This weekend’s light-hearted, escapist superhero post from Balladeer’s Blog will take a look at the Marvel publications from January of 1973, excluding reprints.
DAREDEVIL AND THE BLACK WIDOW Vol 1 #95 (January 1973)
Title: Bullfight on the Bay
Villain: The Man-Bull
Synopsis: Matt Murdock has relocated his law practice to San Francisco in order to move in with his new lady, the wealthy Natasha Romanoff aka the Black Widow. Matt’s alter ego Daredevil has also made San Francisco his new home, but because this is just a comic book nobody makes the connection that Matt is Daredevil … even though DD has become the Black Widow’s crimefighting partner.
Back in New York, Daredevil’s old foe the Man-Bull has his gang break him out of prison so he can go to San Francisco and kill Daredevil. The unsuspecting Matt Murdock is settling in at Broderick & Sloan, his new law firm.
When the Man-Bull begins rampaging through Frisco in order to flush out our hero, the Black Widow and Daredevil swing into action against him. Eventually the villain renders Daredevil unconscious, leaving the Black Widow alone against him for the cliffhanger ending. Continue reading
ADVENTURE COMICS VOL 1 #352 (January 1967) 
The Fatal Five are Tharok, a cyborg whose cybernetic brain makes him more intelligent than Brainiac 5; Validus, a huge purple monstrosity whose insanity drives it to perpetual violence; the Emerald Empress, evil ruler of an entire planet whose populace recently won a war to overthrow her; the Persuader, a killer and plunderer whose armor and Atomic Axe make him unstoppable; and Mano, a mutant whose hand wields energies so powerful that the hand destroyed his entire home planet. 
SPIDER-MAN Vol 1 #104 (January 1972) 
Back to the story, Spider-Man is saved from the quicksand by the timely arrival of 
LEGION OF SUPERHEROES (Superboy starring the …) Vol 1 #203 (August 1974) 
Eventually, Dream Girl has a dream foretelling an imminent attack by Validus – the huge, mindless monster who is strong enough to take on entire teams of Legionnaires at once. Because Validus is usually harmless unless controlled psychically by its fellow Fatal Five member Tharok, the Legion makes sure that the cyborg Tharok is still safely incarcerated at Space Prison Complex X33. 
When Validus ultimately attacks Legion headquarters in future Metropolis, he is routing the heroes while withstanding all their counterattacks. Invisible Kid at first seems to have abandoned his post to dally with Myla but it turns out he actually solved the problem at hand. 
AVENGERS Vol 1 #84 (January 1971) 
While searching for the Well at the Center of Time, the only safe place to hide the Ebony Blade, the Black Knight is captured by Arkon and his new consort – 
For this weekend’s light-hearted, escapist blog post about superheroes, Balladeer’s Blog goes back to the Justice Society of America, this country’s very first superteam. Years ago, I covered the early years of the JSA, from their first appearance in 
ALL-STAR COMICS Vol 1 #28 (April 1946) 
AVENGERS Vol 1 #72 (January 1970) 
This leads to the Avengers learning that Scorpio is not alone – he is a member of 
POWER MAN Vol 1 #21 (October 1974) 
The hurt and angry Power Man returns to his Hero for Hire office above the Gem Theater. Luke gets attacked there by the original Power Man, a former operative of Baron Zemo who was given his super-strength by the Avengers foe the Enchantress. 
FANTASTIC FOUR Vol 1 #129 (December 1972) 
Crystal, Johnny Storm’s longtime girlfriend and former member of the Fantastic Four, was forced to move back to the Inhumans’ hidden city of Attilan due to her body’s negative reaction to air pollution in the human world. 
GRIPS 
As I indicated in the title of this blog post, I consider the Grips tales to be what low-budget, disreputable Grindhouse movies of the past were to glossy, professional films from major studios. The writing and artwork in Grips seldom approached the standards of the Big Two publishers, but the visceral violence, profanity and often taboo subject matter more than made up for the overall shoddiness of the finished product. 
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