Daredevil Villains #11: The Ox
DAREDEVIL #15 (April 1966)
“–And Men Shall Call Him… Ox!”
Writer, editor: Stan Lee
Penciller: John Romita
Inker: “Frankie Ray” (Frank Giacoia)
Letterer: Art Simek
We’ve seen the Ox before. He was one of Mr Fear’s henchmen back in issue #6. But this time it’s different. It’s his spotlight story, and now there are two… um, two Oxen?
With Ka-Zar’s origin story out of the way, Stan Lee reverts to the established Daredevil formula. Matt’s back in New York, he’s back in the office, and he’s back in the romantic triangle with Karen and Foggy. Poor Foggy is still feeling the after-effects of being hospitalised by the Fellowship of Fear back in issue #6. Not that he’s mentioned it in issues #7-14, of course, but apparently it’s still giving him dizzy spells. And so Matt is given the opportunity to reflect on how the Ox was, in fact, the most dangerous member of the Fellowship of Fear.
The Ox’s gimmick is very simple: he’s big, strong and not very smart. This issue strongly implies that he’s not just mentally below average, but has some sort of disability. He debuted as one of the Enforcers in Amazing Spider-Man #10 (1964), and has superhuman strength for no apparent reason. Presumably he’s a mutant. Since we last saw him, he’s been in jail, sharing a cell with mad scientist Karl Stragg. We quickly establish the dynamic: Stragg has a plan to use Ox’s strength to escape by slowly working on the bars, and Ox is half-heartedly playing along. But Ox isn’t entirely sure he even wants to break out, and Stragg is already getting frustrated with him. Crucially, the Ox is sensitive about his low intelligence, but Stragg is promising to raise his intelligence to normal levels if he helps them break out. That’s the Ox’s motivation.
Fall of the House of X #1 annotations
As always, this post contains spoilers, and page numbers go by the digital edition.
FALL OF THE HOUSE OF X #1
“The Trial of Cyclops”
Writer: Gerry Duggan
Artist: Lucas Werneck
Colourist: Bryan Valenza
Letterer: Travis Lanham
Design: Tom Muller & Jay Bowen
Editor: Jordan D White
FALL OF THE HOUSE OF X. This is one of two linked miniseries to complete the Krakoan era, the other being Rise of the Powers of X. The format echoes the twin minis House of X and Powers of X that launched the Krakoan era.
The title also alludes to the Edgar Allan Poe story “The Fall of the House of Usher” (1839), though there’s no terribly obvious significance to that fact.
COVER / PAGE 1. Wolverine, Colossus, Nightcrawler and Shadowkat in action. We can see a couple of Orchis footsoldiers reflected in Colossus’s first.
PAGES 2-4. Cyclops dreams about being hung after an Old West show trial.
Timely was the name of Marvel’s Golden Age predecessor. It’s not immediately obvious what that has to do with anything either. Marvel does have an established Old West town called Timely – it was the setting of the 2015 miniseries 1872, which was part of the “Secret Wars” event, and was basically “the Marvel Universe, but a Western”.
Daredevil Villains #10: The Plunderer
DAREDEVIL #12-13 (January & February 1966)
“Sightless, in a Savage Land” / “The Secret of Ka-Zar’s Origin!”
Writer, editor: Stan Lee
Layout penciller: Jack Kirby
Finishing penciller, inker: John Romita
Letterer: Sam Rosen
Colourist: not credited
DAREDEVIL #14 (March 1966)
“If This Be Justice…!”
Writer, editor: Stan Lee
Penciller: John Romita
Inker: “Frankie Ray” (Frank Giacoia)
Letterer: Artie Simek
Colourist: not credited
However questionably, Stan Lee apparently felt that Wally Wood’s run on Daredevil had gone awry. Wood’s replacement was John Romita Sr, doing his first work for Marvel. This time, Lee took no chances, with Jack Kirby doing the layouts for Romita’s first two issues before Romita (who says that he only wanted the inking work at first) took over as penciller. He didn’t stick around on Daredevil for long, but that’s because he was swiftly promoted to Amazing Spider-Man.
As for the story direction, Lee seems to have been toying with drastic action. The previous arc ends with a tacked-on epilogue in which Matt and Foggy suddenly realise that they’ve been so preoccupied with the plot that they haven’t been doing any legal work and they’ve run out of money. They need to downsize. So Matt announces that he’s leaving, and the whole thing plays like it’s setting up a new status quo.
It isn’t. Instead, Daredevil spends three issues exploring the back story of Ka-Zar, before Matt simply returns to the office, with no mention of why he left in the first place. It’s been three months, the kids will have forgotten.
