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The following is either my, or in the case of a guest editorial their, personal opinion. It is not fact, it is not unarguable, and it is possibly even not correct. As with anything which is, fundamentally, a personal opinion, the magical acronym YMMV (Your Milage May Vary) appddes. |
Originally envisioned by Mark Gruenwald, the Marvel Handbooks have gone through many interations. The first of these was the "Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe", and covered twelve issues, plus a two-volume "Book of the Dead" (an amusing exercise is to go through the Books of the Dead and see how many have indeed remained deceased...), and a final volume detailing the weapons and accessories (because we all know that the secret to fashion success is to accessorize).
There were a few more editions - a "Deluxe" edition followed, and then annual updates, and finally a less-than-useful version for binders (the idea being that when a new entry came out, you'd just update your binder).
After a long hiatus, Marvel has started up their handbook program again. this time issuing what amount to semi-annual yearbooks, usually with a theme, delving into the heroes and villains in some focused area of the Marvel Universe 616 (and beyond - Yes Virginia, there is an Ultimates Handbook).
Given the focus of the Star-Spangled Site, I was royalled peeved when the Colorado Springs area comic shops had no copies. I was even more annoyed when Mile High Comics had no copies. While I wanted one, I wasn't sure I wanted to pay twice the price of the book - once for buying it, and the equivalent in postage.
Finally, Michael Hoskins pointed me to a place where I could order it, and when I raved about the Marvel Legacy 1960's Handbook (and its really cool - go snag one off the shelf at your local shop, and have them reorder if they're out. Go ahead, do it now. I'll wait), he asked me to review the Golden Age 2004 Handbook.
And - never being one to resist an opportunity to shoot off my biiiiiiig mouth, here we go!
The Handbook contains some 46 entries, one per page. Of these, roughly two-thirds are connected to Captain America, the Avengers, the Invaders, and/or the Liberty Legion, so for a Cap fan, this is as close to perfect a reference volume as it gets. Each entry has some respresentative artwork, and in the case of characters who have both a modern and Golden Age look - like Spitfire, for example - her modern costume is displayed prominently, with an inset of the classic look. Each entry also has a "Power Grid" for the anal-retentive statistics freaks in the audience, a qucik section for powers and paraphenalia, and (for the most part) about half the page for background. The last few pages are given over to an Appendix and Bibilography, which is excellent miscellany for the Golden Age scholar.
A reasonable format, with some personal comments as caveat. First, the Power Grid - they're pretty meaningless, since the abilities of the characters aren't intended for adjudging a Super Hero RPG, but rather to serve at the discretion of the writer; anyone can beat Cap if they're lucky, Cap is having a bad day, and he ate my cooking for dinner. Hell, if he ate my cooking he'd be in the Avengers infirmary; Jarvis I'm not.
Second, I could pretty much identify all of the artwork (cover excepted) used from other sources - heck, I lifted not a few of them from the same source material for older versions of the pre-Microhero site design. And did I mention that the cover stinks? As opposed to other handbook covers, tis one as a paltry eight people on it; not a big crowd scene. But I digress, with apologies to Peter David... my problem with some of the art (like the picture used for the Yellow Claw) is that while it may be "authentic", from the Golden Age period, its just not recognizable as the Yellow Claw. In similar vein, the illustration of Spitfire is horrid, washed out and muddy - a fault of the original artwork, but it doesn't come close to conveying her dynamic character. I would have prefered some consistency of style, and better yet - new illustrations! Yeah, I know - there are such things as budget limitations on a speculative product like this, and I understand that, but I'd still have liked to have seen at least some new stuff - for example, couldn't they have used a picture of The Fin from New Invaders like they did for Spitfire, rather than the GA piece they used?
Also, each of the entries is given over to a single page, which is about right for most of the entries - except some of the giants of the era, like Captain America, whose history deserved to be comprehensive, especially given how many of the other entries tied in - for example Captain America II/Spirit of 1776, Captain America III/The Patriot, and Captain America IV/The Grand Director are all major parts of the Captain America legacy which appeared while Cap was on ice - I think they each deserved a paragraph, and a cross-reference to their own entry.
Another objection was that there were a great many villains excluded from the Handbook, while other more obscure heroes made the cut. Dr. Druid more properly belongs in an Avengers volume, and Fin Fang Foom in a Monsters or at least a modern-era book. Is Namora or Hurricane more relevant than Master Man, Brain Drain, the Scarlet Scarab, Baron Blood, or Iron Cross?
Of course, knowing that this was - pretty much - a labor of love for all involved, those must have been some touch choices to make, and I'd have hated to see the knife-fights involved during the "selection committee" meetings. Its easy for me to "arm-chair quarterback" the book, but bear in mind that while I kvetch about the artwork, or about the entry length (and consequently, the level of detail), or the selections, that should in no way imply that the entries, as they stand, aren't - at worse - perfectly functional, and at best, informative and entertaining. The Jack Frost and Miss America entries are virtually perfect in artwork, scope, and level of detail. I almost wish this had been two volumes, to allow them to have shown more of the character evolutions, and give some time to those overlooked - like Bucky II/Fred Davis, who filled the role of Bucky after his presumed death, and was one of the founders of the V-Battalion.
Maybe next year - the nice thing about the entries in the 2004 volume is that, being more historical, there aren't likely to be as much need for updates on characters already covered, and they can focus on some of the likely candidates for new entries!