Sunday, September 01, 2024

Sunday Splash Page #338

 
"Widescreen. No, Wider," in Marvel Super Special #10, by Doug Moench (writer), Gene Colan (penciler), Tom Palmer (inker/colorist), John Costanza (letterer)

Marvel Super Special was one of Marvel's big magazines of the late-70s/early-80s. It seems to be have been mostly devoted to adaptations of various films of the time. Raiders of the Lost Ark, The Last Starfighter, Conan the Barbarian. The last issue was the Howard the Duck movie.

The only story I have is the lone Star-Lord appearance in issue 10, where Peter Quill and Ship come under attack by some mysterious beam emanating from a black hole, which pulls Quill and (separately) Ship through the other end, where they encounter the enormous civilization-ship pictured above. The people on-board are gracious, hospitable and look much like Earthlings.

They are also, of course, hiding ulterior motives. Star-Lord ends up in the middle of a civil war between the part of the population that want to continue life on their ship, and those who want to settle on an actual planet (like, say, Earth.) In a precursor to his story in Marvel Preview, Moench has Star-Lord try to insist of reasoning with the conqueror side, only to conclude it's futile. Quote, 'He rejects the pacifism which will not work. He scorns the non-violence which brings nothing but death. HE FIGHTS!'

Moench seems to conflate not killing with non-violence, which is kind of asinine for a guy who wrote comics about people in costumes punching criminals. Bushmaster probably didn't consider Moon Knight "non-violent," even before Spector cut his face off. I feel it's worth mentioning that in the last Claremont/Infantino Star-Lord story, Quill is able to defeat a civilization-battleship that is destroying inhabited worlds under the notion it's better to kill them before they could potentially become a threat. He does this without killing anyone, but fights his way through security when he has to. Non-lethal, not non-violent.

But as mentioned last week, Moench's Star-Lord is a dim bulb. Everything that's happening has to be explained to him. He doesn't figure out any of the deception on his own. The story starts with him having a dream of people first hailing him as a savior, then cursing him, but he's less a savior to the side he helps than a blunt weapon they use to overcome the militaristic faction's firepower advantage.

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