Moving my recent "Frankenstein" posts togeth with the intention of continuing.
DICK BRIEFER'S FRANKENSTEIN:
JUNE 20: I am diligently plowing my way through volume one of Dick Briefer's Frankenstein. I will probably post some sort of individual topic, but I haven't yet decided the direction the thread will take. I'm considering either discussing just the Briefer series, or I might make some sort of "chronology" out of all the Frankenstein series.
JUNE 21: I have been thinking a lot about how preschoolers play (or at least how I and my friends used to play when we were pre-schoolers). Usually the play was one-on-one, with my most frequent playmates at the time being either my next-door neighbor Scotty or my cousin Jimmy. (My social circle wasn't very large before I started to attend elementary school.) Our make-believe play was quite imaginative at the time, part role-play and part improv. One of us would suggest a scenario, and that would become the "reality" we would then build upon, no questions asked. Dick Briefer's Frankenstein reminds me in many ways of Fletcher Hanks' Stardust except, whereas I once described Stardust as a comics written and drawn by someone who was told what a comic book was but had never actually seen one for himself, Frankenstein is more like a comic book plotted by a preschooler. When I was very young, our "plotting sessions" were often peppered with the phrase "Let's say..." For example, they might go something like this...
"Let's say Dr. Frankenstein and his girlfriend go to a wax museum in a carnival, and there's an exhibit of the monster inside."
"Okay, let's say it's really the monster who has replaced the wax figure."
"Yeah, and let's say all of the bodies are real dead victims."
And that would be it, we'd go from there. We wouldn't give too much thought to why the monster was there or how he got into the park without being seen or where his victims came from or what he did with the wax figures. Or it might go something like this...
"Let's say the doctor and his girlfriend go up into the Statue of Liberty."
"And let's say the monster is crawling up the outside."
"Let's say he breaks one of the windows and starts throwing people to their deaths."
"...then Dr. Frankenstein leaps out to window to destroy the monster."
"...but he misses and lands in the statue's arm."
"...then the monster lifts him up and puts him back in the statue because he wants him to suffer."
Or...
"Let's say the doctor adopts a little boy who was orphaned by the monster."
"Yeah, and let's say ten years have passed and he grows up to be a superhero who fights the monster."
These are all actual plots from Prize Comics.
JULY 4: I am still reading tpb v1, up to Prize Comics #26. (The "big change" comes with #33.) I am impressed by the level of story-to-story continuity on display. Prize Comics was an anthology title and Frankenstein debuted in #7, but he was cover-featured (apart from "floating head" shots) only once. That was #24, when all of the anthology's other characters (Green Lama, Black Owl, Yank and Doodle, Doctor Frost, even the (humorous) General and the Corporal) banded together to take him down.
JULY 11: Prize Comics #33 is where the direction, if not the tone, changes. I have read some of Briefer's purely comical Frankenstein's, but these are not those. The monster (called "Frankenstein" after its creator) has been captured. Professor Carrol speakseloquently on the monster's behalf and is granted custody. He brings in a psychiatrist (to hypnotize him), a barber (to give him a haircut), a plastic surgeon (to fix his face) and a tailor (to sew him a suit). In the very next issue, his new adventures begin. When he doesn't work out in the job market (#34), he is sent to the first grade (#35). An old enemy (the Midget) returns in #37, and Frankenstein is (falsely) accused of stabbing a boy in the back. This is 1943, and not exactly the kid-friendly humor comic I was expecting. that is the end of v1.
JULY 18: After his makeover in #33, Frankenstein (the monster is known as "Frankenstein" after his creator) moved into the phase of dark humor in #34-37 I described before. In Prize Comics #38 (which leads off v2), Frankenstein becomes involved with Nazis. They undo his rehabilitation and he becomes evil again, but it doesn't last. At that point, he becomes a double agent (in a Gestapo uniform) working against the Nazis. This phase last through issue #43. Then his adventures in Nazi Germany come to an abrupt end and he returns to the United States. I have this "neat idea" that all "Frankenstein" comics from every company all relate the stories of a single character, and it is at this point where I slot the "Creature Commandos" stories from DC's Weird War Tales.
In the next phase of Dick Briefer's version (which lasts from #44 through #48), Frankenstein meets Zora the Vampire and Rollo, her thrall. The stories continue in a light-hearted but slightly edgy vein and trio end up managing a hotel (don't ask), but this direction ends rather abruptly as well. Issue #49 sees Frankenstein in a Superman spoof as "Blooperman." It is at this point the series becomes silly, and I have no desire to read the "silly" issues at this time.
JULY 26: The humorous Frankenstein continued in Prize Comics through #68 (1945), at which point the no-longer-monster was given his own eponymous title, which ran for 17 issue through 1949. the series reamined on hiatus for three years until it returned in 1952, with #18, to ride the wave of horror popularized by EC. The series was rebooted at that point as a continuing horror series and is really quite good. Frankenstein continued in that vein until #33 in 1954 when it was laid low by Frederic Wertham's anti-comics crusade.
