DAZZLER: HER EARLY STORIES

This weekend’s light-hearted, escapist superhero post from Balladeer’s Blog looks at the early adventures of Marvel’s mutant superheroine Dazzler.

DAZZLER Vol 1 #1 (March 1981)

Title: So Bright, This Star

Villain: The Enchantress

NOTE: After the popularity of Dazzler (Alison Blaire) following her early role in the X-Men‘s first clash with the Hellfire Club, the character was given her own solo series.

Synopsis: Dazzler, whose mutant power involves converting sound into various forms of light energy – including laser beams and ultra-violet rays – is still a struggling singer at New York City nightclubs. When gangsters who own a record company try to force her to sign with them, she refuses and the criminals sic some of their thugs on her. Spider-Man helps her defeat them and Iron Man gives her a more high-tech version of her roller skates.

Meanwhile, the Avengers’ frequent villain the Enchantress plans to take advantage of a dimensional rift which will be opening soon. By comic book coincidence that rift will be opening at the latest club where Dazzler will be performing.

DAZZLER Vol 1 #2 (April 1981)

Title: Where Demons Fear to Dwell

Villain: The Enchantress

NOTE: Dazzler’s role as a “disco” singer (LMAO) was retconned away over the years and she was referred to as a rock/ pop singer.

Synopsis: The night of Dazzler’s debut performance at Club Numero Uno, the Enchantress strikes while she is on stage and the dimensional rift starts to open. Dazzler fights her but is seriously overmatched.

Her friends in the superhero community in the audience – the X-Men, Spider-Man, and a few Avengers plus the Thing and the Human Torch from the Fantastic Four – spring into action. They help Dazzler defeat the Enchantress and prevent her from opening the rift wide enough to grant her supreme power. Dazzler gets signed by powerful talent agent Harry Osgood.   

DAZZLER Vol 1 #3 (May 1981)

Title: The Jewels of Doom

Villain: Dr. Doom

Synopsis: Dazzler is scheduled to appear at a U.N. charity concert. Unfortunately, one of the jewels that will be on display in relation to the concert (It’s only a comic book. Just go with it.) is secretly one of the lost Merlin Stones.

Dr. Doom wants to track down all the stones, which will grant him incredible power. He attacks the concert in progress and Dazzler fights him but is defeated. Doom escapes with the Merlin Stone and with Dazzler as his prisoner.   

DAZZLER Vol 1 #4 (June 1981)

Title: Here Nightmares Abide

Villains: Dr. Doom and Nightmare

Synopsis: News reports of the chaos at the charity concert inform the world about the theft of just one jewel and about Dazzler’s disappearance. Her estranged father, a judge, is too emotionally distant to make himself care.

Meanwhile Dr. Doom sends Dazzler into the dream dimension to obtain the next Merlin Stone. She battles Dr. Strange’s old foe Nightmare (at right) for it. The entity is especially vulnerable to our heroine’s light powers, and she returns to reality with the stone.

Doom plans to send her after more of the Merlin Stones, but she rebels, only to be defeated again, seriously wounded this time. The Fantastic Four, on the trail of their archenemy, arrive, but Doom flees, leaving Dazzler behind and the Merlin Stones story is dropped. 

DAZZLER Vol 1 #5 (July 1981)

Title: The Terror Tank

Villain: Bo Barrigan and his Terror Tank

Synopsis: Not long after being released from the hospital, Dazzler gets caught up in a battle between the brand-new superhero the Blue Shield and mid-level crime boss Bo Barrigan.

Barrigan has engineered the theft of a military weapon that he dubs the Terror Tank and goes on a rampage with the ultra-high-tech device. Dazzler and Blue Shield work together to defeat Barrigan’s thugs and the Terror Tank, which ultimately blows up with the villain inside it.   

X-MEN Vol 1 #148 (August 1981)

Title: Cry Mutant!

