Yet another "The End" Week begins!

I started this bit 14 years ago, partly because the last week of the year was probably going to be a low-content area for comic book blogs...back when there were a lot of them, posting on the regular...and because last issues have always held an interest for me. It seems like even longer ago, but it used to be the last issue of a comic maybe meant the big goodbye, that you were not going to see those characters again, ever. Back when Star Wars was cancelled, I thought that was it; there would be no more Star Wars for me, in any way, shape, or form, forever. Really! When you're done laughing, yes, I was wrong. And comics being what they are, tons of books are cancelled, then retooled and relaunched later...sometimes by 'later' I mean 'immediately.' Every so often there might be one like Master of Kung Fu #125 or Micronauts #20 that seem like a hard stop, and they still come back! He hasn't got a new series yet, but Marvel's brought back Crystar; and I suspect are eying ROM. (Two last issues I haven't blogged yet!) 

So, we'll start with a title that's I know I've got two last issues for right here; but it's also had um, at least two miniseries, and like three more series since; and that's before you start throwing adjectives like 'Secret' or 'Fearless' into the mix. From 2002, Defenders #12, "Silent but Deadly" Story and art by Erik Larsen; and "Fooling with Mother Nature" Written by Jo Duffy and Kurt Busiek, pencils by Ivan Reis, inks by Randy Emberlin.

Even though Busiek and Larsen would've been pretty good gets as far as creative teams go, this series seemed to have a rough time of it: #8 features a blurb on the cover from a comics site (actually, a magazine!) proclaiming Defenders "The Worst Comic Ever Produced" but I've mentioned before, I liked the issues I read. The opener this issue isn't the strongest, as it was for 'Nuff Said month (like the Captain Marvel issue we mentioned the other day) and was silent: the cursed Defenders (Strange, Namor, Hulk, and the Surfer) get teleported to defend the earth yet again, this time in a mysteriously silent and rocky environment, which is shortly filled with rocky monsters.

Larsen's usually good for comedic touches, like the Hulk getting Namor's attention, by throwing a good-sized rock at him. It might be intentional: when the spell is broken, and sound returns, the guys still don't seem to have anything to say to each other, they were pretty over this...The second story, "Fooling with Mother Nature" includes the Defenders that did (usually) want to be there, Nighthawk, Valkyrie, and Hellcat; helping fight time-distorting baddie Chronarch. Who turns out to be a janitor that accidentally broke/created a time vortex, and gets wrapped up in a few pages; but the main four are again pissed that they had to show up for that, as the curse was getting to them. Back at Doctor Strange's Sanctum, Nighthawk's "spiritual advisor" Papa Hagg stops by to help, and gets bounced by Strange. The four then decide, if they can't get at the dead Yandroth to break the curse, they can go to Gaea, goddess of earth, and make her break it.

Nighthawk, somewhat dismayed, follows them and observes them petitioning a seemingly disinterested Gaea, who refuses to release them, even after they attack her. She teleports them away, dismissively; and when Nighthawk finds them again, the four have resolved to "tolerate this state of affairs no longer--and we will do what must be done!" This was setting up them going bad for a bit, in the Order, another name Marvel seems to trot out every so often. I'm not sure how much Nighthawk's relationship to the team was explored (or Patsy's, or Val's) as this feels like he's on a basketball team with four other guys who would barely let him sit on the bench.

Well, since I've got a moment, we might as well glance at another last issue that's been in the pile for some time: from 1986, the New Defenders #152, "The End of All Songs" Written by Peter B. Gillis, pencils by Don Perlin, inks by Dell Barras.

This is yet another last issue that's still part of a crossover event, so drink! It's a Secret Wars II tie-in, so of course we get the Beyonder midway through this just to muddy the waters, but this was straight-up editorial deck-clearing: Angel, Beast, and Iceman had to be reset and freed up to go to X-Factor #1, which I read when it came out, and can't recall if any of them so much as mention being part of the Defenders or losing all their teammates. Also, Beast had a dog, and doesn't get to bring it with him? Man. Moondragon, infected by the "Dragon of the Moon" and then empowered by the Beyonder, wants to do good, but also thinks killing the Defenders would be a good first step there. While Moondragon tortures the X-guys by threatening various supporting cast members, the other Defenders sacrifice themselves to destroy the Dragon, and are seemingly reduced to crumbling ash.