JULY 31: My previous post jumped the gun a bit an took the discussion to the end of the series (#33), when in fact I read #31 only today. These stories are pretty gruesome, but this issue's "Three-Fold Horror and Revenge" in particular. It is exactly the kind of story a kid would write. (See my recent link to Stephen Colbert's Inside Goodbye: Hell-O! "movie" pitched by kids I linked in "Anything, Everything or Nothing at All" recently.)
There are three brothers: John is a painter; James is a singer; Jerome is a conductor. Shortly after the story opens, the three brothers come upon the Frankenstein monster stuck up to his neck in quicksand. Deciding that he is "a living horror! A blight upon the beauty of nature! It does not deserve to live!" one at a time the brothers take turns 1) sewing the monster's lips shut, 2) poking out its eyes, and 3) poking out its ear drums. The monster is found by an old witch who nurses it back to health and resores its lost senses. Later, the monster seeks its revenge upon the three brothers one at a time. "With two fingers of steely strength outstretched," the monster takes its revenge upon John. As Jerome is listening to his records, the monster first breaks them, then boxes his ears, popping his ear drums, deafening him. Lastly, he drops onto the stage as James performs. "Lips, teeth and tongue help to form perfect speech and perfect singing--but powerful fingers are put to work to destroy that combination."
"Sometime later, in an insane asylum," one of the doctors observes that the brothers, now completely insane, sit around like statues all day. "yes, they do resemble a statue," te narrator tells us, "the statue of the three wise monkeys... speak no evil, see no evil and hear no evil!"
MARVEL'S FRANKENSTEIN:
AUGUST 4: I have moved on from the Dick Briefer series to the 1973 Marvel color comic The Monster of Frankenstein by Gary Friedrich and Mike Ploog.
AUGUST 8: Gary Friedrich and Mike Ploog teamed up to produce the first half-dozen issues, the first four of which were told in flashback. Just as the original novel was told within a framing sequence narrated by Robert Walton, so too are the first four-issues narrated by his great-grandson, Robert Walton IV. Because much of the original story was Frankensein relating what the monster had told him (a story within a story within a story), the comic book adds an extra layer (a story within a story within a story within a story). Actually, it's not that difficult to follow; for the most past Friedrich and Ploog have swapped one narrator for another, his great-grandson.
The year is 1898 and the Monster has been frozen within a block of ice for 100 years or so, when Robert Walton IV leads an expedition to the Arctic to find it/him. The action cuts back and forth between the past and the present, the first three issues adapting the novel. The fourth issue is still told partially in flashback, relating what happened to the Monster immediately after the events depicted in the novel. At that point, the story catches up to itself and proceeds in 1898, with the Monster heading south to find "The Last Frankensein." Many people compare Marvel's Man-Thing to DC's Swamp Thing (for obvious reasons), but the real comparison should be between Frankenstein and Swamp Thing. For one think, Mike Ploog's style is closer to Bernie Wrightson's, and for another, Gary Friedrich's plots are closer to Len Wein's. The series' title changes from The Monster of Frankenstein to Frankenstein's Monster with #6, Ploog's last as artist.
AUGUST 15: After issue #6, Mike Ploog was replaced as artist by John Buscema for #7-10, the villain for #7-9 being Dracula. The only thing that could have made these issues better would have been if they were inked by Tom Palmer (but they were not, alas). The villain of #10-11 was Vincent Frankenstein (the last descendant of Victor), and the artists were John Buscemaand Bob Brown. The end of the story reveal yet another Frankenstein, so the family tree will continue. #12 is a transition issue by Doug Moench and Val Mayerick. When it comes time for me to link all the Frankenstein comics together into a "cohesive" whole, #12 will be a key example. Not only does it transition from 1898 to 1973 (or does it?), but the end also splits the story in two, one branch heading into #13 (via Giant-Size Werewolf), the other into Monsters Unleashed.
SEPTEMBER 7: Picking up where I left off...
GIANT-SIZE WEREWOLF #4: This is more of a "Werewolf By Night" story than it is a "Monster of Frankenstein" story, but this is definitely where it takes place in continuity... at least in regard to the color comics issues; the b&w ones are a bit more problematic. Jack Russell's narration is intrusive so I simply skipped it. If I were reading from the werewolf's POV I wouldn't have.
THE FRANKENSTEIN MONSTER #13-18: The last six-issue storyline is written by Doug Moench (#13-17) and Bill Mantlo (#18), and drawn by Val Mayerick. It introduces a new supporting cast (Ralph Caccone, Eric Prawn, Veronica Frankenstein and her assistant Werner Schmidt), a new villainous organization (I.C.O.N. - International crime organization Nexus) and its operatives (Cardinal, Indigo and Rainbow). The very last issue introduces Victoria Frankenstein, but her relationship to Veronica is not specified (a distant cousin, I imagine).
