101: You Never Forget Your First

Summary
In this episode of Comic Dudes, hosts Dave and Matt reflect on their first comic book experiences, discussing Luke Cage and The Mighty Thor. They explore the significance of these comics in their lives, the storytelling styles of the 90s, and the cultural impact of comic books. The conversation highlights nostalgia, representation, and the evolution of comic book storytelling, culminating in a discussion about the art and narrative techniques used in these classic issues.

Chapters
00:00 Back to the Roots: Comic Book Origins
02:55 First Comic Book Experiences
05:53 The Significance of Representation in Comics
08:57 Nostalgia and Personal Connections to Comics
12:00 Exploring Luke Cage: A Deep Dive
14:59 Reflections on Comic Book Storytelling
18:06 The Gritty Realities of Street-Level Heroes
21:00 Cultural Context and Dialogue in Comics
23:47 Exploring Authenticity in Character Representation
26:44 The Evolution of Luke Cage and Jessica Jones
27:50 A New Direction for Thor: Eric Masterson's Journey
30:45 The 90s Marvel Landscape: Humor and Challenges
35:21 Comparing Covers: Aesthetic and Nostalgia
40:10 Reflections on Comic Book Memories and Friendships

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Original Music by Alex Productions
Show notes include some AI generated content

Transcript

Dave (00:01)
Welcome back to the Comic Dudes, podcast about comic books and comic book related things. My name is Dave with me as always, my friend and co-host Matt. Matt, how you doing?

Matt - CDWA (00:12)
I am doing very very well today. I am excited to get back to my roots, so to speak. To go to the origin point of becoming a comic dude. And I hope we do that today.

Dave (00:26)
I love it. We will. Before we do that, a quick reminder. You can follow us on Twitter. Our Twitter handles will be in the description of this episode. I will never call it X. The podcast also has an Instagram and a TikTok. So if you'd like to follow us there, those are also in the description of the episode. And if you'd like to join our Discord, we're talking about comic books and video games and sports and all kinds of stuff in the Discords. If you'd to join us there.

There's a link for that here as well and as Matt alluded to We're going back. We're way back 30 years or so back back to when Matt and I were Babies maybe not babies We were young young young boys not teens tweens maybe

Matt - CDWA (01:15)
Baby.

Yeah, nah, nah, I was definitely young. I was a youth. I was a youth. I was a youth, yeah.

Dave (01:24)
In one of the Utes. So here's so here's what we did. Some kind of just I'm circling the topic. We went back and read the very first comic book that we ever got. For me, that was The Mighty Thor number four thirty three came out in June of nineteen ninety one. I was ten years old. Now you all know how old I am.

Matt - CDWA (01:49)
gosh, reverse math.

Dave (01:50)
Matt, what was yours?

Matt - CDWA (01:53)
Mine was CAGE number one. And it was published in 1992. I don't know exactly what month. Cover date's April, so it's probably March of 1992. But yeah.

Dave (02:04)
then maybe mine didn't come out in June. don't know. I just went by the cover date.

Matt - CDWA (02:06)
I that it's like a month or two ahead of the stamp is like a month or two ahead of time or maybe I don't I thought it was but whatever it came out 91 and 92 respectively like that's all we know so yeah yeah

Dave (02:10)
Is it?

I don't know. Well, anyway. Yeah, early 90s. So anyway, I reread my first comic and I read Matt's first comic and then he did the same. He reread his first comic and then read my first comic. And now we're going to talk about it. And I'm going to I'll defer to Matt. He can go first.

Matt - CDWA (02:35)
gonna take the ball halftime we're gonna score hours I was in this I can't remember who said that so yeah it was like a Seahawks game I don't can't remember exactly who said it we're gonna take it and score I think I don't know

Dave (02:37)
Who said that? it the Seahawks?

Was it? who was it?

Was it, he had a brother too. His brother played quarterback too. yes, it was Matt Hasselbeck. I think someone fact-checked me. I'm pretty sure that was Hasselbeck and then they didn't, they didn't get the ball and they didn't score. They lost. That was overtime. They lost.

Matt - CDWA (02:55)
Is it Hasselbeck? Okay, yeah. Okay.

even yes even better even better so all right well so my my issue was cage number one I read this on Marvel Unlimited and I read Dave's there too so this is a good spot you know if you want to pay seven bucks this month to read these issues digitally you can definitely do that but

Dave (03:27)
Wait, it's cheaper. There's a cheaper way. Just go to Comixology on Amazon. $1.79.

Matt - CDWA (03:30)
yeah, yeah, that's true.

Supporting the machine that you

Dave (03:36)
Which is hilarious because the cover price is a dollar!

Matt - CDWA (03:39)
So you're paying more than the cover price. You did. To get it digital, digitized and put it on the service. So, it's true. And your scans are better than the Marvel Unlimited ones on Composagy for sure. For sure. Much better.

Dave (03:41)
I got upcharged.

It is in crisp high definition on my iPad Pro.

undoubtedly, and so is the gatted view. Marvel Unlimited gatted view is a little janky.

Matt - CDWA (04:02)
Yeah, it's not great. So, yeah, so my book just,

Dave (04:09)
Tell me how you got this. me, recount the story of Matt getting his first comic book. Young Matt, 10 year old Matt, or however old you are in 1992.

Matt - CDWA (04:12)
Yeah.

Yeah, I, 92 I would have been six. So there's this place, I live in Rochester now, but at the time we lived in Ohio and our family is up here in Rochester. So we would visit and come to Rochester often. And I vividly remember the store where my dad got me this comic book and it was,

Dave (04:21)
Damn.

Matt - CDWA (04:43)
Worldwide News, which is located on St. Paul Boulevard in Rochester. This is not a comic book shop. It is a, I'll just say very eccentric store that sells the likes of beer, liquor, lottery tickets, some cigars. And more importantly, this was the first time and also videotapes and magazines. the videotape section, I remember

My dad was distracted doing something up front and I stumbled into the video section. And not only do you have horror movies and things like that, but for some reason there was these like movies with women that had like stars over certain parts of their body. And I don't know why these stars were there at such a young age, but later in life, I came to find out what those stars were and what parts they might be covering. So I actually,

Dave (05:40)
I love it. You know, can I just say if I don't know if this is I don't know this is countrywide, but if you're if you live in the Northeast, you grew up in the Northeast, you're from the Northeast. As soon as you said news at the end of the name of this story, I knew exactly what it was. I knew exactly what they sold. I know exactly what it looked like on the outside. And more importantly, and even worse, I know what it smelled like inside.

Matt - CDWA (05:41)
Yeah, so this was just like a news then that you got

Yeah.

Yeah, you can

Exactly. You know exactly what it's like. And they have like, you know, all that stuff, but they had a lot of magazines and they had a very large comic book section at the time. so I actually called my dad to talk, to ask him about this before. And I was like, why did you get me Luke Cage? And I assumed obviously.

There was not a lot of black superheroes like at the time, you know, like on the newsstands getting, yeah, like not a lot of those heroes. like, I didn't know if he just like, this is like a, this is a black superhero. Let me buy this for my son. So he has something to read. That's one thing. Like my dad intentionally apparently went into this store to get me a comic book. So it's like, yeah, like.

Dave (06:39)
Yeah, you had cage, Black Panther.

Matt - CDWA (07:00)
Like, yeah, like, there's a, you know, it'd be one thing if, there's this black superhero. Let me grab it. Like, no, my dad drove us there specifically to get it because he heard of Luke Cage and he kind of knew about Luke Cage, but not really. He wasn't a comic book fan, but he's like, there's this new comic book coming out with this black superhero. Let me take my son and get it. like, that was like pretty cool to hear that. he, this, this is the representation talk that we, you know,

Dave (07:22)
That's awesome.

Matt - CDWA (07:28)
We go back and forth about like, that's why it is important because like he intentionally drove us to the city to go do that. That's what I'm saying. Like I was like, yo, that's like pretty cool. So like, no, not at all.

Dave (07:34)
Yeah. Yo, shout out Mr. Ward. That's dope.

Yeah, especially for not being a comic fan himself. He had no idea the path he was setting you on all those years ago.

Matt - CDWA (07:45)
Yeah, very dangerous pass. No, I'm sure my dad wanted to get some lottery tickets because he was a big lottery player. So let's not front. I'm sure that had part of the occasion, but that was definitely part of reason. You want to get a video? I don't know. But that was definitely part of the reason not the video. I'm not going to put that on my dad, but that was part of reason that we definitely went. So and yeah, so that's why I just wanted to also say like Luke Cage, like

Dave (07:55)
Maybe you wanted to get a video.

I don't know.

Sorry, Mr. Ward.

Matt - CDWA (08:14)
through you getting me back into comic books later, Luke Cage was always one of my favorites. He was just a really cool hero. I love the whole him and Danny Rand iron fist thing. I love that he had a stable relationship. And that was something that I appreciated. Unlike Mr. Fantastic, he wasn't an asshole to his wife all the time. He was kind of like a normal dude. And I forgot they're like daughter, but he was.

a good father and they were a good couple together. This is like New Avengers era. I'm jumping ahead. Yep. And, you know, I believe somewhere down the line, he actually becomes the mayor of New York City as well too. that's, that's your, that's your, that's like newer. And he did leave the Thunderbolt as well too. Yeah. But so Luke Cage has always been something that's important. Like my dad to this day in his basement.

