This past week, somebody put out a graphic combining the new Steve Trevor from the Wonder Woman movie with the current Captain America (who as we know, has the real name of Steve Rogers) with the title Steves on a Plane.
Being the airplane/comics nerd that I am, I could not let that go past. So to Super-Team Family: The Lost Issues, I proposed the All-Steve Squadron, which includes the above and...
* from DC's War Heroes, Steve Savage the Elder, better known as Balloon Buster
* from Avon Comics of the Fifties, Steve Savage the Younger (Captain Steve Savage)
* from TV and Charlton Comics, Steve Austin (The Six Million Dollar Man)
* and from Archie Comics, Steve Stacey: Sky Detective.
I guess I need to get into Steve Stacey. He had a very very brief career. He only appeared in 16 PAGES in the anthology Blue Ribbon in 1941. His series was an okay idea for a comic, but the writing and visuals didn't work so it's no surprise to me that it ended.
In the story, Steve was a flight instructor who broke up a sabotage scheme against his flight school, and as a result, he got recruited into the Civil Aviation Authority as an investigator. In the course of his adventure, he also saved the life of a female student pilot named Joyce Barton--who appointed herself his assistant. Together, they fought mob hitmen, air pirates, Nazi sleeper agents and the like.
There wasn't much backstory for either character. It was alluded that Steve was previously a competitor in air races, and before that, flew for the U.S. Mail.
Writer's Block: Superman
Jun. 8th, 2012 03:16 pmThe webcomic keeps me interested in comics in general, but the last time I bought a NEW comic book was when BATTLER BRITTON appeared a few years ago. I'm more likely to get collected volumes of past comics than buy the stuff on the racks these days.
Judging by what I have currently, I suppose my answer to the latter question is ENEMY ACE.
Writer's Block: Live action hero
Aug. 10th, 2011 01:36 pmI thought American Splendour was pretty good. Haven't seen Ghost World or Scott Pilgrim yet.
I like superhero movies, but really don't get to see a lot of them. Since the Batman franchise revival of the Nineties, there have been enough made that they could probably fill out the entire programming block of a cable channel.
Writer's Block: A super debate
Mar. 19th, 2011 12:30 pmMy father was Peter Parker a few times so the one end of the argument has its merits. I have never gotten into Green Lantern so I don't know of anything that entails. One superpower that is really seductive to me is the one that Walky had in It's Walky...he could take control of extraterrestrial technology with his mind whenever he came in contact with it. Flying saucers, killer robots, machines of mass destruction, death rays, reincarnation tanks--all obeyed Walky when he put his mind to it.
And yes, I would love to have that power. Besides, who can argue that I don't have it NOW? I haven't encountered any extraterrestrial technology myself yet...
Freewill, Once More
Oct. 7th, 2010 06:33 amThis morning I had to interrupt my meditation on your horoscope. I'd studied the astrological configurations and said my usual prayer, asking for guidance to come up with the oracle you need most. But nothing had occurred to me yet, and it was time to leave the house for an appointment. As I closed the door behind me, I was still in deep thought about you. Then my face hit something gauzy, and I pulled back. Overnight, a spider had spun a huge web spanning the entire porch frame. I'd knocked it a bit off-kilter, but it was still intact. "That's got to be an omen," I thought to myself as I stooped under it and continued on my way. An omen of what? A little voice in my head gave the answer: Sagittarius is ready to merge more directly with the great web of life.
Overnight I dreamt that I met myself. "Stephen Bierce! Don't be afraid, it's Stephen Bierce! I won't demand anything from you, and I don't care whether you demand anything from me..."
It would have been more interesting but the dream leapt ahead to a binge screening of the whole Iron Man saga--#5 was being released and somebody wanted to see the other four first before going to the theater.
Research Addiction
Mar. 26th, 2009 06:45 pm
And the one I got the year before...

