Rip Jagger's Other Dojo

Let me take advantage of this extra day in February in the year 2020 to look at one of the most important publications in comic book history, and one which just happens by the way to feature a compelling "blaxploitation" character and takes it to a new level in a new format, and as it turns out into a new marketplace as well. Comic books were dying off in the Bronze Age as newsstands quit carrying them as their profitability became harder and harder to achieve. New ways to meet the dwindling numbers of the comic book consumer were needed and the direct market was fashioned to give publishers new life and to give the fan new comics, and as it turned out comics unlike anything ever seen before.  The "graphic novel" was just being born and early examples are Contract with God by Will Eisner and Red Tide by Jim Steranko among others. But the one which cracked the code in the new marketplace was a "graphic album" or "comic novel" fr

Captain Gravity and the Power Of The Vril from Penny-Farthing Press is a handsome trade volume. It has flap covers and exceedingly high production values seep through it. One close glimpse showed me that Sal Velluto was the artist and I always stop to check his stuff out more closely. This was the perfect marriage of talent and topic as they had Sal drawing vintage pre-WWII settings and characters. I left this one on the stands a long time before I finally picked it up. It seemed (and it is) a very close spin on The Rocketeer by Dave Stevens, but there's more going on here still. Actually anyone who likes Rocketeer will in all probability like this. I'd call the story by Jason Dysart, Rocketeer meets Indiana Jones meets Hellboy. It's not a rip-off but all of these properties deal with the Nazis and often with the occult aspects of the Third Reich. This story does a great job with these themes as well as dealing a bit with good old fashioned American racism since

BlacKKKLansman is the movie you thought was a comedy sketch on the Chappelle's Show , but then he'd have to be blind. (It is a brilliant sketch.) Turns out this shit really happened way back in 1979 when a black cop named Ron Stalworth,  among other things joined the Klu Kux Klan by mail order and phoned up David Duke, then Grand Wizard of the Klan. It's a wacky story of perceptions misunderstanding about race, and it's a story that doesn't really let any of us off the hook.  It's a story that  begged to be made into a movie, but what could've become a mindless crime adventure as developed by some, in the hands of Spike Lee becomes a sensitive and compelling fable about racism in America now and then, but mostly now because while some things might change in these United States, racisim it seems will never ever die. (Topher Grace as David Duke) The movie does what movies can do best, squash up time and events and give a dramatic power to thi

The Birth of A Nation is at once one of the greatest movies and most terrible movies ever made. D.W. Griffith's expansive and innovative storytelling is on full display and the magnificent power of cinema is is all too evident, but tragically the story this tells is one of a dreadful history, of an aspect of American life which is truly shameful. That shame is not present in Griffith's portrayal of the Klu Klux Klan, the Secret Empire which in this movie rises up out of a misguided sense of necessity to stem the savagery of the freed black slaves who show they are incapable of leading themselves in a civilized manner and threaten the creamy white skins of Southern womanhood. It's the most profound and dreadful bullshit! But this truly is a well polished turd, and the artistry of The Birth of A Nation can be recognized, but never should its themes be celebrated. D.W. Griffith was a Kentucky boy, like myself, and for that reason I was keen to include some of his wor

Blackenstein (don't you just love the title) is a flick I've been eager to see for many many moons. I caught part of it one night on a late-night fright show once years ago, but by and large the movie has escaped me. Every once in a while I get on a Frankenstein kick and want to check out all the versions I can and this one was always a gap in my knowledge. But no more! Now despite starring a Lone Ranger, the ironically named "Ivory Stone" and the perfectly named "Roosevelt Jackson", I cannot say this is in any way a "good" movie by any measure normally applied to cinema. But it's a pretty nifty diversion and offers up a "Frankenstein" who is almost noble and a "Frankenstein's Monster" who is especially sympathetic. A woman wants her boyfriend, a veteran horribly wounded in Vietnam to get special medical treatment and her former mentor (John Hart as "Dr. Stein") has just the right techniques to possi

MAD Magazine enters a new and I guess old phase with its new hybrid publishing scheme to blend some few new material with lots of vintage stuff from across the many decades of the magazine's history. The first issue focuses on television, a medium which has been around only just a little longer than MAD itself. I was frankly surprised by the nature and quality of some of these articles. There's almost literally something for anyone and frankly some of it didn't appeal to me. But then some of it appealed to me in a big way. But there was two sentences I found that disturbed me: "The vintage MAD pieces reprinted in this issue were produced in a time that was less mindful and sensitive to the matters of race, gender, sexual identity, religion, and food allergies. The text of these articles is presented here unaltered (and with crossed fingers) for historical reference." I'm used to cautions like this on vintage collections of cartoons and such. But a m

Black Lightning - Cold Dead Hands is a modern reworking of the Black Lightning concept by the Tony Isabella, the characters creator. It's a modern comic book story with modern comic book art and that means for this fanboy it's an inferior outing compared to its Bronze Age source. I give Isabella credit for trying to make this reimagined Black Lightning fit into the world of the modern day, a world in which young black men are shot down for far too little reason far too often. Once again we have the teacher-hero who returns to elevate the lives of the children and bring them hope. But in this case, the teacher-hero smacks too much of the type I don't like, given credit for charm but showing little evidence of labor and gifted with interested and bright students just eager for a chance. No one ever does the struggle of battling the system on behalf of kids who don't care for the battle to be fought, but Black Lightning came the closest. This version has too much

Captain Cosmos has stood his final watch my friends. The Last Starveyer has left this planet Earth behind for good alas. Nicola Cuti  has passed away  after a long bout with cancer. The creator of Captain Cosmos - the Last Starveyer and Moonchild the Starbabes and scores of other entertaining comic book characters, Nicola Cuti worked as an editor and writer and artist for Warren, Charlton, DC, and more through the many decades of his career. He has a story in the most recent issue of The Creeps magazine titled "Bug-Eyed Monster" and it was his role as an Associate Editor which finally got me to give that mag a chance. Nick Cuti had career and life which seemed filled with enthusiasm for the comics and characters he loved. His most famous creation was E-Man who he fashioned with artist Joe Staton long ago at the now gone but hardly forgotten Charlton Comics shop where Nick was an Assistant Editor to George Wildman. E-Man stares down on me at this very

Tony Isabella has crafted a reputation for writing black heroes. His creation DC's Black Lightning being  the most famous of his outings in this arena. But he began at Marvel and there he wrote some singular issues of the comic Luke Cage, Power Man and later he crafted the earliest adventures of Black Goliath . In the debut issue of Black Goliath (smartly drawn by George Tuska and Vince Colletta)   we meet the fifteen foot giant who is in his off hours Bill Foster, a talented bio-chemist who had in earlier days assisted Henry Pym and it was there that he'd "perfected" the growing formula which Pym had dabbled with for many years. In that first issue we find a Goliath who is reminiscing about his early days in the Watts community and who ends up fighting some low-level criminals he chances upon. Later we learn that Foster is a man in full command of his power, who can elevate to fifteen feet on a whim and who is running a research lab manned by three up and c