(Opens comic) Goddam--From 1982,
Marvel Team-Up #121, "Look Before You Leap!" Written by J. M. DeMatteis, pencils by Kerry Gammill, inks by Mike Esposito.
Speed Demon returns, this time in the middle of a chance meeting and rekindled rivalry of Spider-Man and the Human Torch. Unfortunately, this also features the return of Leap-Frog, in the person of the original's son Eugene. After a career getting thumped by Daredevil, the old Leap-Frog had retired, served his time, and was trying to raise his son right but was seemingly haunted by his failures. Eugene has the bright idea of making his old suit "a powerful symbol for
good!" but maybe should've followed up on it with, I don't know, five minutes of practice with those powered springs. After accidentally trashing a cop car, Leap-Frog does manage to beat Speed Demon, by sheer luck. By the way, this issue's
cover has those weird pointing-hand caption boxes I associate with old issues of
Flash, as well as a mysterious figure in silhouette that is way too slim to be Eugene. (It's not as bad as the time Marvel pulled that with
Volstagg, but still.)
More interesting here is the Spidey/Torch relationship: not as acrimonius as they used to be, they're both probably closer friends than they would care to admit. To anyone. Ever.
I'm sure over the years they really are legit closer as friends than they would admit, yet also seem to bring out the immature worst in each other at times as well, kinds like back during Morrison's JLA run when Wally & Kyle clashed as much as they did despite being so close in age.
ReplyDeleteI think deep down, or not so deep down, Peter will always feel like the unpopular introvert science nerd, which clashes with Johnny's more outgoing, popular self. And yet, still good friends.
Definitely glad no one like an Ellis, Millar or someone similarly as famous for their dark takes never got their hands on ol' Froggers. I just don't think I'd ever want to see a super, dark & depressed Eugene turning into a serial killer or suicide bomber as an attempt for said character to be more "realistic."
Still amazed he got his own ML figure as well.
I appreciate a good comedic hero character, so I'm down with Frog-Man. His headlining Team-Up issue with Spidey was pretty good too- brought in a bunch of animal themed villains and introduced White Rabbit, if I recall correctly.
ReplyDeleteMan, Marvel Team-Up is a seriously underappreciated book.
@H: I definitely 100% agree with you on MTU being woefully underappreciated. It really is given how many classic stories, team-ups and legends who worked on the book. It's very telling that the What If? series has a shit ton of trades to call their own, but Marvel Team-Up does not. That needs to be changed.
ReplyDeleteI don't know about that- they got up to about # 100 in the Essential collections, and there are a few storyline and/or writer focused collections of MTU out there. What If? just has more volumes to collect- they were doing one for almost every big event for a while there.
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