Valkyrie's pretty much the only one we really care about, and while Gillis may have intended to bring everyone back later, I think it was a spell for her. Despite being really vindictive and mean here, Moondragon is given a bit of an out in the end, that she helped save some supporting cast before her end; and she would be back in 1989, well before the others. I think Moondragon gets the bump because she was an Avenger; but Valkyrie had to be more popular?

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Sodam? Better check your local laws and statutes about that.

I was searching for a bit, since I swore I had blogged more than a few issues of this series: yeah, after it became Avengers Spotlight, maybe. From 1989, Solo Avengers #16, featuring "The Sinister Secret of Sodam" Written by Tom DeFalco, pencils by Al Milgrom, inks by Jose Marzan; and "Seconds!" Written by Peter B. Gillis, pencils by Don Perlin, inks by Jack Abel.

On the trail of Hawkeye and watching some A.I.M. goons, Mockingbird wants to help out her estranged husband, but can't let on she was following him only because he was going to meet his ex, the Black Widow. "Ex" is probably too generous...While Mockingbird gets inside and then starts pummelling A.I.M. troops, Hawkeye and the Widow have been captured...by Hank Pym? No, a robot Hank. Not even a good Ultron one! Hawkeye had known the robot was a fake the whole time--because he turned his hearing-aid up and could hear it clanking internally? Wouldn't doing that make everything else unbearably loud?

The real Hank is also there: he had been kidnapped, while attempting to cure his long-thought-dead wife Maria of her artifically-enlarged brain. Think an even more unwieldy MODOK. But she does get a new sort-of rocket chair, and new name: SODAM! "A Specialized Organism Designed for Aggressive Manuevers!" Was she ever Maria Pym? We don't find out here; but in another area, Mockingbird kicks a guy into shooting a computer, causing a power failure, freeing Hawkeye and Widow! The Hank-bot tries to stop the real one from giving Hawkeye some info, but then gets thrown into one of SODAM's mind-blasts and blown up. Somewhere else, SODAM's bosses give the order to retreat, so she hits the base self-destruct. The Avengers get out in a rocket sled, while Mockingbird has to chance the teleporter she got there in. No one is really happy in the end: Hank wonders if his wife is really dead, and Hawkeye understands since he wishes he could see his, as Mockingbird, her involvement still unseen, walks away.

Next up, the return of Moondragon! A tough nut to crack, since she was turned to ash in Defenders #152, a last issue I have but have never managed to blog because...ugh. Business magazine editor Pamela Douglas is having severe psychological problems, paranoid delusions, culminating in shaving her head to prove her boyfriend/husband Tom didn't love her? She does get what, for the time, would be a surprising amount of support, and wigs! (Her haircut would've predated Sinead O'Connor's big American break, but those panels really made me think of Britney Spears...) She later has a near-breakdown in front of an anti-abortion billboard. You don't see those in the Marvel U. too often. Thank god. Tom doesn't understand why she thinks she saw a baby, she wasn't pregnant; but they're interrupted by a giant clawed hand coming through their bedroom skylight!

Still, fleeing in terror, Pamela does get some answers where the baby is: Titan. Of course, the answer comes from the voice in her head; the mind of Moondragon! Pamela was Heather Douglas's closest female relative, a cousin or something, so why not move in and stay for a bit while a new clone body was being grown on Titan? Heather had been too weak to help or make herself known before, but the giant hand wasn't her doing. Well, not directly, anyway: it's the Gargoyle, Isaac Christians. His soul, trapped in a crystal, possessed some army guy that found it. Heather feels bad for what she did to him--under the Dragon of the Moon's control, or not, she was always a little 'look-what-you-made-me-do'--but c'mon, she already died for it, let it go. Pamela, with Heather in her head and the Gargoyle's soul in her hand, beams up to Moondragon's spaceship, for a trip to Titan...maybe you should tell your boyfriend you're going? Maybe he'd be concerned or want to go or something; but looks like he's getting extra ghosted. This was allegedly to be continued later; but I'm not sure it was before she returned in Quasar. I swear there was maybe a brief stretch in the 70's, where Marvel was really pushing Moondragon as their female lead in merchandising? I don't think there was a Spider-Woman yet, Storm wasn't big yet, maybe the Invisible Girl and Wasp weren't doing it? As often, I could be wrong. (And I might be! I vividly remember getting stickers of the Thing and Moondragon from Cracker Jacks way back when; but looking it up, there were Wasp and Invisible Girl stickers as well! Maybe they wanted a better guy/girl split.) Read more!