That Time Frank Borth Drew Spider-Man

Yeesh.
I even leave threads dangling when i'm picking up dangling threads.

As you may recall, a few months back we went back to see when Frank Borth had the Spider Widow meet the Spider-Man. I was supposed to follow that up with that time, decades later, when Borth drew our more familiar Spider-Dude...

Yet, not quite The End.
In that same issue, Frank also did this two-page spread -

We leave you with this lovely piece done for Monsters Attack (obviously, since they spammed it) the previous year, in 1990 -

You Deserve This Crown, Tantri...

Thrice have we visited with Birbal. But, if modern politics shows us anything it's that we're more likely to find evil clowns running the show. So let's look at another figure from Indian comics who's less Birbal and more Black Adder - a court adviser named Tantri The Mantri. Mantri means a Sage (one who thinks and says, from the Sanskrit), for those of you who might be wondering.

Tantri The Mantri was a long running feature in Tinkle, the comic magazine for children at which we've glanced previously. The earliest strip i've seen is from around #50, but i'll have to do some deep digging to try to find when he debuted. I've yet to find a good database that covers comics published in India. For example, the Grand Comics Database has indexed 11 out of 530 issues.

Today we'll look a little later in the run. These strips were scattered between #209 to #289...

I'll go hunting for that first one i saw with the mechanical flying elephant for next time...

page art by Ajit Vasaikar, Asit, Shayam Desai, and Seema Mande for Tinkle #s 209, 254, 275, 283 & 289 (1990, 1992, 1993, 1994)

...We've Seen The Odd Disturbance Or Two...

There are times when my mind and i are ... i guess 'frenemies' is probably the best term these days. I've made mention of how it can wander away from me, and that was a major part of the recent down time.

That's terribly vague and offers little understanding of how things can work around here...

Aside from my odd existence as a hermit (I typically interact with other humans twice a month - fetching supplies and letting the med techs poke & take their samples. Hermit.) things can get kind of weird for how my mind and i interact. Much of the time, we're quite chill together. We were a top performance team for a long time, after all. But other times...

Here's an every day type example of how it sometimes work.

I was debating what to make for dinner for a bit. I was feeling like doing breakfast for dinner with some bacon, eggs & hash browns or cooking up some pork chops and some black pepper beans with some bisquits or corn bread to sop it up. Eventually i wound up deciding on something in between instead - pork chops & hash browns. (Hash browns can make for some pretty good dinner taters when the mood is right) So, i get up and go to cut a couple chops off some pork loin.

A bit later i realize that i've minced the pork loin and i'm chopping up onion, bell pepper, cilantro & garlic. Apparently i'm making tacos for dinner.

Now, don't get me wrong. They were very good tacos (scratch, not packet mix, cooked street style) and i enjoyed them quite a bit. I just wasn't really involved in the decision making process.

Not surprisingly, this makes it fairly impossible for me to work these days when i can't reliably depend upon my mind to go where the editor/publisher needs it to be. Hence the early retirement.

Generally speaking, we maintain an equitable accord. But when it gets a mood, it's quite difficult, if not impossible, to work against it. Push harder, and it's got all those little mental tricks to divert and distract, or to zone out and shut down. Dirty tricks, they is.

Hopefully, i'll write more about things upstairs over time. It would be good for me, even if boring for you. At least it gives a little insight into what happened when things went quiet around here.

Don't worry.

I'm pretty sure none of this ever happened now...

art from Sensational She-Hulk #s 11 & 47 (1990, 1993)

Deadpool's Big Green Mama

Deadpool has a formidable power set. But, arguably his greatest power is Awareness. He knows he's a character in a comicbook (or movie), and that grants him knowledge and power as well as great snark. But someone else at Marvel paved the way for him. Right from the cover of her first issue (of her second run)...

And,no - it's not just a cover bit.
Let's look at She-Hulk's comments as she's wrapping up her first adventure (vs. the Circus Of Crime, following in her cousin's massive footsteps)...

(Yeah, we did)

The cover of the second issue continued to reference Bruce's old adventures, not only comics-aware but also comics-in-hand...

...unfortunately for Jennifer, it wasn't just the cover...

She not only knew she was in a comic book, but also was quite aware of the conventions of the form and of Marvel publishing history...

Knowing that she's in a comic also means knowing that entertaining the audience is primary. She'll even pause the story during a slow point to help keep the readers amused...

Okay. That might leave you a bit confused to the extreme definition of 'talking head panels' but there's a good reason. They've gone all Spock's Brain on her...

DeFalco was Head Honcho at the time, so you'd think his word would carry more weight, huh? Don't worry - they did make good sense of it all by the end.

Oh - "LOOK! The Blonde Phantom is here tonight!"

As you may remember from yesterday's post, Louise Grant's primary concern, even in her heroic identity of Blonde Phantom, was usually getting together with her boss, Mark Mason. Did she succeed and finally become Mrs. Mason?

Oh, yes...

Note that Louise mentions that she was the one who contacted Jennifer. That's because she was tired of existing in comics limbo. She managed to escape by becoming a supporting character in another book.

Yes, Louise is aware, too. And more experienced than Jennifer. After Jen starts to become infatuated with the D.A., Louise lets her in on some important information. Then she shows her how to use her awareness of their reality...

It being a comic, of course their lunch gets interrupted - by Stilt Man (a part of the book's declared policy of using only lame villains, y'know). She-Hulk ditches most of her expensive outfit to keep it from being ruined, and after the fight...

No, of course it wasn't Victor Von Doom when The Doctor arrived(nor was it The Doctor, for that matter) ...

Instead of Doctor Doom, Jen got Doctor Bong - an old Howard The Duck villain. She-Hulk is drawn (really, i didn't do that) into a television reality where she and the others are trapped at the channel changing control of Bong...

The bad Doctor has always been deranged, and Saturday morning cartoons have really set him off this time. Fortunately, Jen eventually realizes that they aren't really on tv...

(I did mention that he was a Howard The Duck villain, right?)

The appearance of an old Howard The Duck villain also teases the future here. Before too long, Steve Gerber would wind up writing the book - including the next (un)appearance of Dr. Doom ... Victor's 5th cousin, Dr. Bob Doom, D.D.S. And he's got an evil implant plot to rival his cousin. Yeah, it's the next worse thing to sibling rivalry. Vic gets all the acclaim.

So, by her 5th issue she was mastering the manipulation of her reality as a comic character.

55 issues later...

And so it went...


Before we go -
Some may be wondering yet about the title from a couple days ago teasing today's post. It comes from a bit later in the run...

...there. All makes sense now, right?

page art by John Byrne & Bob Wiacek, Brian Hitch & Jim Sanders III from Sensational She-Hulk #s 1-5 & 19 (1989, 1990)