I've been reading some groups on FB that are vehemently anti Stan Lee to the point that one might think that "The Man" was the greatest threat to creativity and comics of all time. Of course, these groups are single minded in their praise of Jack Kirby, Steve Ditko and most artists while shunning most writers.
With Stan and Jim Shooter now deceased yet still being attacked, some of that vitriol has been transferred to Roy Thomas, Marvel's second editor-in-chief and considered to be Stan's right hand man, his "Houseroy" if you will. This was exasperated by the Wolverine controversy.
But it makes you wonder, when Roy eventually goes to the Big Bullpen in the Sky, who will "inherit" the anger?
The next living EIC is Marv Wolfman, a beloved figure, yet I've seen criticism about him and stolen artwork so will some readers turn on him?
And then who? Tom DeFalco? Jim Lee? Or even Chris Claremont? John Byrne? There aren't that many big names from Marvel's Silver/Bronze Ages left!
On the “What are you watching right now?” thread, JD talked about a Route 66 episode that somehow made it to Toronto. He mentioned drinking ages and strip clubs, on which I’m about to comment without performing a threadjack.
In the U.S. the states all had separate drinking ages until the Federal Government threatened their highway funds in 1984. They all subsequently switched to age 21.
My parents were very conservative. My Dad often had a single can of beer after work. I remember his having two cans only once. So when I was inducted into the Army, I had only had sips of Communion wine. On my twentieth birthday in 1968 at Fort Knox, Kentucky, I had my first glass of beer, which I immediately liked. I was drinking legally. They had a huge sign above the on-base bar that proclaimed that the drinking age was 18 1/2.
Still in my twentieth year, I was assigned to an Engineer company in northern Virginia. One time I went with a couple of friends to a club in Washington DC. No one carded us there either. While we were drinking our beers there was a girl in go-go boots dancing topless right in front of us. She looked absolutely miserable. Back then I don’t think there was such a thing as putting paper money in in G-strings. That came along later.
I had my twenty-first birthday in Vietnam. We had no plumbing but there was a very basic service club a short walk from my “hooch” (dwelling) that sold cans of beer for very little*. I don’t think I celebrated my birthday, for whatever reason. We were about ten miles from what was supposed to be the Demilitarized Zone, and were treated with rocket attacks about once a week. The sound of an exploding rocket will wake you and sober you up handily.
We didn't have the current prohibition of alcohol when deployed. I think this started when we were in Afghanistan because strict Muslims do not drink alcohol.
*The beer and sodas would arrive like most things on our river in shipping containers. These were essentially what we see today mounted on the backs of trucks. Sometimes these steel containers became parts of bunkers. My unit had a system that saved the beer money and used it to pay for visiting bands from the Philippines and South Korea to give occasional free shows in the service club. They were pretty good. We were generally considered to be in too dangerous an area for big USO shows. In addition to the groups we hired, we had a single tiny USO show, also in our service club.
I don’t know what they did in other areas of Vietnam, but no one carded us there. Many years later I was surprised to learn that in “more secure” areas, they would have to check out their rifles from the unit armorer, like Stateside. We always had our rifles in our sleeping quarters and occasionally took them to our workplaces if Intelligence thought there might be a “ground attack.” Didn’t happen while I was there.
Initially, under a different battalion commander, we would go to bunkers when there was a rocket attack (usually a single rocket). When we got a new lieutenant colonel, instead he had us go to the edge of camp and get into trenches, ready for a ground attack. Many years later I found out that this was because sappers tossed bags of explosives into the bunkers of a sister unit.
Thank you for this. I'm fascinated by the lives people have lived, especially the odd corners like, say, drinking and entertainment near armed conflict.
Sometimes I am moved to share experiences. Whatever I tell you will always be the truth. A little clarification:
“My parents were very conservative.”
