After the first volume of Defenders wrapped up around issue 150, there was a brief Secret Defenders series in the early '90s (which we might look at in 8-10 years), and then in the early 2000s, Kurt Busiek and Erik Larsen teamed up for another Defenders series, with all of the Big Four - Strange, Hulk, Namor, and the Surfer - involved.
We talked a little bit about the challenges of having a team comprised of grumpy (or whiny in the Surfer's case) loners in Sunday Splash Page #143. Steve Engelhart took the approach of having them get roped into a series of missions, one bleeding into the next. After that, they're never really together. Len Wein shuffled the Surfer off, and Gerber sent Namor away, although Kraft brought him back, but not until after Strange bowed out. Instead you got a few mainstays like Valkyrie and Nighthawk, and eventually Hellcat, and a bunch of temporary folks like Luke Cage, Red Guardian, or Moon Knight.
Busiek and Larsen decided to lean into the idea these guys didn't really want to hang out, by making it something beyond their control. Hellcat warns them that an old enemy named Yandroth is up to something, and they grudgingly thwart him, arguing constantly. Yandroth dumps a death curse on them, tied to the Earth's life force. Any time Earth is threatened, the four of them get yoinked (with a "POIT!" sound effect) from whatever they were doing and deposited where the threat lies. And they can't leave. If they get too far away, the curse just POITs them back.
As you can imagine, none of them love this development, and the longer it goes, the surlier and more irritable they get. But you can only enjoy reading about a team of people who increasingly despise each other for so long, so Busiek and Larsen were smart enough to add some other, more cheerful characters. Hellcat sticks around, feeling a little guilty that she was the one who alerted them to Yandroth. Altough Larsen reverts Patsy's costume to the primarily yellow one she's mostly had, getting rid of the frankly-very cool-looking one Norm Breyfogle gave her in the Hellcat mini-series he and Steve Engelhart did (which we'll probably see in a couple of years).
Nighthawk jumps at the chance to get back in the superhero game, and at one point admits he prefers the Defenders to trying to join the Avengers because the Defenders don't waste time on charters or rules. They just go deal with the problems. And the first mission after the curse involves Pluto and Lorelei trying to manipulate a Valkyrie. Nighthawk also had a statuesque blonde bodyguard who seems connected to the Valkyrie deal and that turns into a whole thing. Anyway, those three serve the valuable function of being a) likeable, and b) able to function as a team. Hulk and Namor spend as much time fighting each other as anyone else, and Strange and the Surfer spend most of their time acting like exasperated parents.
After issue 12, the book becomes The Order (although it maintains its numbering) for six issues, as the Big Four seemingly hit their boiling point and decide the best way to protect the world is to subjugate it. That story, and the series, wrap after 6 issues.
I guess the book didn't get a positive reception at the time. They put a quote from Comics International on the cover of issue 8 where it was called 'the worst comic ever produced.' Which seems ridiculous. I mean, what about all those shitty attempts to copy the Ninja Turtles that came out in the 1980s, or any number of Image series with unintelligible plots or indecipherable art?
It's not Busiek or Larsen's best work, certainly. Busiek was writing Avengers simultaneously with this, among other things, and I think Larsen was struggling with pneumonia for part of the time. Ron Frenz steps in once or twice, and Ivan Reis a couple times as well. Matt Haley draws most of The Order.
I think trying to force the Surfer in there as a permanent piece was a mistake. He's not really the sort to get drawn into the Hulk and Namor's bickering, and Strange doesn't really need someone else to hang around and be exasperated with him. So he mostly just complains about how insane humans are, which, granted, is 85% of all Silver Surfer stories anyway, but just makes him kind of annoying.
5 comments:
I was writing for Comics International at the time and I don't think I wrote that review, but I would have to dig out my files to be certain.
I do remember that the series got a lot of criticism at the time, and I never understood why. It seemed to offend the fans for some reason, but it was the first time I'd read any Defenders comic so maybe I was insulated from whatever was annoying everyone else.
Same here on it being my first run-in with the Defenders. Maybe it offended the Gerber purists or something?
For a while there, they really play up Hulk and Namor's fighting with each other for comedy. The issue that splash page is from, one of them hits the other with a rock to get their attention, then the other hits them with one as payback, and it's like this petty kid's game. Maybe that bugged people?
Yeah, it was a bit weird, because isn't the original Defenders comedic, or at least leans that way? Perhaps it was the wrong sort of comedy. Hulk having a baked beans obsession: okay. Hulk throwing rocks at Namor: not okay.
I think the original series leans to the absurd or satirical at times, especially when Gerber was writing it. So maybe silly stuff that's supposed to have a societal point is OK?
Or it's just those were written in the 1970s, and after about 1985, comics are supposed to be Serious Business.
I suspect you are correct on both counts.
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