Marvel-ous Monday: "A Blast from the Past!" by Stern, Elias, and Mooney

Greetings, Groove-ophiles! Omega the Unknown #8 (February 1977) was second of two infamous fill-in issues. Writer Roger Stern and Penciler Lee Elias don't seem to have gotten the memo about not making waves, continuity-wise, during their filler ish, as we get some new faces from Omega co-creator Gerber's cancelled Man-Thing mag. Perhaps Gerber and fellow writer/co-creator Mary Skrenes were at least in on what was going on, as this ish smoothly segues into next issue (with the return of Gerber and Skrenes at the typewriter). Regular artist Jim Mooney supplies the inks, by the way, keeping some continuity going for this fill-in.

What Ol' Grovoe really gets a kick out of is the appearance of Captain Marvel villain Nitro. Only in a classic Marvel mag would a villain show up to fight a hero in the wrong hero's mag! And Omega, being a hero (or whatever he was), was obliged to duke it out with our explosive bad-guy. Another irony (we didn't know about at the time) was the fact that Nitro was out to kill Mar-Vell--not knowing that their first battle back in Captain Marvel #34 was actually slowly killing our Kree Captain....

Cover art by Gil Kane and Frank Giacoia

Black and White Wednesday: FOOM Magazine #9 Cosmic Stuff by Stern, Vohland, Starlin, Byrne, and more

Hey, hey, hey, Groove-ophiles! Here's the best ish of FOOM Magazine Young Groove never had: the special cosmic issue: FOOM #9 (late 1974/early 1975)! Yeah, Young Groove's subscription for FOOM ran out with ish #4 and the family was moving from Ohio to Kentucky, so the folks nixed my re-upping for a while. After the move, I met a fellow sixth-grader named David who loved comics as much as I did. He had a subscription for FOOM and let me borrow his copies. Wotta pal! FOOM #9 started off with an in-freakin'-credible Jim Starlin cover and was loaded with articles on Silver Surfer, Warlock, Captain Mar-Vell, and the Watcher by a young Roger Stern and the late Duffy Vohland, and filled-to-the-brim with outtasite art by newcomers like John Byrne, Don Maitz, and Stephen Fabian. Is it any wonder I loved this ish?

And just 'cause Ol' Groove loves ya, baby, here's the legendary Mistress of Kung Fu back cover, also by that kid Byrne!

Oh, and fear not, faithful ones! Ol' Groove eventually got his own copy of FOOM #9 (thanks, eBay!). Oh, and my folks let me re-subscribe just in time to get FOOM #10 featuring the All-New, All-Different X-Men. Don'tcha just love happy endings?

Groove's Faves: "The Evil That Is Cast..." by Stern, Byrne, and Layton

It's Ol' Groove's birthday! 1963 was some year, wunnit? Avengers, X-Men, and moi! Seriously, as usual, since it's my birthday, yers trooly is picking one'a his all-time fave comic mags to rap with y'all about! This time we're looking at a masterpiece created by the multi-talented hands of writer Roger Stern and artists John Byrne (who co-plotted, as well) and Bob Layton: "The Evil That Is Cast" from The Incredible Hulk Annual #7 (Summer 1978). Sterno was killin' it on the Incredible Hulk around the time this annual came out, while Byrne and Layton had teamed up to provide some awesome art on The Champions about a year earlier. When Teen Groove saw that double-sized beauty on the bottom of the magazine rack at the local Convenient Store, there was no doubt it was goin' back to Casa de Groove! I mean, besides the aforementioned awesome creative team, we had the Hulk (of course), The Angel and Iceman (from The X-Men and, yep, The Champions) versus the original Sentinel, Master Mold with the mind of another X-Villain, Steven Lang! Roger's story was very cool, lots of action and humor, giving art-team Byrne/Layton plenty of cool stuff to draw, especially Master-Mold's asteroid hq--wow!! 'Nuff said! Check it out! Pass the cake!