The Chrysler Building Knows How You Feel...

One day in the Marvel Universe New York's world famous Chrysler Building just suddenly came alive. It grew a face, some arms and an awesome beard. It began to pummel annoying super-heroes and contemplate just exactly what it wanted to do with it's life:
That right there my friends, is why comics are great.

God bless you Dwayne McDuffie, you will be sorely missed.

(Today's moment of memorial was brought to you by the garishly titled World War Hulk Aftersmash: Damage Control #3. Drawn by Salva Espin and the great Dwayne McDuffie who died just recently. In this issue a suddenly sentient Chrysler building wakes up and fancies a brisk stroll. It's a wonderful wacky story by a wonderful writer.)

Mutants Are Funny...

Forget what you heard about mutants being angsty, grim and dour. Those dudes are funny...even after they've had their hands lopped off.

That's almost as funny as that time Iron Fist hit Storm in the face with a pie.

(Today's mutant mirth is brought to you by Zeb Wells and Leonard Kirk's fantastic New Mutants series - New Mutants #15 specifically. Also in this issue Bastion's transplanted demonic arm scratches a bald man's head of it's own accord and Warlock pukes....a lot.)

Only A Mother Could Love: A Man In A Nice Sweater...

My previous couple of 'Only A Mother Could Love' posts have demonstrated that the beauty of Marvel's classic Alpha Flight series was in its insistence on using character concepts that are utterly absurd on paper but totally awesome in practise. Puck, Snowbird and Sasquatch are just the tip of the ice-berg. This is a series that boasts the angtsy, teenage, chick version of pigmentally challenged, mind-controlling Daredevil villain the Purple Man and a dude whose super-power is the ability to summon up a primordial blob, a caveman and a lanky nerd from the future.

But the issue we're going to talk about today, #31, shows that this absurb/awesome dichotomy extends beyond the Alphans themselves and into their rogues gallery as well.

Let me tell you Alpha Flight has one hell of a rogues gallery. From teeny-weeny, evil, super-genius Smart Alec to flesh puppeteer Scramble the Mixed-Up Man to the immortal, balding, decay-spewing Pestilence (who happens to be Snowbird's baby son possessed by the evil ghost of dead pirate).

As kickass as some of those guys may be, all of them pale in comparison beside the dude in the cosy sweater and metalhead armbands on that cover.

His name is Deadly Earnest.

Hell no I'm not kidding - his name is Deadly....Frickin....Earnest.

As if his name alone didn't blow your tiny minds, it's nothing compared to the snazzy sweater clad madness that lurks beyond that killer Mike Mignola cover.

It all begins, as so many classic stories do, with a big fat naked guy mugging a street punk for his clothes.

At Last The Origin Of Deadly Earnest's awesome sweater...

Once the naked sweater stealing is done it's revealed to us that when Deadly Earnest shows up in your story he doesn't just bring his 'touch of death' and keen fashion sense with him ...he brings his own friggin' mythos.

Dude is an ancient force of nature that can only be stopped by a magical sword which is weilded by his undying, snazzy red jumpsuit wearing nemesis...um...Nemeisis. Nemesis is cursed to walk the Earth forever wacking poor old Deadly E. everytime he ressurects himself and mugs some poor schmo for their threads.

Obviously all that death poking and thread stealing in downtown Montreal draws the attention of not just Nemesis but of Alpha Flight as well. Before you can say 'Canadian Super-Heroes Do It Better' the whole lot of them are fighting it up in a underground subway station.

Not My Arm! *

As you can see things begin to go downhill for poor Earnest pretty quickly when bouncy midget Puck gets his hands on the mystical Earnest-killing blade. Luckily for all of us Deadly...Frickin'...Earnest fans in the house that's not enough to put our boy down.

Is That All You Got You Pansy?

Not even chopping off his head can stop him. He takes a lickin' and keeps on tickin'. Not only that but his severed head hits you with some smack-talk while his mutilated body wanders around hoping to stumble across you so it can pound your hairy midget ass into the ground.

Marco....Polo

That's the kind of commitment we like to see in our super-bad-guys....that and quality knitwear of course.

Unfortunately in the end mighty Deadly...Frickin'...Earnest is finally brought low when he gets a little bit...hit by a train.

Phew - I tell you people Bill Mantlo + Alpha Flight = good crazy.

If Fred Van Lente and Greg Pak's new upcoming Alpha Flight series captures even half of the brain-tingling madness that made these classic Alpha stories so great it'll be well worth a coupla bucks every month. **

* A sneaky little tip o' the hat to all the 'Freddy versus Jason' fans in our audience.....anybody? No? Just me then, okay - - moooving on

** I've got high hopes for the new AF series in this regard. After all it is being that it's co-written by the dude who came up with Pokerface!

Low Self Esteem?

Could be worse, you could be forced to hang out with Zarathos for all eternity...


That dude's just mean.

(Today's positive affirmation was brought to you by Ghost Rider v1 #46 wherein Johnny Blaze loses his position as Stunt Rider Champion of the world to smack-talking, dandy Fargo Flagg while dressed in a particularly silly red leather outfit with a big J.B. embroidered onto the breast...you can kinda see old Zarry's point on this one).

Helping Your Death Cult To Succeed...

As every death cult founder knows one of the most important things when it comes to recruitment is your mantra. The folks you recruit are going to have to chant it over and over and you don't want them getting bored or missing the point.

So rule number one when putting together your death cult's mantra is that it should be as informative as it is catchy. Observe:

Gimme a D, Gimme an E...

See, you're going to have that sucker stuck in your head all the live long day.

(Today's nod to death worshipping yuppies comes to you all the way from Ghost Rider v1 #38 by Michael Fleisher and the ultra-talented Don Perlin. In this issue suicidal, flame-thrower-touting bikers make a senator's daughter walk the plank because her father is drafting a senate resolution to outlaw the worship of death. It's like the West Wing...if Martin Sheen were a death-worshipping pirate biker.)

Even The Losers...

Brace yourselves loyal YouAreComic readers, I'm about to use two phrases that you never thought you'd hear used in a single sentence - 'Old Dazzler Villans' and 'awesome'.

Believe it or not our awesome comic-book moment for today comes from Avengers:The Initiative #27 which features the tragic (yet awesome) story of dodgy old Dazzler villans Johnny Guitar and Doctor Sax.

What do you mean am I serious? Of course I'm serious?

Is that really their names? Of course that's really their names, you think I could make up something that great?

Check them out:

Okay so before we even start these guys have two strikes against them. One, they're music-based super-villans which always instantly makes you lame unless you're the Hypno-Hustler. Two, they can't even take Dazzler even though she was still in her roller-skating Disco phase.

However what they have going for them is a guitar that shoots steel shattering sonic blasts, a brain scrambling sax and a loyal, true friendship that keeps on ticking through musical obscurity, small-time crook-dom, Dazzler-delivered beatdowns and finally a place in Taskmaster and Constrictor's Shadow Initiative.

Unfortunately this Shadow Initiative deal turns out to be a just another dead-end that Johnny has convinced poor old Doc Sax to follow him into. First he talks Doc into leaving his kids to join a crappy rock band. Then he leads him into a life of small potatoes crime. Then he convinces him musical-themed super-crime isn't lame. Now he's got Sax and him a spot on a team that Initiative bigwigs Taskmaster and Constrictor plan to use as cannon fodder when storming the Negative Zone prison which has been over-run by the Fantastic Four's most awesome mane-sporting villan Blaastar the The Living Bomb-Burst!!

This is the the moment that a story about hoary old Dazzler villans goes form 'eh?' to 'awesome'. Johnny doesn't want his oldest friend to get killed in some alien dimension because of him. However he knows that Doc won't leave him to go it alone. So:

It's a pretty incredible moment. Up until this point Johnny Guitar has been nothing but a user trying to get ahead by cutting every corner and making every easy choice, dragging his unfortunate, protective friend into one scrape after another. Here we see that despite his questionable actions in the past Johnny and Doc's friendship goes both ways.

Rather than see Doc die, rather than deprive Doc's children of their father any more than he already has, he picks a fight. He leaves his friend thinking he's the selfish jerk he has always been...to save his life.

Sadly Johnny dies almost the instant he sets foot in that alien dimension. But despite the less than stellar life he led, the less than impressive prowess he showed on the battlefield, the less than perfect cover he used to do of Skynyrd's Freebird....Johnny Guitar died...a hero.

