A Gentleman's Gentleman.

 While researching images to commemorate Gene Colan, I came across a few more I'd either forgotten or were new to me.

 Mar-vell no. 3 is an astonishing cover. I'm not sure that the green tints would make kids realise it was a super-hero book- it looks more like sci-fi/horror. The Guardians were an off-beat team of freedom fighters dreamed up by Doom Patrol and Deadman co-creator Arnold Drake (who also wrote some weird stuff for Mar-vell). They languished forgotten and unloved after this debut story until Steve Gerber featured them in Marvel Two-in-One and the Defenders. Cockrum redesigns helped them look more heroic but Colan's storytelling and layouts in this issue are startlingly avant-garde.
Next, two images from Colan's stint on Cap:

 
The logo jumps off the page and the montage is hip and exciting; the Avengers and Sharon Carter are particularly sexy and dramatic. However, despite the action, the Falcon's original colour scheme doesn't really shout "hero" and he's never really been a cult favorite, unlike Luke Cage or Blade. If the falconer gimmick hadn't been tampered with, we might not have the rather tame flyer of today. (He could also lose the bird medallion too.) Nevertheless,as Marvel's first African-American hero, Falc is hugely significant.

Redundant feathers

I was trying to find the original model for Marvel's Dracula for days. I don't have the Twomorrows Colan book up here in Elgin but I think the series was originally titled "House of Dracula". Not very scary. Anyway, Jack Palance was Colan's inspiration for an exotically handsome Lord of  the Vampires:

The daughter of Dracula was the adversary in my fantasy West Coast Avengers miniseries; The Dean would have drawn a helluva cat fight between Lilith and Madame Natasha:

Finally, this Gerber/Colan co-production  gives us both a glimpse of General Zod and the bizarre image of a woman with an exploding planet for a head:

 Supergirl is a character I would like to like better. Maybe I would have, if Colan had been her artist in the 80s, rather than Infantino. Maybe a Gothic romance miniseries, with Zatanna as gal pal? Super House of Forbidden Love?  I feel Kara works best as a teen, however, a la Cosmic Adventures in the Eighth Grade or Wednesday Comics:

There's room for a sexy, confident Superwoman-as Smallville proved this week- but neither of these ladies quite cut it:

 Lucy Lane with Kristin Wells' head might work....

Last Sunday, I went back to the cinema in Elgin. Naively, I had assumed it was a survivor from the distant past, like me. In fact, it was built in the mid-80s; but then, I suppose that is the distant past . This week, the Playhouse was screening X-Men First Class. I'm relieved to say I thoroughly enjoyed it; it's certainly the best super-hero film I've seen in a long time. (I have to watch Dark Knight again someday soon- I wonder if I would still like it?)

The casting and the style of the film were both striking.  The Cold war milieu had a sexy, Sixties Bond vibe to it -from the Lautner-esque interiors right down to the closing credits-and Fassbender's Magneto had more than a touch of 007 about him while Kevin Bacon evoked some of the more grandiose world-beaters of Roger Moore's era. Who would ever have imagined that Banshee would appear in a movie? I even enjoyed the Canucklehead cameo.

There were a few flaws- retooling Moira MacTaggert as an American and featuring Emma Frost chronologically before her character appears as a young girl in Wolverine ( although this may be an indication that it has been downgraded to a What If /Imaginary Tale). The "So, what kind of powers do you have?" scene was overlong; I didn't care for the Cat-Beast makeup and I don't remember Riptide ever being name-checked. But these are very minor concerns given that it was such a confident, unapologetic comic book movie.

I still think Green Lantern will stink to high heaven though.

I'm still feeling quite negative about Steven "Sherlock" Moffat's vision of Dr Who and looking for alternative takes. Last week, I finished listening to BF's Crime of the Century but, where I'd found the first of the Season 27/ Lost Stories fresh and likeable, this installment seemed a plodding retread, repeating many of the same themes and characters. I guess this is a very tightly woven story arc, so that impression is probably going to continue.

New companion and cat burglar Raine Creevy, as played by Beth Chalmers, has one of those irritatingly perky Big- Finish-Girl voices (at times sounding very like Melanie Bush) and the Metatraxi translator imitating Bart Simpson seemed overly cutesy. Ace should definitely have been written out in the previous story; she succeeds in crowding out Raine in her own debut adventure! However, I like Ricky Groves' gruff wide boy Markus very much and Sylvester had an eerily menacing scene.

Very surprisingly, Eleventh Doctor book Dead of Winter turned out to be that rare thing - a well-written page turner that captures the leads extremely accurately. Heaven knows I don't expect much from BBC Books. Half of the new range have been duds and the latter Tenth Doc books were simplistic and colourless (Slitheen Excursion, I'm looking at you). Anyway, James Goss, who wrote the audiobook Dead Air (aka the Boat That Killed People) has crafted a melancholy tale of sickness, regret and stolen identities while addressing that bloody Tardis love triangle.I haven't been this enthusiastic about a writer's plotting in Who for a long, long time. I'd be happy if Goss replaced Steven "Coupling" Moffat as soon as possible.

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