100 Recommended Back Issues #100: Second Life of Doctor Mirage #8

I've already posted about The Meandering Thoughts of a Malaysian Comic Fan blogs  list of  "100 Recommended Back Issues" when I spotlighted their post about X-O Manowar #0. Now, I've got an excerpt of another Valiant book they chose for their 100 - The Second Life of Doctor Mirage #8 which came in at number 69 on their list. Check out what the blog had to say in the below excerpt: 

The Second Life of Doctor Mirage is an odd title, even amongst Valiant Comics' lineup of original ideas. The protagonist of the series is Hwen Mirage, a investigator who travels around the world with his ridiculously hot wife Carmen in search of the paranormal. And as with anything related to the paranormal in the Valiant Universe, it did not take Hwen and Carmen long to bump into Master Darque who promptly kills Hwen. And that was only the beginning of the first issue. Hwen comes back to life as a ghost, and he and Carmen try to continue life as best they can on both the personal and professional fronts while evading Master Darque's attempts on their lives.

As Hwen still lives a relatively human life, this issue deals with one extremely important aspect of being human - food. How does a ghost eat? Does Hwen hunger as a result of lack of sustenance or is it something vestigial similar to the way an amputee feels their missing limbs? Writer Bob Layton addresses these issues in a tasteful and humorous manner as we see Hwen struggle with the notion of sustaining his ghostly form. And help comes from a very surprising and unexpected source.

This is a great issue that shows how a couple can continue to work when one has been transformed into a superhuman being. It is certainly handled with greater sensitivity and realism than Lois & Clark or Peter Parker & Mary Jane. This was one of my favorites amongst the original Valiant Comics stable of titles, and this is my favorite issue from this series.

If that excerpt put you in a Doctor Mirage mood then check out this entry on the unpublished Second Life of Doctor Mirage #19.

100 Recommended Back Issues #100: X-O Manowar # 0

Some blog called The Meandering Thoughts of a Malaysian Comic Fan created a list of their "100 Recommended Back Issues" and spotlighted a few Valiant books. At #100 is X-O Manowar #0. Check out what the blog had to say in the below excerpt: 

X-O Manowar was one of Valiant Comics' earlier successes. Created by Bob Layton, it told the story of Aric of Dacia, a barbarian Visigoth from the dark ages who was kidnapped by the Spider-Aliens and used as slave labor before he managed to escape from their clutches with the X-O Manowar armor, the most powerful in their arsenal. Unfortunately, thousands of years has passed on Earth due to the effects of time dilation and he must adjust to life in the 20th century. 

This zero issue tells the story of Aric's last days on Earth before his abduction, as well as how a simple barbarian managed to walk away with the Spider-Aliens' X-O Manowar armor. A surprise guest star shows up to help Aric, we learn the origins of the X-O Manowar armor itself and why it is so important to the Spider-Aliens, Aric's life on Earth and how he met the love of his life, and the vital few seconds that put Aric on his destiny. 

It's a very tight story by creator Bob Layton and then regular series writer Jorge Gonzalez, along with some of Joe Quesada's finest artwork. In fact, this issue was one of his earlier collaborations with Jimmy Palmiotti, and the both of them would go on to have a long, fruitful relationship that would result in the birth of Event Comics, the formation of Marvel Knights, and Quesada eventually becoming Marvel Comics' Editor-in-Chief.

 So there you have it, proof that Joe Quesada is Marvel Editior-in-Chief because of X-O Manowar!

Valiant Poster - Ninjak: Rain of Terror

Bernard Chang is a Valiant Comics discovery. He did his first professional work for Valiant Comics (Archer & Armstrong #9) has gone on to illustrate over 40 Valiant comics and was heavily marketed by Valiant as a hot new Valiant only artist. The Second Life of Doctor Mirage was created partly to give him a book to showcase his talents, he even had a hand in creating the character. After, Doctor Mirage took off Valiant planned to unleash Bernard Chang on Ninjak in a mini series entitled "Rain of Terror". Below is a poster given away at conventions promoting the series.

Unfortunately, the art from this poster, a cover and a few interior pages were all that were produced of the series before Acclaim started to rearrange the Valiant publishing slate and canceled the project. To this day very little information has surfaced as to what the story would have entailed.

Valiant Poster - Visitor retailer exclusive

Check out this cool retailer promotional poster for The Visitor featuring X-O Manowar, Bloodshot, Ninjak, Secret Weapons and Solar, Man of the Atom. The poster was distributed only to retailers to promote the forthcoming Visitor vs The Valiant Universe mini series.

The poster image is by Bernard Chang and Ken Branch and measures 26" X 18".

Unpublished - Archer & Armstrong cover by MAK

Check out this unfinished and unpublished cover to an unknown Archer & Armstrong issue by the unidentified artist MAK:

As you can see the cover is only partially inked - a couple of the characters are still just pencils. I have no idea who the two girls on the left are, I suspect they are new characters that would have been introduced in this issue. Unfortunately, I don't know which issue this cover was meant for though I would guess it was created for a inventory issue. Adding to the inventory issue theory is the fact that the cover artist, whose initials are on the cover as MAK, is not someone I am familiar with. I have to say though, it's not a bad cover by inventory issue standards.

Inventory issues are full comics that are created by creators outside of a books regular creative team (usually younger cheaper creators) while the regular creators are working on the ongoing series. The inventory issue is then kept in a draw by the editor until it is needed, for instance when the regular creators fall behind and an issue is needed so that the regular publishing schedule can be kept. Instead of having a book ship late, which can cause a myriad of problems for the publisher, the inventory story is used. Inventory issues are almost always self contained stories so that a readers won't feel too confused by the inventory book being slipped in the publishing schedule. Inventory stories are regularly created and kept in files in case they are needed a year, two years down the road. Often times they are never used!

Archer & Armstrong #9 is a good example of an inventory issue. Barry Windsor-Smith is notoriously slow at creating his amazing artwork and in between the double sized Archer & Armstrong / Eternal Warrior #8 and Archer & Armstrong #10 another creative teams inventory story (having nothing to do with the story that was being regularly published but also not contradicting things too much) was shipped.

UPDATE: MAK is in fact female Valiant artist Elim Mak!

Original Art - Interview Pin-Up

I've never seen this piece by Andrew Wendel and Ralph Reese before. I found it at Roger Clark Art (the url of which is annoyingly stamped on the scan!). It features Ninjak, Doctor Mirage, Timewalker and an Armorine in very un-Valiant like layout - they are all posing, randomly attacking things we can't see, all the opponents are in different directions hence the cross shooting, no one is fighting the opponent closest to them either, oh and they are in some unknown bombed out location... basically everything that Valiant avoids is here. These are all reasons why most of us have probably never seen this before. According to Roger Clark, it was published along with an interview at some point (based on the characters used, it was probably an interview about the third generation of characters Valiant released).

Roger Clark is selling the art for $175 (actually a very good price for a piece that features this many characters). I'll update this post when I track down the interview...the hunt is on!

Fan Art - Ninjak and Turok

Was emailed this piece of fan art featuring Ninjak and Turok: Dinosaur Hunter fighting dinosaurs by Ph!bbz. Not the best looking image but then even the artist admits it looks rusty. Check out the black and white inks and the colors:

Note the illustrators attempt to mimic Joe Quesada's sword flashes! For comparison, here's Quesada's version: