COMIC BOOK DEATH MATCH! | 13th Dimension, Comics, Creators, Culture

Jun29

COMIC BOOK DEATH MATCH: Secret Wars #7 vs. Crisis on Infinite Earths #7

Posted by Dan Greenfield on Jun 29, 2024

COMIC BOOK DEATH MATCH: Secret Wars #7 vs. Crisis on Infinite Earths #7

With 1965’s Green Lantern #40 thrown in for good measure… Fred Van Lente’s COMIC BOOK DEATH MATCH is back and better than ever! Now, as a monthly feature for 2024! See, Marvel this year is celebrating the 40th anniversary of 1984’s 12-issue Marvel Super Heroes Secret Wars by re-releasing each installment as a Facsimile Edition every month. And of course, what is the DC event it’s always compared to? Why, 1985’s Crisis on Infinite Earths, of course. And that series is also being re-released monthly too. (It started in April.) It’s a great time to revisit two maxiseries that redefined comics for good and for bad. You can click here to find the previous entries, but right now the tally stands at Secret Wars 3, Crisis 3. (The Secret Wars #7 Facsimile Edition is out this Wednesday.) Ring the bell, Fred! — By FRED VAN LENTE Marvel Super Heroes Secret Wars #7: “Berserker!” This installment mostly just continues storylines from the previous ish without introducing anything new, except for the Julia Carpenter Spider-Woman, a character literally no one asked for. I doubt most readers realized that Jessica Drew had been de-powered, thereby leaving a hole in the Spider-Verse. But who is this person, other than the fact her new Mike Zeck-designed costume is awesome, and that she has presumably been quietly Spider-Womaning in the same Battleworld-transplanted section of Denver that Volcana and Titania hail from? (I mean, you kind of have to assume that, though that’s never spelled out in the story.) In case you were wondering, Zeck did in fact design Spider-Man’s black costume first, then retrofitted it into Carpenter’s in real time—since, don’t forget, Spider-Man’s black costume showed up on the stands before it does in continuity chronologically. Got it? The villains dump Wasp’s corpse on Heroes’ Village and drive off laughing, which seems, um, tactically unwise. I have a feeling Dr. Doom would have said this was a bad idea, had he known about it, but he’s not around to object. Galactus has finally figured out Doom has been wandering unhindered around his house for two issues and zaps him back to Battleworld. He mopes off to his room to contemplate his cosmic insignificance, forcing Volcana to sell her soul to the Enchantress to save her Wolverine-skewered boyfriend, Molecule Man. Captain America says they can’t retaliate against Wasp’s murderers because someone has to sit here and keep an...

Jun02

COMIC BOOK DEATH MATCH: Secret Wars #6 vs. Crisis on Infinite Earths #6

Posted by Dan Greenfield on Jun 2, 2024

COMIC BOOK DEATH MATCH: Secret Wars #6 vs. Crisis on Infinite Earths #6

Death! Death!! DEATH!!! Fred Van Lente’s COMIC BOOK DEATH MATCH is back and better than ever! Now, as a monthly feature for 2024! See, Marvel this year is celebrating the 40th anniversary of 1984’s 12-issue Marvel Super Heroes Secret Wars by re-releasing each installment as a Facsimile Edition every month. And of course, what is the DC event it’s always compared to? Why, 1985’s Crisis on Infinite Earths, of course. And that series is also being re-released monthly too. (It started in April.) It’s a great time to revisit two maxiseries that redefined comics for good and for bad. You can click here to find the previous entries, but right now the tally stands at Secret Wars 3, Crisis 2. (The Secret Wars #6 Facsimile Edition is out this Wednesday.) Ring the bell, Fred! — By FRED VAN LENTE Marvel Super Heroes Secret Wars #6: “A Little Death…” The Wasp, who’s been trying to escape from Magneto’s lair for the last two issues-plus, crashes her vessel in a Battleworld swamp and stumbles across the Lizard, whom everyone, and, I’m presuming, Shooter & Co., have forgotten about since #1. The two of them recreate the regular-person-is-nice-to-monster schtick from countless Frankenstein movies, until more villains happen by, lethally wound Wasp, and scoop Lizard up. Damn, Janet just can’t catch a break. Dr. Doom, meanwhile, is wandering around Galactus’ house. “Wandering around Galactus’ house” is clearly one of Jim Shooter’s fondest dreams because, as you may recall, doing so is how Korvac gets his godlike powers in Shooter’s most beloved Avengers storyline. Doom isn’t as lucky. Instead, he just summons Klaw, Master of Sound, who’d been zapped into Galactus’s WiFi router by Dazzler in a way too complicated for me to want to describe. Klaw’s brains have been fried in the process, and he becomes Doom’s enthusiastic thrall. Doom sends Klaw back to Battleworld with instructions for the other villains to mess up Galactus’ dinner by causing a volcanic disruption. (Since Galactus converts planets to energy before eating them, I don’t understand how that’s going to slow him down, But am I a master of both science and magic like Victor Von Doom, the Lord of Latveria? Alas, Reader, I am not.) The unrequited love triangle between Colossus, Human Torch, and alien hippie chick Zsaji continues, with Colossus’ agony hilariously rendered by the much-welcome return of Mike Zeck....

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