populated with magic characters and evil villains. To aid her in her adventures, Chance is best friends with a diminutive dragon named St. George, reminding the reader that Paul Smith co-created Lockheed for Kitty Pryde in the X-Men.

The stories are filled with giant frogs (that’s right GIANT FROGS) along with a frog army, the Flying Dutchman, evil Catholic school matrons, low level demons used as flunkies for crime bosses, fairies and a zombie hockey player who returns to get revenge on his killers. Chance finds her way through these stories with heart and compassion and the help of St. George and her police friends… and occasionally, her father.

I never imagined it would last for more than a few issues, but it made it to 11 and was a real gem. Every story is full of that Hardy Boys/Nancy Drew/Harry Potter kind of mystery and magic. When I was a boy, I loved reading these kinds of young-adult (as they call it now) adventure stories. Stories where the main character had a faithful dog who protected him or her or a loyal adult friend who guided him or her through the dangers of the world. Chance has her dragon and her friends. As a reader you know that she will always escape the dangers she has put herself in.

Leave It to Chance is a product of a genre when kids could be the heroes of a comic title. The Newsboy Legion, Superboy, a happy Dick Grayson Robin, Power Pack, and many others. These days, we do have Dog Man and Cat Kid, The Powerpuff Girls and Moon Girl and Devil Dinosaur. But if you are looking for another light but wonderful story with excellent art from one of the best in the industry, I highly recommend Leave It to Chance. There are hardcover collections available through Amazon for under $30.

If you will indulge me for a moment, I happen to love those young-adult adventure novels. There is a purity and hopefulness that comics seem to have lost. I grew up reading Tintin (which I understand a lot of people don’t like) and reading the previously mentioned Hardy Boys, Treasure Island and Kidnapped (the last two by Robert Louis Stevenson), so I long for those days of kids struggling through dangerous situations with their faithful companions or dogs to emerge victorious. Leave It to Chance was exactly that for me. Between James Robinson and Paul Smith, they gave me exactly what I thought young men and women needed: You can make a difference. You can do good things and save the world. You just must believe in yourself.

Homage Comics had a great collection of unique and independent artists and writers, with series like Astro City, Red and Strangers in Paradise (for a spell). Ultimately, Jim Lee, owner of WildStorm, sold his company to DC Comics and, six years later, Homage was merged with Cliffhanger to create WildStorm Signature Series.

I love what this company was trying to do. It was part of a time when comics were exploring new venues and storytelling techniques. Today we have the benefit of those halcyon days: companies creating vastly unique titles and concepts. Nostalgia tells me that everything I remember was greater than what is happening today, but that certainly is not the case. There are wonderful projects being produced now. Scott Snyder is doing great comics, Saga, Deadly Class, Something Is Killing the Children, Paper Girls… all of these are terrific.

But… I miss Chance Falconer, St. George and their adventures. I miss seeing Paul Smith’s artwork in a sequential-art form. I loved his X-Men and grew to love his other work. I loved James Robinson’s writing when he created Golden Age (with Smith), then learned quickly that he was even better than that. He is a great writer.

Leave It to Chance is amazing and well worth the read.

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MEANWHILE…

The Golden Age was a wonderfully dark and interesting series from 1993-94, featuring a slightly more realistic version of the Justice Society of America. It featured all of the old, WWII characters and a revived Adolf Hitler. The four, 48-page issues were right in step with the post-Alan Moore/Frank Miller time period. Then Robinson moved on to Starman, also for DC, where he became a superstar. Leave It to Chance was a completely different style, aimed at a younger audience. Still, his stories were solid and powerful. And fun.

Paul Smith was already a superstar from his 10-issue run on The Uncanny X-Men after Byrne and Cockrum. He left the X-Men to draw a prodigious run on Dr. Strange with Terry Austin. Having started his career in animation with Ralph Bakshi’s Lord of the Rings animated movies, he was the perfect choice for Leave It to Chance. His clear, clean, slightly animated style brought a wonderful life to Chance Falconer and the strange villains who inhabited this mystical city of Devil’s Echo.

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MORE

— BURIED TREASURE: Gerry Conway and Jose Luis Garcia-Lopez’s CINDER AND ASHE. Click here.

— BURIED TREASURE: Edvin Biukovic’s THE HUMAN TARGET. Click here.

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Peter Stone is a writer and son-in-law of the late Neal Adams. Be sure to check out the family’s twice-weekly online Facebook auctions, as well as the NealAdamsStore.com, and their Burbank, California, comics shop Crusty Bunkers Comics and Toys.