Villain: Caliban

Synopsis: When Storm, Sprite and their new friend Spider-Woman attend a Dazzler performance in New York City, the mutant called Caliban is attracted to the venue by his ability to detect the presence of other mutants. While she is performing, Dazzler notices that Caliban tries to abduct Sprite, so she intensifies her light show accompanying her singing to provide a distraction.

Storm and Spider-Woman use that distraction to slip into costume and go after Caliban. They free Sprite, and Caliban retreats to the sewers. The ladies then return to their seats for the rest of Dazzler’s performance.   

DAZZLER Vol 1 #6 (August 1981)

Title: The Hulk May Be Hazardous to Your Health

Villains: The Hulk and Satan’s Creeps

Synopsis: Dazzler snags a street gang called Satan’s Creeps for the cops. After several public performances in a row where no carnage breaks out, Dazzler and her band are doing a show at Gordon University.

The fugitive Bruce Banner is covertly working there as a janitor to gain access to some of the university’s tech but turns into the Hulk when he is caught. Dazzler fights the rampaging Hulk but is defeated. She courageously resumes chasing him when she regains consciousness.   

DAZZLER Vol 1 #7 (September 1981)

Title: Fort Apache: The Hulk

Villain: The Hulk

Synopsis: Dazzler continues her running battle with the Hulk. In the end, she manages to use her mutant powers for a tranquilizing, semi-hypnotic light show that calms the rampaging beast and he turns back into Bruce Banner.

Dazzler is very sympathetic to Bruce’s plight, so she smuggles him out of the area, buys him new clothes and such, and gives him some money. He thanks her and goes back on the run.

DAZZLER Vol 1 #8 (October 1981)

Title: Hell … Hell is for Harry

Villains: Techmaster and the Enforcers

Synopsis: Alison Blaire is called to a meeting with Harry Osgood, who pressures her about the apparent superpowers he saw her use during the Hulk’s recent rampage.

Alison bluffs that she does it all through special effects gimmicks. (Hey, it was Johnny Blaze’s public explanation for his Ghost Rider schtick for a while.)

Meanwhile, a supervillain calling himself the Techmaster breaks Spider-Man’s old foes the Enforcers out of prison and has them abduct Harry Osgood, whom he blames for his disfigurement. Dazzler must save his life and defeat the villains.

She does so, but Techmaster escapes. Osgood realizes she is a mutant but agrees to keep her secret due to growing public anger against mutantkind. Sometime afterward, government agents abduct Alison at gunpoint.

DAZZLER Vol 1 #9 (November 1981)

Title: The Sound and the Fury

Villains: Ulysses Klaw and Project Pegasus

Synopsis: Dazzler finds herself being held at the Adirondack Mountain facility of Project Pegasus, Marvel’s recurring top secret government research center on beings who possess superpowers. Despite her courteous treatment by the security chief – the superhero Quasar (see cover) – Alison soon realizes she is basically being held prisoner, like the other test subjects – the supervillains Klaw, Solarr and Nuklo.

Klaw makes an escape attempt and defeats Quasar. When he tries to kill Alison she uses her mutant powers, but since Klaw’s entire body by this point is pure sonic energy, he gets absorbed by her, killing him. Tormented at the thought of killing someone, Dazzler uses her power surge to escape Project Pegasus, only to collapse in the forest.   

DAZZLER Vol 1 #10 (December 1981)

Title: In the Darkness a Light

Villains: Galactus and his herald Terrax

Synopsis: Because Alison Blaire has been missing for days while being held at Project Pegasus, her band has had to cancel a few high-profile gigs. Meanwhile, Galactus just happened to detect Dazzler’s sudden surge in power due to her absorption of Klaw. The Big G. teleports our heroine to his spaceship, where she panics and fights him.

She unleashes every bit of additional energy she absorbed from Klaw, blasting Galactus with it, but he is unfazed. He tells Dazzler that her ability to be powered up to incredible levels means she can fetch his rebellious herald Terrax for him. He subjects her to cosmic levels of sound, then sics her on Terrax, who faces her in combat.

DAZZLER Vol 1 #11 (January 1982)

Title: … Lest Ye be Judged

Villains: Terrax and Galactus

Synopsis: While Alison Blaire’s friends on Earth continue worrying about her, she clashes with Terrax in his outer space hideaway. Eventually, she defeats the axe-wielding herald and they are both returned to Galactus’ ship Taa II.

Dazzler talks Galactus into forgiving and freeing Terrax, plus returning her to her apartment. Astonishingly, the Big G. does both, and once in her apartment, Alison makes excuses to her friends about where she has been. 

DAZZLER Vol 1 #12 (February 1982)

Title: The Light That Failed

Villain: Techmaster

Synopsis: Having lost all the career momentum she had going before her abduction by Project Pegasus, Dazzler and her band have been stuck taking much lower profile gigs in hopes of climbing their way back up the ladder.

The Techmaster lures Dazzler and Harry Osgood into a trap, but our heroine overcomes all his high-tech devices and saves herself and Harry once again. 

DAZZLER Vol 1 #13 (March 1982)

Title: Trial and Terror

Villains: The Grapplers (Titania, Letha, Poundcakes and Screaming Mimi)

Synopsis: The hard times continue for Dazzler. She and her grandmother try to get her father Judge Blaire to reconcile with her but that attempt fails. Her latest boytoy, a surgeon, dumps her, she is still stuck with low-class singing gigs and to top it all off, the government arrests Alison for killing Ulysses Klaw when she was at Project Pegasus.

The government wants a quick trial and a low profile on this case, so she is temporarily confined on “national security” reasons while her new attorney, Kenneth Barnett, works on pre-trial release. While imprisoned with supervillainesses, Thundra’s old foes the Grapplers try roughing her up but Dazzler outfights them.

As the hush-hush closed trial gets going, things look bad for Alison until Quasar himself bucks the Project Pegasus brass and testifies on Alison’s behalf. She is found not guilty and released with a “national security” gag order. Quasar promises to keep her mutant nature top secret. 

DAZZLER Vol 1 #14 (April 1982)

Title: Without Getting Killed or Caught

Villains: The Lafarge Gang

Synopsis: Much time has passed. Alison and her band have worked their way back up to a level where they are booked as the opening act for rock star Bruce Harris’ tour. At one of the concerts, the superhero Blue Shield shows up to stop a sniper.

This leads to Dazzler covertly helping She-Hulk and Blue Shield to take down Lafarge and his organized crime gang. Afterward, the tour manager starts to hype Dazzler as the new headliner, with Bruce Harris opening for her. 

DAZZLER Vol 1 #15 (May 1982)

Title: Private Eyes

Villains: S.H.I.E.L.D.

Synopsis: The concert tour eventually takes Dazzler and her band to San Francisco, where she hires private investigator Jessica Drew, whom she knows is Spider-Woman, to try to find her long lost mother. Dazzler helps, and the two ladies wind up following a lead into a building which turns out to be full of death traps.

After overcoming all of those traps, our heroines learn that they’ve broken into a covert S.H.I.E.L.D. training site. Spider-Woman promises to use her connections with Nick Fury to set things right so they don’t get in trouble. 

DAZZLER Vol 1 #16 (June 1982)

Title: Black Magic Woman

Villain: The Enchantress

Synopsis: While Jessica continues looking for Alison’s mother, Dazzler learns that the jealous Bruce Harris has used his influence to get her and her band kicked off the tour. Our heroine starts her next relationship, this time with Kenneth Barnett, her lawyer from the Klaw trial.

Days later, the Enchantress abducts Dazzler to Asgard to have her at her mercy. While the two fight it out in a stadium full of rowdy Asgardians, Odin’s attention is drawn and he interrupts the deathmatch. When the Enchantress explains what’s going on, Odin instead has the two ladies compete in singing. (Josie and the Pussycats in Asgard?)

Dazzler wins the singing competition and Odin teleports her back to Earth. 

