By: Bill Mantlo (writer), Lee Elias (art), Marie Sev. (colors) & Joe Rosen (letters)
The Story: We’re introduced to a new hero, The Human Fly, who is immediately called into action to save a hijacked airliner.
What’s Good: When reviewing a comic of this era (1977) you always have to be a little precise about what you mean as “good”. Do you mean “good for 1977” or do you mean “good for present day” or do you mean “worth collecting?” I always do these reviews as a present day item with an eye towards: Will this issue cause me to compulsively dig through back-issue boxes or search eBay for more issues?
Let me start by saying that I wish more comics of today had artwork this tight. Elias does a great job with something that many artists struggle with: drawing both superheroes AND people wearing clothes. What do I mean by that? Well, most superheroes (in their tight clothes) are really just nudes that have bodypaint for a costume (which is kinda dumb when you think about it). But a lot of superhero artists today tend to draw their civilian characters the same way: They start with a nude and then hang clothes on them like they are playing with paper dolls and it looks about as good as paper dolls sometimes. Elias’ non-super characters look like you’d expect them to look (and not like someone painted their clothes onto them).
This issue also has a collecting tidbit if you’re into Spider-Man. As Human Fly is saving this plane full of people, it turns out that one of the passengers is none other than the webslinger himself. I guess those people bemoaning Wolverine or Deadpool showing up in too many comics should feel better knowing that using guest stars to sell weaker titles wasn’t a practice invented in the 1990′s
But, my favorite thing about this issue is the unintentional comedy factor. It starts out on the first page as Fly is being lowered from the “speeding jet-copter” that is shadowing the 747 at 300 MPH with assistance from his buddies: “stunt engineer” Ted Locke (who has no hands) and pilot Blaze Kendall (that’s a woman’s name, btw). It is just full of all kinds of 70′s goodness.
Oh….and Fly has a golden cane (aka, pimp stick) and the cover shows him HITTING A SHARK with the pimp stick. Who knew that the boys in Jaws were doing it all wrong?
While not a part of the comic itself, there are some really classic ads in here. Besides the obligatory ads that encouraged young boys to engage in the pedophile-friendly job of door-to-door salesmanship, there’s a great Daisy BB gun ad AND a full-page ad for Joe Weider’s body-building system showing Mr. Weider with the future Governor of California himself: Arnold “Schwerzenegger” himself (I don’t think that is how it’s spelled). They must be great friends to misspell his name!
What’s Not So Good: You better love the story for its unintentional comedy factor because it isn’t much otherwise. A hijacked 747… That’s it. There is nothing too original or high drama to it. But, you have to remember that this story was written for little boys, so it’s wrong to expect Grant Morrison-style story telling. It just isn’t a story that is going to make you read it and say, “Where has this awesome sauce been my whole life?”
Conclusion: A soft story, but that’s a given for the era. Lots of unintentional comedy and art that would look nice anytime make up for it.
Where can you get it: This issue is going to set you back ~$8-9 in most back issue bins. I think it’s pricey because of the appearance by Spider-Man because Human Fly itself only ran for ~14 issues. The other issues are dollar-bin material for the most part.
Will I buy more issues: I probably won’t seek them out, but if I come across them in dollar bins I am totally grabbing them just to see the future adventures of the pimp stick.
Grade: B (mostly due to unintentional comedy)
- Dean Stell
Filed under: Marvel Comics Tagged: | Back Issue, Bill Mantlo, Dean Stell, Joe Rosen, Lee Elias, Marie Sev, Marvel Comics, The Human Fly, The Human Fly #1, The Human Fly #1 review
I just love that in the 70′s they felt that giving the dude a golden cane seemed like a good thing and that we can enjoy unintentional comedy from it all these years later. I do have to admit that I have been wondering if Human Fly’s adventure with the sharks is in some later issue. Guess I’ll be checking the “H’s” in back issue bins for awhile. Sigh…..