I have been living in the late '80s recently (actually I have been commuting back and forth), and it occured to me that I have read almost the entire First Comics series Crossroads over the course of various discussions. I read issues #1-2 as part of my Sable discussion, #4 as part of Grimjack, and #5 as part of Dreadstar. It struck me that #3 is the only one I have left to read and that I might as well go for it. Then I got to thinking about one of my boxes labled "Miscellaneous New Universes" and that I might as well dip into that as well. My thesis will be that, in the '90s, one of the problems with the comic book field is that publishers were no longer content merely to publish good comic books, they wanted to launch entire universes. I think I have pin-pointed where this trend began, and I will identify it when I get to it. First, though, on to Crossroads.
Crossroads was a series of "done-in-one" stories in which characters from various First series met for the first time. ("Across infinite space and time, parallel lives meet at the Crossroads.") The beauty of this series is that each issue was entirely self-contained; one need not buy any issue of the connecting series nor even the entire crossover series itself in order to get a complete story. Each issue was done by a different writer/artist team, and Steve Rude provided the covers for all five. One character from each issue would carry over into the next, then "hand off" the series to the next character, and so on. For example, Jon Sable was the common character in issues #1 and #2. In issue #1 he met Whisper, and in #2 he met Badger. Of the three, Sable was the character most based in reality. Whisper wore a costume, but was still "realistic"; the Badger could be.
The Badger carried over from #2 to #3, where he met the comic relief character from American Flagg!, Luther Ironheart. In #4, Judah Macabbee met Grimjack (the "Luther" connection is there, but its tenuous), and in #5 Grimjack met both Dreadstar and Nexus. As I have written elsewhere, #4 and #5 blend seemlessly with Grimjack and Nexus and Dreadstar, but it is not necessary to have read the regular series to follow Crossroads or vice versa.
NEXT: Total Eclipse
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HEAVY HITTERS:
"Heavy Hitters" was a short-lived imprint of Epic Comics, which itself was an offshoot of Marvel Comics. I bought, read, and (mostly) enjoyed all of these:
These titles launched in "flights." There were some others as well. I broke Midnight Men out from "Heavy Hitters" and filed it with "Howard Chaykin." Most of these were not a "universe" per se, but the Heavy Hitters Annual tied five of them together.
"Sachs and Violens" was a delightfully absurd series by Peter David and George Perez. The titular duo went on to become supporting characters in "Fallen Angel", also by Peter David.
That "Heavy Hitters Annual" must have been wild. I recognize Jugger Grimrod from "Alien Legion" and Lester Girls from "The Trouble of Girls" in the cover. Let's just say that neither is an obvious guest star for the other.
I had forgotten Sachs and Violens carried over into Fallen Angel. I dropped out after a while, but Tracy enjoyed it an continued to read and collect it. I have it around here somewhere.
Here is some more info on the contents of the HEAVY HITTERS ANNUAL.
BRAVURA:
"Bravura" was a short-lived (1994-1995) imprint of Malibu Comics. Like "Heavy Hitters" and "Helix" it was not a "universe" per se, yet nevertheless contributed to my NUF.
These are the Bravura titles I read:
And these are the ones I did not read:
I liked the ones I bought and would have liked to have seen more of them, even the ones that were eventually completed/continued elsewhere.
'Breed III (published later and not by Bravura) ends up guest-starring several other Starlin creations for a while, although the continuity is questionable.
Apparently some variant of the story of this Bravura Dreadstar miniseries has been kept as canon by Starlin and will be visited in the next Dreadstar book.
You know, I tried like crazy to find a copy of Dreadstar vs. The Inevitable that you told me about, but was unsuccessful. I suspect that, if it was in fact published at all, the print run was so small as to cover only those who contributed to the Kickstarter campaign. (I did find one... for $400!)
Sorry about that. But I have read online that Kayla will be discussed in the third book of this revival.
LEGEND:
"Legend" is another mid-ninties imprint, this one from Dark Horse Comics. In many ways, I saw Legend as an "answer" to Image, and one of the relatively few bright spots in the otherwise dismal '90s comic book field. The departure of the Image hot-shots nearly destroyed Marvel, dealing it a blow from which the company nearly a decade to recover. Legend was a group of "hot-shots" I could really get behind, unfortunately this push would last only a couple of years. But what a push it was! Some of the titles were interconnected, but most were standalone. they included.
...and many more. Any one of these titles could support an entire discussion, but there aren't many people left on the board who were reading comics 30 years ago and/or have anything to say a bout them. (60 years ago, sure, but not 30).
NEXT: Image's answer to Dark Horse's answer.
I collected Next Men, which can easily be read as John Byrne's way of doing the X-Men "right," in his mind. Here, at least, he was putting real effort into his work.
Welcome to the discussion, Kelvin. I'm glad you're here!
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