I'll have to sign off now because I'm kinda welling up he - -er - -I mean there's...um...something in my eye. You guys run along to your local comic-book shop and buy this book.

Godspeed Johnny Guitar, wherever you are, say hello to Jim Morrison for me.

Green Lantern: Bird Of Prey...

Anyone who came to this post expecting a fish-netted Green Lantern riding around on a motorcycle and fly-kicking bad guys with Huntress, Oracle & co is going to be disappointed.

This is just a post about that time Green Lantern switched bodies with an eagle and did this:

While his mind in the eagle's body did this:

Oh Silver Age - you so crazy!

(Today's power-ring slingin' was brought to you by the batshit crazy Green Lantern v2 #35 in which, no your eyes do not decieve you, Green Lantern does in fact eat live sheep raw while a pistol-packing eagle takes down an international spy ring. There's also some crazy shit about a disgruntled circus clown who wears a yellow cape, walks on air and carries a gun that shoots golden masks. Hey, don't look at me I didn't write the damn thing!)

Green Lantern Goes Postal...

Not too many of the comics I've been reading recently have been turning out anything worthy of a post here at YouAreComic. No moments of abject awesomeness or just straight up comic-book insanity quite tickled my fancy enough.

Then I started reading Showcase Presents Green Lantern Vol 2.

It wasn't too long before my eyes were greeted by this horrific sight:

Yup, that's Hal 'Green Lantern' Jordan getting his Patrick Swayze on with some foxy little blonde chippie. GL's got the moves.

Of course this is the Silver Age, so doing the boogaloo with a sexy lady is never just that. Here the blonde chippie is in fact an evil spy who is hypnotising Hal with her tacky but magical dimestore necklace. Apparently doing the Watusi can result in a post-hypnotic suggestion commanding you to mail all the details of your employer's top secret government contracts to enemies of the state.

Unable to find these nefarious move-busting fiends by convential methods due to the post hypnotic whammy he's suffering, Hal takes the only other avenue of attack available to him.

He disguises himself as a secret-divulging, country-betraying letter and mails himself to the bad guys!! How many stamps do you think it takes to send a big can of whoopass?

That my friends is how you take down bad-ass, dancing, post-based terrorists.

I hope the folks at Homeland Security are taking notes.

(Today's special delivery was brought to you by Green Lantern v2 #37 where in the issue's second feature Green Lantern flies through the galaxy on the back of an uncomfortable, star-faced midget powered by a magic wristwatch)

Super-Villains Never Get A Night In...

Isn't it always the way. You've settled in for a relaxing night at home. Nothing more planned than sinking a few beers and organising your sacks full of loot with your mutant animal buddies...

...then some Kryptonian chippie shows up with a half-dressed, unconscious teenager on her shoulder demanding that you return her friend's brain.

Damn super-heroes, they just have no sense of common courtesy.

(Today's girl's night in was brought to you by those hospitable folks at Power Girl #11. Just another straight-up awesome issue from the dream team of Justin Gray, Jimmy Palmiotti and Amanda Conner. Power Girl cuts off someone's arm with her heat vision and hugs a giant, par-boiled gorilla. Good times.)

Only Mother Could Love: Sasquatch versus Sasquatch...

Now that the trusty YouAreComic blog is back to our semi-regular schedule it's about time for the return of our patented 'Only A Mother Could Love' posts featuring comics/characters that get no love.

Last time we got our O.M.C.L. on I was talking about Alpha Flight, and specifically an issue focused on my favorite Alphan and resident midget hairball Puck (I also talked about nuns, nymphomaniacs and superhero skirt slits - which led to this apology...then this apology for the apology. But don't worry my intrepid female readers I promise that I've since learned my lesson). So today I'm going to continue gushing about those four-colour diamonds in the rough...Alpha Flight.

This time it's Alpha Flight #23. Why that issue I hear you ask. Well because this issue gives me an excuse to ramble for a bunch of paragraphs about a dude who accidentally turned himself into giant fuzzy yeti while trying to be the next Bruce Banner and a chick who's half mountie half Canadian demi-goddess.

