“Quick, someone come over here and do the zeroes. I’m a hand short.”
Sonic the Hedgehog #200
Archie Comics (July 2009)
WRITER: Ian Flynn
PENCILER: Tracy Yardley!
INKER: Terry Austin
COLORIST: Matt Herms
LETTERER: John Workman
COVER: Patrick “Spaz” Spaziante
EDITOR: Mike Pellerito
More episodes of Nyberg on the News 8 (CT) YouTube channel
This video is about 10 years old by the time I post this. She would be at least 26 now. It’s still pretty cool. According to her Linked In profile she’s been publishing since she was 12. Thought this might inspire or at least impress someone.
The year: 2008. After having been stuck home with inflammation from Crohn’s Disease I discovered blogging. People actually thinking about storytelling the same way I did, even if we had different views about it. I had only found that with newsgroups and Transformers previously. There were Transformers but also nostalgia, comics, cartoons, and other things nobody in my friend group or my family really discussed very often. After my second hospital stay I found myself replying in the comments and realizing I was almost writing articles. So in November of that year I started my own website. You’re reading it right now unless someone stole or reblogged this article.
Every year around this time I do a “best of” for the year. The anniversary officially was Sunday, but that’s when I do the comic and then the chapter by chapter book review on Monday. So for once I’m late due to scheduling instead of forgetting I should do one of these.
Somehow I managed to miss very few posts this year. I did have to keep an eye on my dad as he went through a milder version of the diverticulitis that ruined my 2016 and attempts at a week off coincided with me being unwell or otherwise distracted, but I managed to stick to the schedule this year. I even started a couple new article series and added a “BW Prose” section to link all my various storytelling attempts not in comic book form, to join the comic archives I already had. I also just finished a book I ended up spending the whole year plus going over, not usually a curse of reviewing a book a chapter a week, but there you go.
Now it’s time to look back at the articles that I still remember, ones I plan to reference a lot, or just ones that I felt necessary or just fun to make. What makes this year’s list of article links? I decided to break them down into categories after writing the whole list, so they may not all be in proper chronological order. Kind of like my comic collection.
At least modern comic covers make a good poster while not selling the story inside.
Thunderbolt #56
Charlton Comics Group (February, 1967)
“Beware The Cobra”
CREATOR/WRITER/ARTIST: PAM
The Sentinels: “Where Walks…The Titan!”
WRITER: Gary Friedrich
ARTIST: Sam Grainger
EDITOR: Dick Giordano
For those of you who missed the preview, “The Rescue” is from back in the days when arcs didn’t have titles, just individual episodes. Arcs have been retroactively added in to match the arc titles of later seasons of the classic series. This arc consists of two episodes, “The Powerful Enemy” and “Desperate Measures”. This is also going to be different from the usual novelisations I’ve reviewed one chapter at a time in the past. Those were based on the last available draft and production images the author had access to in order to get the book out on time alongside the movies. The Rescue novel came out in 1988, a year after the late writer wrote it and over twenty years after the David Whittaker script was written. So changes here are totally a matter of choice by the author.
This was also the first story without Susan, the Doctor’s granddaughter. Carol Ann Ford left the show, so Susan stayed behind on an Earth that was just freed from Dalek control to help rebuild the planet and build a new life with her new love interest. I think Big Finish did audio dramas with what’s next, but considering the young Time Lady in training has more knowledge than the Earthlings, you’d think she’d have had a hand in Earth’s eventual move into space and helping form a galactic federation with (of course) Earth as a centerpiece. After all, the show is written by Earthlings. It’s also why most of the aliens and ancient civilisations show up in the United Kingdom, because until Disney+ came along the show was very much British with the occasional Scotsman as the Doctor because they’re still in the UK.
The book itself has no chapter titles. I’ll be noting which of the two episodes is being adapted here, and remember that the BBC dropped this episode on the Classic Doctor Who YouTube channel just in time for me to use the arc as part of Saturday Night Showcase to set up this review. So watch that first if you want, or just follow along the novel. I have the Target Books printing from 1988, imported to the US because of the show’s American fanbase via PBS back when they still mattered. That’s for anyone actually reading along. Let’s begin with the prologue and set our story up with technically part one of “The Powerful Enemy”.
Somewhere, Spider-Woman is wondering how Choice is getting away with this after the flack she got.
Hardcase #11
Malibu Comics/Ultraverse (April, 1994)
“The Angry Past” part 2
WRITER: James D. Hudnall
PENCILER: Scott Benefiel
INKER: Jasen Rodrigues
COLORING: Moose Baumann & Foodhammer!
LETTERER: Tim Eldred
EDITOR: Hank Kanalz
The Clutter Reports (my other site) Atop The Fourth Wall Crisis On Earth Prime Lean Into Artcast Bully Says “Comics Oughta Be Fun” Siskoid’s Blog of Geekery
Cartoon Hero’s Lair SF Debris Four Million Years Later
BW Media Spotlight 