The X-Axis – w/c 25 December 2023
X-MEN UNLIMITED INFINITY COMIC #119. By Steve Foxe, Steve Orlando, Phillip Sevy, Ceci de la Cruz & Travis Lanham. Is this the first time that an X-book has been published on Christmas Day? Truly, it warms the heart to think of the diligent assistant editor, trudging through the snow to the offices of Marvel Comics to press the big red PUBLISH button on the thirty-second floor. That’s dedication. Especially for the middle chapter of an Arakko storyline. This is turning into the sort of Arakko story that doesn’t work for me – the sort where we’re somehow making the logical leap from “expressing your pain is a good thing” to “battering one another with sticks is a good thing”. To be fair, I suppose this sort of ritual combat event is a fairly standard fantasy trope, and the genre has never much appealed to me anyway. But when you start trying to rationalise it in this kind of therapy-speak way, and have a bunch of characters from Earth nodding along and going “yes, this all sounds entirely reasonable”, you end up lampshading how much it doesn’t make sense.
IMMORTAL X-MEN #18. (Annotations here.) This is the final issue – or, if you prefer, the book morphs into Rise of the Powers of X for its final arc. Either way, we really are entering the home stretch of the Krakoan era now. This is the pay off for Mother Righteous’ attempts to become a Dominion, and it rather cleverly hits the accelerator by revealing that Orbis Stellaris and Dr Stasis already tried and failed to become Dominions off panel. Actually, maybe it really is rushing to the end for scheduling reasons, but if so, it’s a very neat way of making it into a positive.
Immortal X-Men #18 annotations
As always, this post contains spoilers, and page numbers go by the digital edition.
IMMORTAL X-MEN #18
“Happily Ever After”
Writer: Kieron Gillen
Artist: Juan José Ryp
Colour artist: David Curiel
Letterer: Clayton Cowles
Design: Tom Muller & Jay Bowen
Editor: Jordan D White
COVER / PAGE 1. A giant Mother Righteous toying with Professor X, Jean Grey, Emma Frost and (oddly, because he’s not even a cast regular) Cyclops.
PAGE 2. Mother Righteous lets Jean lead her through the White Hot Room.
Mother Righteous is our narrator for the issue, breaking the pattern of each narrator being a member of the Quiet Council. That said, she has (effectively) been among the leading figures in the makeshift version of Krakoa within the White Hot Room, which probably qualifies her.
Mother Righteous started following the addled Jean Grey into the desert at the end of the previous issue. As she explains later on, she assumes (correctly) that Jean will be drawn to the location where she can try to ascend to Dominion status.
Uncanny Spider-Man #5 annotations
As always, this post contains spoilers, and page numbers go by the digital edition.
UNCANNY SPIDER-MAN #5
“Fade to Blue”
Writer: Si Spurrier
Artists: Lee Garbett & Simone Buonfantino
Colour artist: Matt Milla
Letterer: Joe Caramagna
Design: Tom Muller & Jay Bowen
Editor: Sarah Brunstad
COVER / PAGE 1. Nightcrawler with techno-organic stuff rounding on him.
PAGES 2-7. Nightcrawler and Silver Sable reveal their ruse.
Okay, now on one level, this is quite clever. Issue #4 went out of its way to verify that they’d checked Nightcrawler’s DNA and it definitely wasn’t Mystique. But since then, X-Men Blue: Origins has established that Mystique does change her DNA when she copies someone, in order to rationalise the Azazel/Nightcrawler connection (as shown in flashback on page 6). So when this issue does the reveal that the scan was just wrong, it’s not just a cheap retraction of the cliffhanger.
Astonishing Iceman #5 annotations
As always, this post contains spoilers, and page numbers go by the digital edition.
ASTONISHING ICEMAN #5
“Out Cold, part 5”
Writer: Steve Orlando
Artist: Vincenzo Carratù
Colour artist: Java Tartaglia
Letterer: Travis Lanham
Design: Tom Muller & Jay Bowen
Editor: Mark Basso
COVER / PAGE 1. A shattered Iceman.
PAGE 2. Flashback: Mr Clean defeats Romeo.
This takes place before page 23 of the previous issue, and shows Mr Clean defeating Romeo while Iceman was off in New York. Clyde, the guard drone was seen in issue #1, and mentioned again by Iceman as one of his security measures last iissue.
