Hey you kids! Get off my continent!

Huh, I've been doing this for how many years and haven't brought up Magnus, Robot Fighter yet? It wasn't a book I read as a kid, since Gold Keys were somewhat few and far between in my neck of the woods. I never read Valiant, either; but over the years I've picked up a few back issues and reprints, and the Magnus crossovers with Nexus and Predator. (Why Predator and not Terminator? I imagine the Terminator people vetoed the idea of a guy in a red skirt karateing Arnold to death...)

More after the break!

While I haven't read every single Magnus comic, it seems like a common theme that just about everyone, except for Magnus himself and on rare occasions his girlfriend Leeja, are completely useless. Most of the citizens of North-Am are spoiled rotten and completely dependent on their robot servants, except for the underclass of Gophs (or whatever they were called...) that are fiercely independent to the point that you can't help them or get them to do anything except live free in their own filth.


Since I don't read them often, though, it doesn't bother me as much that much that Magnus never seems to make a lot of headway in getting the citizens off their lazy asses. But, I remember Magnus fondly for one reason more than any other: the song "The Death of Magnus" from Servotron's CD No Room for Humans. Servotron was an indie-rock band that in-character, was like Devo assimilated by the Borg. Surf-guitar songs about robot superiority and the inevitable human extinction. If Bender had been around at the time, they would've been his favorite band.

Unfortunately, I couldn't find a video for "The Death of Magnus," so here's "I sing the body cybernetic" from their second album, which I wish I had right now...I had a Servotron t-shirt for years from one of their shows, and wonder if it's still around here somewhere.



Scans from Valiant's Vintage Magnus Robot Fighter #2, "Giant from Planet X" Written by Robert Schaefer and Eric Freiwald, pencils and inks by Russ Manning.