They were both in the Conservative Party when they grew up in England. They went through the Depression there and The Blitz. During The Blitz my Dad was a firefighter. In addition to his typical smoking he was exposed to a lot of burning buildings. My Mom, before marriage, started smoking while hiding in the subway tunnels from the bombs. After they became U.S. citizens, they voted Republican. I can’t imagine either of them voting for Donald Trump. I registered Democratic when I was of age (then 21) and gradually became less and less conservative.
I became less and less conservative over time because I met more and more people of different backgrounds and beliefs. The best thing about the military draft was that everyone had to meet and trust people they otherwise might not meet. In school I was around kids of different races and religions. Beyond the Army, my job had me meeting and dealing with many people who had different backgrounds. Some were temporary hires, some worked under me, some were on my level and some were higher in the chain of command. I wore a tie every day because I never knew when I would be face-to-face with a member of Congress.
“My unit had a system that saved the beer money and used it to pay for visiting bands from the Philippines and South Korea to give occasional free shows in the service club.“
It slipped my mind that later in my time there, but before the USO show, we hired a band from Australia. We had Vietnamese women working for us in the mess hall and doing some cleaning during the day. We had visiting merchants on some days, one of whom I paid to do my laundry. All of the musicians and singers we hired up until then were Asian. If there was a TV on base it wasn’t where I was. I consciously avoided TV, anyway, because I thought it would just make me homesick. It was 1969 and I missed the first Moon Landing, only seeing it months later. So, when the blond Australian women performed, I had the impression that their noses were very pointy. They weren’t. They just weren’t the Asian faces I saw all the time.
We always had our rifles in our sleeping quarters and occasionally took them to our workplaces if Intelligence thought there might be a “ground attack.” Didn’t happen while I was there.
I was glad to have been sent to Virginia before Vietnam. I was drafted for two years active service and up to four years in the reserves. The Tet Offensive happened in early 1968, before I was even in the Army. As an homage, they threw a second (lesser) Tet attack at the same time in 1969. The guy who ran our tiny PX told me that when they retreated he fired over their heads. Since bullets are also subject to gravity, firing in the air is no guarantee. The other reason that I’m glad that the Stateside assignment preceding Vietnam was that I didn’t want to put up with chicken-$#!% inspections after the relative freedom of being in a war zone. When I left for Vietnam, I was scheduled to go home a month before my enlistment ended. Instead of getting out a month early, I got out of active service about 3 1/2 months early when my battalion was deactivated. In 1973, when virtually all troops were pulled out of Vietnam, they gave me an honorable discharge after five years instead of six. I was subject to be back in the Army any time when I was in the “Ready Reserve.” Those of us who had been in a war zone were exempted from Stateside reserve service.
My Stateside assignment to an Engineer company that specialized in pontoon bridges was interesting in several ways. One time I got to participate in building a bridge from huge inflatable bags and steel girders. About one-third of the company were new guys like me; one-third returned from Germany; and one-third returned from Vietnam. In the shower one day I saw a row of bullet scars on a guy’s back. When I arrived there I wasn’t needed as a company clerk and worked instead in Supply. This led me to want to be in Supply when I went to Vietnam, so the first four-to-six weeks I was there. They did need me as a battery (company) clerk, so I switched over. All of my experiences with guard duty and $#!%-burning were before my job change. They didn’t get around to having me patrol the camp perimeter. My predecessor as battery clerk got all of those duties on top of his job. I really wanted to be indispensable, so I opened the office every day. At a reunion in 2015 I saw my captain, who said I was his Radar. I guess he meant I was reliable. Or maybe because he heard that I read comic books.
"Wait a minute! Aren't I a LMD? Am I programmed to act old? How can I have a heart attack when I don't have a heart? Can I override this? Am I a LMD who thinks he's old or am I just an old LMD? When was I built anyway?"
Replies
One of my attempts at making a meme came up in my FB Memories from ten years ago, and I was like, "Is it really ten years since that nonsense?"
I've been reading some groups on FB that are vehemently anti Stan Lee to the point that one might think that "The Man" was the greatest threat to creativity and comics of all time.