That's right folks, you may have thought a hairy midget grandpa possessed by a giant, black, Arabian ghost that gives him cramps was cool - but he's got nothing on Sasquatch and Snowbird.

This issue opens like any normal Alpha Flight issue. Some soap opera drama, Puck getting beat up by a girl, Snowbird having a snooze...nothing special. That is until cheesy villain of the month 'Caliber' shows up and starts shooting up downtown Vancouver.

Now let's be honest. Caliber...is not a good villain. He milks what face-time he gets here for all he's worth. He blows some stuff up, spouts some bad super-villain dialogue and generally comes off as a bit of a tool. Then some Alphans show up to put the kibosh on his fun and games.

Things begin to get interesting when the 'kibsoh putting' doesn't go as planned and poor Sasquatch ends up getting shot in the right nipple:

Damn, That Guy's Purple Nurples Are Hardcore!

Sans nipple and understandably upset by it's loss Sasquatch quickly wraps up the whole 'walking-tank-rampage' thing with a well placed punch in the mush. Caliber goes down, peace is restored, evil is punished....job's a good 'un.

Things take a turn for the awesome just a moment later when the Alpha victory celebrations are crashed by a fighting mad Snowbird. She swoops in, turns into a giant artic owl and brutally attacks poor old Quatchie!

Arrggh! My Other Nipple!

With his last remaining nipple gone Sasquatch kinda loses the plot. He attempts to strangle his smoking hot, mentally ill girlfriend Aurora with her stylish scarf and uses skirt-slit sporting chica badass Talisman's own magical mojo against her.

As it turns out,Snowbird's owl-based nipplectomy was not the unprovoked attack it appeared. It seems that when Sasquatch science-geek alter-ego Walter Langowski botched his attempt to duplicate Bruce Banner's Hulk-inducing accident he didn't actually turn himself into a giant fuzzy teddy bear as we all first thought. He in fact weakened the dimensional walls enough to let through Tamaraq, one of the mythical Great Beasts (The Northern God's version of the Greek Pantheon's Titans). Put simply Walter blew a hole in reality and got himself possessed by a giant Canadian Monster God! That boys and girls...is an origin story.

Being how the rest of the team are down and how it doesn't seem fair to make the guy with hairy midget powers fight the extra-dimensional Yeti - it's down to Snowbird to take Tamaraq down. Luckily her Great Northern demi-goddess shape-shifting powers provide her with the perfect solution:

Holy Cow, It's the Albino-ible Snow-man

That's right folks the only way to fight a humungous, megalomaniacal other-worldy Yeti is with a humungous, megalomaniacal other-worldy Yeti.

This issue's awesome-quotient now rockets right off the scale as we're treated to a killer Sasquatch on Albino-Quatch throwdown. Feast your eyes:



Fortunately for the poor citizens of Vancouver these guys are Canadian super-heroes. Unlike their pansy American counterparts these guys all have a little touch of the Wolverines about them. So there's no angsting or bleeding heart 'there's got to be another way' talk.

If you're a giant albino Yeti and you want to stop a giant orange Yeti from wrecking up your city the solution is obvious. You just rip that dimension-hopping punk's heart out with your fuzzy bare hands:


The issue ends with a remorseless Snowbird vowing to hop the dimensional barriers and venture into the Kingdom of the Great Beasts where there will be yet more ass-kicking and heart-ripping. I tell you, those mounties are badass.

Incidentally this isn't the last we see of poor old Walter. He comes back from the dead like all good comic characters do. Of course sometimes he comes as a robot...then other times as a woman...but hey, back is back.

After hearing all this I can understand your confusion as to why no-one read the classic Alpha Flight series back in it's 80s heyday. I mean you weren't getting nearly as many Canadian Monster Gods over in the pages of Spider-man. What were you 80s comic fans thinking?

Anyway I know you're all pulling on your coats to pop out to your local comic-book store and pick up this issue from a 25$ bargain bin so I'll sign off here. But hey, come back in a few weeks time when 'Only A Mother Could Love' will be presenting an epic battle like no other 'Alpha Flight versus Deadly Ernest'...

......no, I'm not kidding, Deadly Ernest really is his name.

Be there or be a Canadian Albino Monster God.