Wrath of the Spectre The Complete Controversial Saga by Michael Fleisher & Jim Aparo. Format: 200pg color book. Price: 19.99 US, 26.99 CND

Reviewed by Jamie Coville

You are probably wondering why this is called "Controversial." Well, these stories kinda started a long and public lawsuit involving Michael Fleisher vs. Harlan Ellison and the Comics Journal. During that lawsuit Harlan Ellison and Gary Groth began feuding and they still hate each other to this day. A variety of stuff has sprung up from that, eventually turning into a large, ongoing feud with Peter David and the Comics Journal crew. I'm not sure if any other comic book has started this much bad blood in the industry. So how did these comics start that? Well, in an interview in the Comics Journal, Harlan Ellison was talking about these Spectre stories and calling the writer Michael Fleisher "bugfuck" for writing them. He likely meant the term as something positive but Fleisher didn't like to being called crazy in print and sued (there's more to it than that, but I won't go into detail here). Harlan called Fleisher bugfuck because these stories have the Spectre killing people in very sadistic ways and it's surprising the Comics Code allowed them to be published. I almost feel sorry for Jim Aparo, who had to figure out ways to draw this stuff and get it by the Comics Code. The stories themselves are very simple. Somebody does something horribly evil, the cop Jim Corrigan figures out who does it in short order and turns into the Spectre and kills them in a sadistic manner. What hooks you and keeps you reading is wondering how Spectre will murder the next villain. Fleisher does try to do more than this, he introduces a love interest and they deal with the idea of him no longer being the Spectre and living a normal life. They also bring in a newspaper reporter and he's introduced as Earl Crawford but weirdly Jim Corrigan calls him Clark Kent. The character looks very similar to Kent and I suspect it actually was intended to be him but they changed him as he's written really out of character. While he gives Superman style speeches about a fair trial and justice, he never turns into Superman to try and stop the Spectre and at the end of the story he says "I-I've got to go somewhere quiet . . . be by myself . . . h-have some time to think all this over! But first . . . first I need a good stiff drink!" I'm not sure what happened here but it feels like some sort of mix up. There is a weird credit called "script continuity" for a Russell Carley, who was Fleisher's friend and collaborator. Fleisher had only done straight prose writing and wanted help in writing for an artist. Russell Carley was an artist and gave him a hand in both plot ideas and formatting the prose for the artists. After the early stories are done, they reprint some later stories by the same team (with Mike DeCarlo and Pablo Marcos as inkers). Aparo clearly updates his style a bit and it's somewhat jarring at first, but not as jarring as the story ending with an unfinished subplot. In the introduction it's revealed that DC editorial didn't like these types of stories when they first ran and ordered them dropped, with a few new issues already written. Paul Levitz, who was a big fan of the run, kept those scripts and got Aparo to draw them many years later. The book also includes the covers and other odds and ends like pin ups and a Who's Who on the Spectre. Aparo's art is very clean and straightforward. It's great comic book art, makes reading the stories easy and enjoyable. I wish there were more trades with his art in them, especially his Batman run. As for this book, it's interesting for historical purposes. The writing is not good by any means, but I was strangely intrigued enough to continue to read it. It did take me 3 sittings to finish it in the course of two days and it felt fast. I bought the book on a discount and if you are interested in something that's not too serious but not too jokey or superhero-ey then I recommend this book. It gets 3 stars out of 5. Regards, Jamie Coville http://www.TheGraphicNovels.com News and discussion on a free, Delphi like forum.

[Back to Collector Times]

[Prev.]

[Return to Comics]

[Disclaimer]

[Next]