MARVEL TEAM-UP #36-37: There is no sense of continuity between The Frankenstein Monster #18 and MTU #36; the plot threads from the Frankenstein series remain dangling to this day. MTU #36-37 is written by Gerry Conway and drawn by Sal Buscema. The villain is Baron Ludwig von Shtupf and Spidey's allie is SHIELD agent Judith Klemmer. Man-Wolf enters the story at the very end of part one. Frankenstein's monster has been hanging around the MU every since, but they've never done much with him. From here he goes to Iron Man, and was last seen (to the best of my knowledge) in a Hulk special from the early 2Ks. I had originally planned to read two more Frankenstein projects, but I think I'm going to take [what I hope will be] a short break at this point.
Replies
I've now read Volume 2 of PS Artbooks reprints of Dick Briefer's Frankenstein strip. Jeff has already discussed this on the first page, and I honestly don't have much to add. But I've got some observations:
The first two volumes reprint the entirety of the "Frankenstein" strip from Prize Comics, issues #7-68 (Dec 40-Mar 48). Vols 3-8 reprint the Frankenstein comic book, issues #1-33 (1945-Oct/Nov 54). Which means the strips aren't presented chronologically. Instead they're separated by title into different volumes. That is to say the stories from 1945-Mar 48 at the end of Volume 2 overlap chronologically with the stories in the beginning of Volume 3. That's almost become a rarity in today's Golden Age of Reprints, where DC publishes (for example) all the Superman stories from Superman, Action Comics and World's Finest chronologically in the ominbus line, instead of being separated by title. Once I begin Volume 3, I will be retracing some territory from Volume 2, as far as content.
That content, as Jeff says earlier, is all over the place. The strip goes from horror, to "good" Frankenstein, to Nazi Frankenstein, to double-agent good Nazi Frankenstein, to ambivalent Frankenstein and his vampire friends, to outright funny Frankenstein. If nothing else, it keeps the stories from becoming repetitious. I appreciate how much more readable these stories are than the competition as a result. (I will never recover from reading Golden Age Green Arrow Omnibus Volume One.)
I noted earlier that Briefer is continuity conscious in an age where that wasn't normal. He does take advantage of the lack of expectation, by just dropping scenarios he's tired of. It's only noticable because it wasn't his usual approach. (It was everybody else's approach.) He does it a couple of times in Volume 2.
The last page of the penultimate story (untitled, from Prize Comics #67) was omitted in my copy. It's not a crisis, as I can guess the punchline he was heading for.
On to Volume 3!
Which means the strips aren't presented chronologically. Instead they're separated by title into different volumes.
Huh. I didn't even realize that.
The last page of the penultimate story (untitled, from Prize Comics #67) was omitted in my copy.
Page 247? That must mean you are also missing the firat page of #68 (p. 248). I'll see what I can do. Tracy...!
Page 247? That must mean you are also missing the firat page of #68 (p. 248). I'll see what I can do. Tracy...!
Agh, I miscounted the stories. What I thought was the penultimate story was, instead, the antepenultimate story. (They're very short! I was in a hurry! There were sunspots! And other excuses!) The upshot is that the ninth page of the third-to-last story should have been page #240, which is instead the first page of "Frankenstein and the Yogi."
As I said, it's not a crisis, as I can guess how the story ends. It's about a glamorous Hollywood actress who wears a lot of makeup, and in the end falls into a swimming pool that Frankie has accidentally filled with paint remover. And she dies of toxic shock.
No, no, that's what would happen in the real world. I'm guessing that in the final page the paint remover will show she is hideous.
The upshot is that the ninth page of the third-to-last story should have been page #240, which is instead the first page of "Frankenstein and the Yogi."
Most of these are eight-page stories. In a quick flip-through, I found only one nine-pager in the entire volume. If the last panel of your page 239 is the monster administering artificial respiration to the actress, that might be the last page. Either that or my copy is missing the ninth page of the story, too. Only Don Glut would know for sure. ;)
Only Don Glut would know for sure. ;)
Don Glut ... and the Grand Comics Database! Which confirmed that the untitled Frankenstein story in Prize Comics #66 was, in fact, 9 pages. I found the story on Comic Book Plus and copied the page. I've been unable to print it on my finicky printer, but maybe you'll have better luck:
I've been unable to print it on my finicky printer, but maybe you'll have better luck
I've made a HC for myself to put between pages of my copy of v2.
I have meddled a bit with the page picture. Hopefully this may help.
https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1CDowkNCeRwjZtKqA1JTE6TNfOwW...
Thanks, Luis! I got a workable B&W out of your efforts, and that will suffice.
I think I just need a new printer. In color, there are parallel, blank lines at certain intervals, indicating to me that I've got dirty or worn-out rollers. Ah, well.
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