Burning moss
Meant for you
Only a matter of time

So far as I can tell, this issue is one of only a handful that place Master of Kung Fu within the Marvel Universe. It’s already astounding enough that a comic book devoted to the Kung Fu craze lasted years past its peak, but to do so without continual support from the more popular kids from the Marvel universe is quite the accomplishment.

Hunted through the everglades by two assassins and riding high on Fu Manchu’s narcotics, Shang Chi runs into both Man-Thing and David Carradine. The series begins to soften its tone, revealing that the former assassin is now hesitant to take the life of even the most heinous of henchmen. Englehart tempers this disappointment by comparing Shang Chi’s own willingness to serve Fu Manchu with those of his enemies, blurring the line between the various pawns in this game.

“The Dragon Lady is everything a mortal could ask for.” – Orson Welles

I stopped by the Dragon Lady Comics today to pay my respects. It wasn’t my regular, and it was too far away from most of my other stops for me to visit every time I visited Toronto. But once in awhile I would make the effort and hike it from the bus station out to Little Italy, saving the money I could spend on transit to use on classic comic strip reprints instead. Odds are good that I would have delved into the old masters of the adventure strip eventually, but I wouldn’t have done so as early and with as much vigour as I did upon discovering the work of Roy Crane, Milt Caniff, Noel Sickles and Frank Robbins while rummaging through the bins at Dragon Lady Comics. I left the store with their last two Johnny Hazard books and dust all over my fingertips.

You will never understand
How the reptile mind
Struggles

Shang Chi seems to have entered the scene fully formed. It’s as if the shock of discovering that his father is one of history’s greatest villains has inured Shang Chi to further surprises, giving him a confidence beyond Marvel’s penchant for neurotic characters. Most telling is Shang Chi’s plan of attack, choosing to chip away at Fu Manchu’s empire instead of launching a frontal assault. It’s rare to see such a calculated, proactive approach in a serial comic, like if Batman were to concentrate exclusively on dismantling Ra’s al Ghul’s criminal empire over a ten year period.

The fight scenes had me double checking the Comic Code Authority at the time of publication. Shang Chi squares off against an Indian dacoit in two absolutely brutal clashes that wouldn’t be out of place in today’s comics. I have to admit, my dislike of Paul Gulacy’s artwork was the one thing holding me back from taking on this project, but I can think of few artists as capable of drawing a man setting himself on fire and jumping through a plate glass window.

Most accidents
Happen
Buddah be praised

There are so many ways that a martial arts comic can develop. The transition to regular series brings with it the introduction of supporting cast member Black Jack Tarr, whose presence solidifies the title’s path into the espionage genre.

Strange that the company we keep has such a large impact on our own lives, but it rarely affects fictional characters in quite the same way. Imagine if the first people Shang Chi met in the Western world were astronauts or motocross drivers. What a wonderful comic that would be.

Your concrete paths
And overflowing gutters
Are not welcome

It’s obvious that the team behind this issue were uncertain whether it would last one issue or one hundred. The villain is a former friend of Shang Chi’s named Midnight, and is presented as being Shang Chi’s equal in Kung Fu, but he’s introduced and dismissed so quickly that it doesn’t really mean a thing. Worst of all is Midnight’s outfit, with a clumsy fedora and cloak marking him as a fourth-rate Shadow knock-off instead of a martial artist.

Shang Chi’s distance is interesting. He shows a detachment to the alien streets of New York City, puzzled only momentarily by a squalor he’s unaccustomed to before banishing it from his mind. Unlike so many other heroes, he’s less interested in saving a world he neither understands or cares for then he is destroying an evil he is already familiar with and leaving us to wallow in our own filth.

Paper warm
With slashing bodies
And neglected evils

Jim Starlin and Al Milgrom delineate the action with stiff poses caked in meaty feathering that gives off the kind of creeping panic one would feel upon waking up alone in a theatre on the Deuce. If powerful drawings are out of the question, pages that reek of stale bong water and black light posters aren’t a bad substitute.

In its way, Fu Manchu’s mastery over outdated methods of domination is brilliant in that this modern world seems to have forgotten how to cope with his archaic villainy. Master of Kung Fu is not only the tale of a boy and his estranged father, but a story about how tradition can be as dangerous as innovation.

I’m not able to attend Noir City this year, so I’ve decided to hold my own film noir festival at home, starting with The Money Trap featuring the considerable charms of Elke Sommer.

It’s been ten years since Jenny Everywhere was first made public. I check up on her every couple of months, and I’m always shocked and pleased to see new people discovering her and creating new worlds for her. Thanks to everyone who took a chance on her. The toast is on me.

In celebration of her tenth birthday, I present the only Jenny Everywhere story I’ve ever completed, a 24-hour comic from a few years back. Check out the hot mess after the jump.

J. has a roller derby game this weekend, so I thought I’d dig up something, anything that involves roller skates. I’ve drawn roller girls a few times, and never really felt like I got it. I think I should make like Wile E. Coyote and push my next attempt as far as it will go. That’s some great posing there.

I was never that big a fan of the Road Runner when I was a kid. In other Warner Bros. cartoons, the dialogue combined with the animation played off of one another to raise the quality of both. That said, I had an assignment in college where I had to animate a scene with Wile E., and it certainly increased my appreciation for what the animators of the Golden Age were able to achieve. Wile E. may be the least appreciated character design to come out of Warner Bros. I love how mangy he looks with all his little tufts of matted fur, and how he has that huge torso that makes him look like a hunchback and accentuates his tiny, malnourished stomach. They really nailed him right out the gate.