Of course, these groups are single minded in their praise of Jack Kirby, Steve Ditko and most artists while shunning most writers.
With Stan and Jim Shooter now deceased yet still being attacked, some of that vitriol has been transferred to Roy Thomas, Marvel's second editor-in-chief and considered to be Stan's right hand man, his "Houseroy" if you will. This was exasperated by the Wolverine controversy.
But it makes you wonder, when Roy eventually goes to the Big Bullpen in the Sky, who will "inherit" the anger?
The next living EIC is Marv Wolfman, a beloved figure, yet I've seen criticism about him and stolen artwork so will some readers turn on him?
And then who? Tom DeFalco? Jim Lee? Or even Chris Claremont? John Byrne? There aren't that many big names from Marvel's Silver/Bronze Ages left!
On the “What are you watching right now?” thread, JD talked about a Route 66 episode that somehow made it to Toronto. He mentioned drinking ages and strip clubs, on which I’m about to comment without performing a threadjack.
In the U.S. the states all had separate drinking ages until the Federal Government threatened their highway funds in 1984. They all subsequently switched to age 21.
My parents were very conservative. My Dad often had a single can of beer after work. I remember his having two cans only once. So when I was inducted into the Army, I had only had sips of Communion wine. On my twentieth birthday in 1968 at Fort Knox, Kentucky, I had my first glass of beer, which I immediately liked. I was drinking legally. They had a huge sign above the on-base bar that proclaimed that the drinking age was 18 1/2.
Still in my twentieth year, I was assigned to an Engineer company in northern Virginia. One time I went with a couple of friends to a club in Washington DC. No one carded us there either. While we were drinking our beers there was a girl in go-go boots dancing topless right in front of us. She looked absolutely miserable. Back then I don’t think there was such a thing as putting paper money in in G-strings. That came along later.
I had my twenty-first birthday in Vietnam. We had no plumbing but there was a very basic service club a short walk from my “hooch” (dwelling) that sold cans of beer for very little*. I don’t think I celebrated my birthday, for whatever reason. We were about ten miles from what was supposed to be the Demilitarized Zone, and were treated with rocket attacks about once a week. The sound of an exploding rocket will wake you and sober you up handily.
We didn't have the current prohibition of alcohol when deployed. I think this started when we were in Afghanistan because strict Muslims do not drink alcohol.
*The beer and sodas would arrive like most things on our river in shipping containers. These were essentially what we see today mounted on the backs of trucks. Sometimes these steel containers became parts of bunkers. My unit had a system that saved the beer money and used it to pay for visiting bands from the Philippines and South Korea to give occasional free shows in the service club. They were pretty good. We were generally considered to be in too dangerous an area for big USO shows. In addition to the groups we hired, we had a single tiny USO show, also in our service club.
I don’t know what they did in other areas of Vietnam, but no one carded us there. Many years later I was surprised to learn that in “more secure” areas, they would have to check out their rifles from the unit armorer, like Stateside. We always had our rifles in our sleeping quarters and occasionally took them to our workplaces if Intelligence thought there might be a “ground attack.” Didn’t happen while I was there.
Initially, under a different battalion commander, we would go to bunkers when there was a rocket attack (usually a single rocket). When we got a new lieutenant colonel, instead he had us go to the edge of camp and get into trenches, ready for a ground attack. Many years later I found out that this was because sappers tossed bags of explosives into the bunkers of a sister unit.
Thank you for this. I'm fascinated by the lives people have lived, especially the odd corners like, say, drinking and entertainment near armed conflict.
Sometimes I am moved to share experiences. Whatever I tell you will always be the truth. A little clarification:
“My parents were very conservative.”
They were both in the Conservative Party when they grew up in England. They went through the Depression there and The Blitz. During The Blitz my Dad was a firefighter. In addition to his typical smoking he was exposed to a lot of burning buildings. My Mom, before marriage, started smoking while hiding in the subway tunnels from the bombs. After they became U.S. citizens, they voted Republican. I can’t imagine either of them voting for Donald Trump. I registered Democratic when I was of age (then 21) and gradually became less and less conservative.
