Written by David DeVries, pencils by Paul Gulacy. An American fisherman is infected by a piece of the Thing left over at the end of the first story, and subsequently infects his New Zealander girlfriend, though this time the Things intend to quietly survive together rather than assimilating everything in sight. MacReady shows up once again to put an end to that plan.
In 1989, DC Comics began publishing the Forgotten Realms comic series, written by Jeff Grubb. Each issue contained twenty-six pages, illustrated primarily by Rags Morales and Dave Simons. The 19 issues produced by Morales were his first professional works. Tom Raney illustrated issues #17 and #20. Elliot S. Maggin served as an editor for DC from 1989 to 1991 and oversaw the licensed TSR titles, including Forgotten Realms. Twenty-five issues were published in total, with the last being released in 1991.
The series began by introducing Shang-Chi as a man raised by his father Fu Manchu to be the ultimate assassin for the would-be world conqueror. In Shang-Chi’s first mission, he kills one of his father’s old enemies, Dr. Petrie, and learns of Fu Manchu’s true, evil nature. Disillusioned, Shang-Chi swears eternal opposition to his father’s ambitions and fights him as an agent of British intelligence, under the orders of Sir Denis Nayland Smith.
The series was an instant sales success. However, Englehart and Starlin would depart the series after their third issue, Master of Kung Fu # 17; Englehart over editorial disputes with then Marvel editor Roy Thomas while Starlin, who was unfamiliar with Fu Manchu up until working on the second issue of the series, left out of embarrassment over the racist nature of the Rohmer novels. Despite the title’s co-creators’ early departure, its success grew once writer Doug Moench and artist Paul Gulacy, began collaborating in issues #22. Comics historian Les Daniels observed that “Ingenious writing by Doug Moench and energetic art by Paul Gulacy brought Master of Kung Fu new life.” Their critically acclaimed run continued, with short gaps, until #51 when Gulacy was replaced by artist Jim Craig. Craig was later succeeded by Mike Zeck who became the regular penciller in issue #64 (1978).
Madman first appeared as Frank Einstien in Creatures of the Id and Grafik Muzik published in 1990, but it wasn’t until March 1992 that the first Madman miniseries debuted from Tundra Publishing. The series gained further recognition with its move to Dark Horse Comics in April 1994, where it was relaunched as Madman Comics and went on to be nominated for several Harvey Awards. Madman Comics ran for 20 issues and ended in 2000. From 2007–2009, Image Comics published Madman: Atomic Comics for 17 issues.
Supergirl (Volume 2) was published from November of 1982 until September of 1984, spanning a total of 23 issues. The series was initially entitled, the Daring New Adventures of Supergirl, but shortened the title to simply, Supergirl, with issue #13. This was the last regular comic series to feature the Pre-Crisis Kara Zor-El as Supergirl.
It is discovered that the first incarnation of the Horsemen are actually the biological children of Apocalypse and his wife Genesis who was also sent with Arakko. Following that, Apocalypse went to the Summoner and directed him to the portal to Otherworld where he could return to Arakko, while being accompanied by Unus and Banshee. However, what Apocalypse didn’t expect was that this was all an elaborated plan created by his own children so they could return and overthrow Krakoa with their fellow Arakki mutants and Daemon army. Apocalypse himself was soon attacked and critically injured by his daughter War, being forced to retreat back to Krakoa to heal their wounds and prepare for war between the two groups.
Violent Messiahs is an series created by Joshua Dysart and William O’Neil and published by Image Comics. The comic takes place in a fictional city known as Rankor Island, and focused on the Rankor PD’s attempts to bring in Rankor’s vigilantes. The most prominent characters are Lt. Cheri Major and Detective Ernest Houston, the two cops leading the investigations, Family Man, a serial killer who attacks bad parents, and Citizen Pain, a giant, dark figure who was the most prominent vigilante in Rankor.
J. M. DeMatteis became the regular writer in mid-1991, injecting a grim, psychological tone into the series. DeMatteis began his run with the story arc “The Child Within” (#178–184, July 1991-Jan. 1992), featuring the return of the Harry Osborn Green Goblin. As written by DeMatteis, Harry sank further into insanity and gained the same super-strength possessed by his father, battling Spider-Man again in #189 (June 1992), before being killed in #200 (May 1993). In an undated 2000s interview, DeMatteis said, “I really loved the two years on Spectacular Spider-Man that I wrote with Sal Buscema drawing. Talk about underrated! Sal is one of the best storytellers and a wonderful collaborator. I loved that run.”
DeMatteis left the book in mid-1993 to write The Amazing Spider-Man. Steven Grant and other writers followed through late 1994, when formerAmazing Spider-Man writer Tom DeFalco took over. By this time, all the Spider-books were affected by the controversial “Clone Saga” that culminated with Spectacular Spider-Man #226 (July 1995). This story revealed (though it was later reversed) that the Spider-Man who had appeared in the previous 20 years of comics was a clone of the real Spider-Man. This tied into a publishing gap after #229 (Oct. 1995), when the title was temporarily replaced by The Spectacular Scarlet Spider #1–2 (Nov.-Dec. 1995), featuring the “original” Peter Parker. The series picked up again with #230 (Jan. 1996).
Todd DeZago then wrote for a year before DeMatteis returned through May 1998. Luke Ross succeeded Sal Buscema as the artist and remained until the series ended, but there was no regular writer for the last half-year with Glenn Greenberg, Roger Stern, John Byrne and Howard Mackie all contributing during this time. The final issue was #263 (Nov. 1998).
Penthouse Comix began as a series of short segments in Penthouse Magazine. After 3 of these sections were printed (featuring artwork by Adam Hughes, Kevin Nowlan and Garry Leach), publisher Bob Guccione dictated that Penthouse Comix become its own stand-alone magazine, something which he envisioned competing in both US and European magazine markets. Guccione agreed to a budget that was designed to cherry pick art talent from both American comic book companies and non-US publishers and this resulted in Penthouse Comix offering a per-page rate among the highest ever paid to freelance comic book artists.
The first issue of the stand-alone Penthouse Comix was a 96-page, color, glossy magazine with cover price of $4.95 US. It appeared in spring 1994 and featured work by Adam Hughes, Garry Leach, Kevin Nowlan, Mike Harris, Arthur Suydam, Jordan Raskin, Horacio Altuna, and Milo Manara. Subsequent issues contained work by artists such as Roberto Baldazzini, Richard Corben, Tony Salmons, Bart Sears and Gray Morrow. The magazine’s early issues avoided hardcore sex in favor of “soft-core erotica” and satiric humor that poked fun at various popular genres and popular culture.
Countdown consists of 51 issues, number in reverse, published weekly for one year, crossing over with noteworthy and significant titles published by DC. The series covers much of the fictional DC Universe, told in parallel narratives, through the interconnecting stories of a cast of characters, and frequently crosses over with various other DC titles. Unlike the 52 limited series of the previous year, Countdown is not depicted as taking place in “real time” but presumably operates on the same floating timeline as DC Comics stories in general.
EHT Comics 