I do love Doc Savage. It’s possible that I may even devote a future post to some of my favourite Doc Savage pulps if time allows (yeah, right). But with this post published, I’m entirely up to date with the blogging and that doesn’t happen very often.
This volume (ISBN: 9781401231255) contains about 450 pages of black and white reprints, but the original strips were printed in a B&W magazine, so there’s no loss of colour for this book. The original magazines cover dates are between August 1975 and Spring 1977. Curiously, the original books were published by Marvel, but because Doc Savage was a licensed character and DC now have that license, this collection is published by DC. This is not a new concept (Dark Horse have been doing it for a while with Tarzan, Conan, John Carter, etc.) but it’s not common between Marvel and DC (possibly a first, but I’m not sure.)
The volume reprints the complete run of the Doc Savage magazine. The original mags included Doc Savage related articles and interviews but only the strips, covers and pin-ups are reprinted here. Each issue is a self-contained story of approximately fifty pages, written in the pulp style, which basically means that the narrative hurtles along at break neck speed, Doc Savage instantly jumps into the action and time is always of the essence.
Moench’s quite verbose style suits the pulp characters perfectly, there is a lot of narrative and dialogue, but even at 50 pages the stories are condensed to fit the page count, or at least that’s how they feel when you read them, which could well have been Moench’s intent.
As the title would suggest, these are all Doc’s stories. If you’re hoping to see the good Doctors entourage expanded upon in this volume you may be disappointed. They provide a little comic relief and the odd minor assistance, but generally speaking Monk, Ham, Renny, Long Tom, Johnny and occasionally Pat are superfluous to the plot or, at best are used as a cipher for a plot point.
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| Splash Page from Doc Savage #1 |
As the title would suggest, these are all Doc’s stories. If you’re hoping to see the good Doctors entourage expanded upon in this volume you may be disappointed. They provide a little comic relief and the odd minor assistance, but generally speaking Monk, Ham, Renny, Long Tom, Johnny and occasionally Pat are superfluous to the plot or, at best are used as a cipher for a plot point.
The stories themselves mostly have a fantastical bent. Whether it be lost civilisations or Dieselpunk technology, the feel of the book is a slightly skewed real world, but with larger than life characters.
Like many of the old pulp characters, when handled well, Doc transfers beautifully to the comic medium. Moench seems to have an affinity to this type of character, in his woefully underrated Aztec Ace there a several pulp tropes, but that story is on a grander scale than these self contained strips.
The artwork, the lions share of which is produced by Tony DeZuniga is solid and refined, but not, in all honesty, anything above and beyond the norm. It is certainly not poor and there are several fantastic panels and splash pages, but my enthusiasm for the highs that are reached is tempered by the general mediocrity of the main body of the art. The art seems very safe. As the magazine was a bit of an experiment for Marvel, I can understand them wanting to play it safe, but a little more dash and inventiveness would have suited the story and added to the pulpishness (I’m remembering some of the garish but incredibly eye-catching original pulp covers) of the stories.
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| Doc Savage #3 p.22 |
As I mentioned above, this volumes strength is Doug Moench. He captures the immediacy and full throttle adventure that was the bread and butter of the pulps. I was left in no doubt that the Doc Savage of this volume is the same Doc Savage that appeared in over 180 pulp adventures. His almost super-human abilities dwarf that of his colleagues and even the original pulps recognised this as many of the later stories minimised the involvement of his aides.
I’m not sure why, but although it’s a relatively recent publication, I had a little trouble getting hold of a copy. It’s well worth tracking down though. The Showcase Presents are always good value for money, especially this one, as these stories were always intended to be printed in B&W.
Heartily recommended (Yes I’m biased, but there are plenty of other Doc Savage comics that I wouldn’t recommend.) and won’t cost you the earth. What more could you ask?
Mad Thinker Reads……..
With No Regard For Anything But Justice.
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