Romeo actually puts up more of a fight against Mr Clean than you might expect from him, because it turns out that his empathic powers also extend to imposing painful emotions on people when he hits them. I’m pretty sure that’s new. I’m not entirely sure it makes sense – his powers don’t normally depend on touch – but it’s a nice idea, so what the heck.
Wolverine #40 annotations
As always, this post contains spoilers, and page numbers go by the digital edition.
WOLVERINE vol 7 #40
“Last Mutant Standing, part 4”
Writer: Benjamin Percy
Artist: Ibrahim Moustafa
Colour artist: Frank D’Armata
Letterer: Cory Petit
Design: Tom Muller & Jay Bowen
Editor: Mark Basso
COVER / PAGE 1: Wolverine and Spider-Man in action against Stark Sentinels.
PAGE 2. Tribute to Alison Gill.
PAGES 3-7. Wolverine enlists Spider-Man to help him enter the Orchis space station.
Oscorp. Peter is leaving the Oscorp building, where he currently works in Amazing Spider-Man. (Norman Osborn is good right now, if you haven’t been following it.) Spider-Man is wearing the Oscorp hi-tech version of his costume here, hence the little glowing bits.
“You’ve alive?” Peter knows perfectly well that some mutants are still on Earth – aside from anything else, he’s appeared over in Uncanny Spider-Man – but presumably this is the first time anyone’s mentioned to him that Logan wasn’t among the mutants who went through the gates in X-Men: Hellfire Gala 2023.
The Orchis jet was stolen by Logan in Wakanda last issue, as the footnote says. If its rightful owner Jun Wei is “expected back at her post in less than an hour”, Wolverine apparently came straight to New York in the hope of getting Spider-Man to help. Seems a bit ambitious, but who knows, maybe he wasn’t specifically looking for Spider-Man. Maybe he just figured that the best way to round up some allies at short notice was to head to Marvel Manhattan, swing a cat, and see who he hit.
X-Men Red #18 annotations
As always, this post contains spoilers, and page numbers go by the digital edition.
X-MEN RED vol 2 #18
“The Mended Land”
Writer: Al Ewing
Artist: Yildiray Çinar
Colour artist: Federico Blee
Letterer: Ariana Maher
Design: Tom Muller & Jay Bowen
Editor: Jordan D White
COVER / PAGE 1. A group shot of the cast, for the final issue.
PAGES 2-3. Genesis raises Arakko Prime from the sea to fight Kaorak.
“Autumn Island.” In other words, what’s left of the Autumn Lands now that most of it has got up and walked across the planet. The rebels shown in page 2 panel 2 include Kobak, Khora, Zsen and Sunspot, as well as a bunch of background characters.
“Nine left, eight, seven.” When we left Jon Ironfire last issue, he was singlehandedly fighting his way through the White Sword’s champions – already reduced from 100 to 99 by his own departure. Evidently he’s been doing well.
Genesis is carrying both the Annihilation Staff and Purity (the sword); she still has Sobunar by her side, even though we’ve repeatedly been told that he wasn’t entirely thrilled with some of her choices. Storm challenged Genesis to “raise your island and fight” at the end of the last issue, and she takes up the challenge.
Arakko Prime is the part of Arakko that was the original counterpart of Krakoa on Earth – in other words, Arakko the island, rather than Arakko the planet. The narrator calls it “the living island”, mirroring how Krakoa was billed back in Giant-Size X-Men #1.
Daredevil Villains #9: The Organization
DAREDEVIL #10 (October 1965)
“While the City Sleeps, part 1: The Organization”
Writer, finishing penciller, inker: Wally Wood
Layout penciller: Bob Powell
Letterer: Artie Simek
Editor: Stan Lee
DAREDEVIL #11 (December 1965)
“A Time to Unmask!”
Writer, editor: Stan Lee
Penciller: Bobby Powell
Inker: Wally Wood
Letterer: Sam Rosen
Even the most casual glance at those credits might suggest a troubled production, and that’s exactly what this is. According to Brian Cronin’s “Comic Book Legends Revealed”, it goes something like this: Wally Wood didn’t care for the Marvel method and felt that he was writing the book without being paid for it. So he asked to write a story and Stan Lee agreed. But when Wood’s story came in, Lee hated it.
Accounts vary as to how heavily Lee edited issue #10. Wood claims that relatively little was changed. Lee, in a spectacularly ungracious bitching session on the letters page of issue #12, said that “about the only thing left that Wally himself had written was his name”. The surviving original art suggests the truth is somewhere in the middle and that the published story is basically what Wood wrote. Either way, Lee refused to let Wood finish the story, wrote the concluding half himself, and fired Wood after reducing him to working as inker on part 2.