I became less and less conservative over time because I met more and more people of different backgrounds and beliefs. The best thing about the military draft was that everyone had to meet and trust people they otherwise might not meet. In school I was around kids of different races and religions. Beyond the Army, my job had me meeting and dealing with many people who had different backgrounds. Some were temporary hires, some worked under me, some were on my level and some were higher in the chain of command. I wore a tie every day because I never knew when I would be face-to-face with a member of Congress.
“My unit had a system that saved the beer money and used it to pay for visiting bands from the Philippines and South Korea to give occasional free shows in the service club.“
It slipped my mind that later in my time there, but before the USO show, we hired a band from Australia. We had Vietnamese women working for us in the mess hall and doing some cleaning during the day. We had visiting merchants on some days, one of whom I paid to do my laundry. All of the musicians and singers we hired up until then were Asian. If there was a TV on base it wasn’t where I was. I consciously avoided TV, anyway, because I thought it would just make me homesick. It was 1969 and I missed the first Moon Landing, only seeing it months later. So, when the blond Australian women performed, I had the impression that their noses were very pointy. They weren’t. They just weren’t the Asian faces I saw all the time.
We always had our rifles in our sleeping quarters and occasionally took them to our workplaces if Intelligence thought there might be a “ground attack.” Didn’t happen while I was there.
I was glad to have been sent to Virginia before Vietnam. I was drafted for two years active service and up to four years in the reserves. The Tet Offensive happened in early 1968, before I was even in the Army. As an homage, they threw a second (lesser) Tet attack at the same time in 1969. The guy who ran our tiny PX told me that when they retreated he fired over their heads. Since bullets are also subject to gravity, firing in the air is no guarantee. The other reason that I’m glad that the Stateside assignment preceding Vietnam was that I didn’t want to put up with chicken-$#!% inspections after the relative freedom of being in a war zone. When I left for Vietnam, I was scheduled to go home a month before my enlistment ended. Instead of getting out a month early, I got out of active service about 3 1/2 months early when my battalion was deactivated. In 1973, when virtually all troops were pulled out of Vietnam, they gave me an honorable discharge after five years instead of six. I was subject to be back in the Army any time when I was in the “Ready Reserve.” Those of us who had been in a war zone were exempted from Stateside reserve service.
My Stateside assignment to an Engineer company that specialized in pontoon bridges was interesting in several ways. One time I got to participate in building a bridge from huge inflatable bags and steel girders. About one-third of the company were new guys like me; one-third returned from Germany; and one-third returned from Vietnam. In the shower one day I saw a row of bullet scars on a guy’s back. When I arrived there I wasn’t needed as a company clerk and worked instead in Supply. This led me to want to be in Supply when I went to Vietnam, so the first four-to-six weeks I was there. They did need me as a battery (company) clerk, so I switched over. All of my experiences with guard duty and $#!%-burning were before my job change. They didn’t get around to having me patrol the camp perimeter. My predecessor as battery clerk got all of those duties on top of his job. I really wanted to be indispensable, so I opened the office every day. At a reunion in 2015 I saw my captain, who said I was his Radar. I guess he meant I was reliable. Or maybe because he heard that I read comic books.
Thanks for sharing that, my friend.
"Wait a minute! Aren't I a LMD? Am I programmed to act old? How can I have a heart attack when I don't have a heart? Can I override this? Am I a LMD who thinks he's old or am I just an old LMD? When was I built anyway?"
To think that this panel was published in 1982 - 44 years ago!
Philip Portelli said:
"Wait a minute! Aren't I a LMD? Am I programmed to act old? How can I have a heart attack when I don't have a heart?
Happily, I haven’t experienced this, but I think the arm pain caused by a heart attack is in the left arm. Did the story say it was a heart attack?
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