...to do the following listing. Totally useless factoid, with only marginal interest if you are not a big mainstream comics fan. Pardon my capslock.
USELESS FACT: COMIC BOOK CHARACTERS BY PROMINENCE BASED UPON SPACE GIVEN IN THE ENCYCLOPEDIAS
DC
TOP TIER
* AQUAMAN * BATMAN * CAPTAIN MARVEL (SHAZAM!) * THE FLASH * GREEN ARROW * GREEN LANTERN * THE JOKER * LEX LUTHOR * ROBIN * SPECTRE * STARMAN * SUPERMAN * WONDER WOMAN
SECOND TIER
* ANIMAL MAN * ARION * ARSENAL * THE ATOM * AZRAEL * BATGIRL * BIZARRO * BLACK CANARY * BLACKHAWK * BRANIAC * CAPTAIN MARVEL JR. * CATWOMAN * CLAYFACE * DARKSEID * DEADMAN * THE DEMON * DOCTOR FATE * FIRESTORM * HAWKMAN * LOIS LANE * LOBO * MARTIAN MANHUNTER * MARY MARVEL * MISTER FREEZE * NIGHTWING * JIMMY OLSEN * ORACLE * THE PENGUIN * PLASTIC MAN * RA'S AL-GHUL * THE RIDDLER * SGT. ROCK * STEEL * ADAM STRANGE * SWAMP THING * SUPERBOY * SUPERGIRL * TEMPEST * TWO-FACE * ZOOM
MARVEL
TOP TIER
* CAPTAIN AMERICA * GREEN GOBLIN * JEAN GREY * HULK * THE HUMAN TORCH * IRON MAN * MAGNETO * MISTER FANTASTIC * PROFESSOR X * SILVER SURFER * SPIDER-MAN * THOR * WOLVERINE
SECOND TIER
* ARCHANGEL * ARIES * BETTY BANNER * BARON ZEMO * THE BEAST * THE BEYONDER * BLACK KNIGHT * BLACK WIDOW * BOX * CABLE * CAPTAIN MAR-VELL * CYCLOPS * DAREDEVIL * DOCTOR DOOM * DOCTOR OCTOPUS * DOCTOR STRANGE * DRACULA * ELEKTRA * NICK FURY * GALACTUS * HAWKEYE * HERCULES * THE INVISIBLE WOMAN * J. JONAH JAMESON * KANG * THE KINGPIN * LOKI * MAN-THING * NAMOR * NIGHTCRAWLER * MARY JANE PARKER * THE PUNISHER * HANK PYM * QUICKSILVER * THE RED SKULL * SANDMAN * THE SCARLET WITCH * SHE-HULK * SPIDER-WOMAN * RACHEL SUMMERS * THE THING * ULTRON * VISION * WARLOCK * THE WASP * WONDER MAN
So there it is.
FP
More About Marvel...
Dec. 21st, 2008 04:36 pm

He was an American with family in Germany, who fought the Germans under an assumed identity to protect his kin from reprisals. Marvel introduced him in the early 1970s, when war comics were beginning to lose their steam. What strikes me as being very strange...more than thirty years after his last appearance, Marvel currently is reviving the character in a miniseries.

Yes, Garth Ennis, the writer who revived Enemy Ace--and Howard Chaykin, the artist who DC threw at Blackhawk in the Eighties. The series just started this fall. I wonder if it'll be offered as a compilation.
FP
And The Saga Continues
Dec. 21st, 2008 12:27 am
After receiving the DC volume for my birthday last year, I got the above volume this year, and I just finished a cursory cover-to-cover run through (looking for something I looked for in the DC book--imaginary places in the U.S.). The DC one was better in terms of editing and clarity of information...the Marvel one is more scattershot, including characters that haven't been used in decades (even Atlas vintage!) and excluding a good number that are refered to in entries of other characters or teams.
What's truly bizarre about the Marvel Universe is that it seems to be evenly split between New York City and the Galaxy outside the Solar System. West Coast Avengers? Okay. Alpha Flight? Sure. Excalibur? Aye. But everything else either happens in Manhattan or so far away from Earth as makes no odds. The Five Boroughs are practically a three-ring circus of superheroes and supervillains...makes you wonder who's in the Spandex trade over there.
More to come, later.
FP