DAZZLER Vol 1 #17 (July 1982)

Title: The Angel and the Octopus

Villain: Dr. Octopus

Synopsis: Alison’s grandmother fails to talk the lady’s father into telling her the truth about her mother. Meanwhile, Dazzler and her band score a television appearance and it goes over very well. She and Kenneth continue their romance, and she defends them both from muggers with just her physical fighting ability and not using her powers.

Soon, the mutant Angel starts trying to woo Alison away from the lawyer in a series of genuinely intrusive maneuvers. Eventually, he flies her over the city for thrills and they kiss. While driving around in Angel’s sportscar, the pair corral the escaped Dr. Octopus and send him back to prison. 

DAZZLER Vol 1 #18 (August 1982)

Title: The Absorbing Man Wants You!

Villain: The Absorbing Man

Synopsis: Thor’s old foe the Absorbing Man is back in New York City and is intrigued by underworld rumors that the singer Dazzler actually has energy powers. He plans to absorb those powers as soon as he can.

When Dazzler is forced to cancel that night’s performance at the Peppermint Lounge over technical issues, the Absorbing Man attacks her and in the course of their fight he manages to absorb some of the light energy she shoots and he grows into an enormous body of such energy.

DAZZLER Vol 1 #19 (September 1982)

Title: Creel and Inhuman Treatment

NOTE: The title is a play on Absorbing Man’s real name, Carl “Crusher” Creel, and the expression “cruel and unusual punishment” but using Inhuman due to Black Bolt’s guest appearance.

Villain: The Absorbing Man

Synopsis: The enormous Absorbing Man is too powerful for Dazzler, who rushes to the Baxter Building, but the Fantastic Four are off on a mission. She calls the X-Men and the Avengers, but they too are off on current missions. Dazzler contacts the Inhumans in Attilan, the Great Refuge.

Black Bolt, the monarch of the Inhumans, agrees to help and has Crystal’s horse-sized dog Lockjaw teleport him to Dazzler’s side. The two fight the rampaging Absorbing Man together. When Black Bolt learns that Alison’s mutant power converts sound into light energy, he unleashes his massively destructive voice, which Dazzler simultaneously converts into light energy to avoid any sonic damage. She then blasts the Absorbing Man with an enormous laser beam that turns him back to normal for the police.

DAZZLER Vol 1 #20 (October 1982)

Title: Out of the Past

Villains: Dr. Sax and Johnny Guitar

Synopsis: Dazzler and her band continue to work the comeback trail, unaware they are being stalked by two disgruntled former band members going by the stage names Dr. Sax and Johnny Guitar. The pair had been fired for stealing from the band.

Angry and resentful, the duo paid for super-weaponry on the supervillain black market, just like Power Man’s foes Shades and Comanche (at right) had done long ago. Dr. Sax now had glasses that let him see despite his blindness and a high-tech saxophone that his playing could make shoot varying levels of sonic energy. Johnny Guitar’s guitar was teched up and also fired sonic blasts controlled by his playing.

NOTE: Goofy villains, I admit, but Johnny Guitar reminds me of the Brazilian superhero Guitarra de Ouro (Golden Guitar).

Back to the story, when the villains try to kill Dazzler and her band for revenge, she defeats them and turns them over to the cops.

*** Later on in the 1980s, Dazzler was publicly exposed as a mutant, destroying her career during the latest anti-mutant panic. Her solo series was canceled with issue #42 (March 1986). She went on to join the X-Men in their issue #214 (February 1987). 

FOR MY LOOK AT SPIDER-WOMAN’S EARLY STORIES CLICK HERE.

FOR MY LOOK AT THUNDRA’S EARLY STORIES CLICK HERE.

FOR MY LOOK AT MANTIS’ EARLY STORIES CLICK HERE.

FOR MY LOOK AT SHANNA THE SHE-DEVIL’S EARLY STORIES CLICK HERE.

FOR MY LOOK AT SHE-HULK’S EARLY STORIES CLICK HERE.

FOR MY LOOK AT BLONDE PHANTOM’S EARLY STORIES CLICK HERE.