Dave (08:44)
So we're talking, this is like New Avengers, Bendis era Luke Cage when he's with Jessica Jones.

he led the thunderbolts at one point, too. We talked about that at one point on this episode or on this podcast.

Matt - CDWA (09:10)
He's got Cleveland Brown's gear. And I know in the back corner, before you go into the bathroom, he's got some old like the seventies Luke Cage comics, because we started collecting some of those as well, too. Like he would just grab them if we saw them. So Cage was always kind of important. So that's why I pick Cage. Yeah. So this issue. Yeah.

Dave (09:21)
Yeah.

I love that. So wait, so hold on. Hold on. So.

took you there specifically to buy Cage. Do you remember, I know you were only six, do you remember picking at any other comics and being like, what about this one? Or would you just leave the store with Cage number one?

Matt - CDWA (09:38)
specifically to get Kay like a black superhero in Cajun's name.

No, and this, I don't know if it was exactly that outing, but like we, once again, anytime we came to New York, we went to this new spot and I got comics. So like, this was my first experience getting comics. I'm pretty sure when we got Cage, there was also like a Spider-Man annual or something, cause it was like a thicker book. wasn't like a single. So like, I remember getting that as well too. And I remembered loving that Spider-Man book as well too, but I don't know exactly which.

Dave (10:09)
Yeah.

Matt - CDWA (10:20)
when it was, I forgot, it's been so long now. The cage stuff is what like really resonated with me.

Dave (10:21)
That's okay. was your first. Yeah, that's what kicked us off. Do you mind if I tell my first issue story? Then we'll get into the actual issue of Cage that you read, that we read. So my story, not intentional at all. Let me take you back to Erie, Pennsylvania, 1991. I used to love...

Matt - CDWA (10:33)
Yeah. Yeah. Let's do that.

Dave (10:50)
Love going grocery shopping with my mom and my grandma. They did it together whenever they we didn't like my grandma didn't live with us. They lived in separate houses, but they always did the grocery shopping together. And. Whenever I would go. Obviously in the toy aisle, I'd be angling for, you know, some little silly little, you know, matchbox car or something or something stupid. Some army men. I don't know. Kids just want whatever.

whatever random toy they see in the grocery store, at least they used to. I don't know if it's that way anymore. Probably not. most of the time I see kids in a grocery store, they're on an iPad, or their own phones. But, you know, and at the risk of sounding like the get off my lawn old man, back in my day, you just wanted to go to the grocery store to get a little toy. So for whatever reason, and in this random trip to the store,

I found myself looking, cause I'd always look at the magazines because I wanted to look for video game magazines. loved reading like Nintendo power and game pro and electronic gaming monthly, all that shit. You do that. Love DGM. That was the best one. EGM was always the best. Shout out EGM and RIP. but I found myself looking at the spinny rack of that, like a wire spinning rack. You've all seen it of comic books. And for whatever reason,

Matt - CDWA (11:56)
EGM, baby.

Yep. Yep.

Dave (12:17)
I saw Thor number 433, the cover to that book is very dynamic. It talks about like a new direction for Thor and the Erik Masterson Thor, a big beard and all is like on the cover and like superhero pose, like swinging Mjolnir. And I was like, damn, this is awesome. And I asked my mom if I could get it. And of course she said no.

Matt - CDWA (12:21)
great cover.

You

Dave (12:42)
But grandma, grandma was the enabler. Grandma loved to get me whatever the hell I wanted. So grandma bought it for me. She says, you know what? I'll get it for him. It's fine. It's only a dollar. I'll get it. And I was like, thanks, grandma. I read it in the car on the way home. I didn't fully know like what I was really getting myself into. I just thought it looked cool. And I wanted to like flip through the pages and something about that comic.

Matt - CDWA (13:05)
Yeah.

Dave (13:11)
And we'll talk about a little bit here. Something about that comic just got its hooks into me. Before I knew it, I was asking for more and more comics when we go to the grocery store. And then I stumbled upon in Wesleyville, of all places, like an old antique store that also sold a bunch of comics, like a bunch of old comics and stuff. And I started to look through those, but like they only had old comics and.

After a few times going there, there was never anything new. It was just the same old stuff. And then, I heard about books galore, from somebody that worked there. Like, yeah, if you want more comics, like there's a place called books galore it's up on, you know, beach street or whatever. Had someone, my mom took me to books galore for my first time and I blew my fucking mind.

Matt - CDWA (14:00)
That had to blow your mind. Yeah, like that had to blow your mind. Like abs-

Dave (14:03)
A whole store just dedicated to comic books and like new ones come out every week and my little brain was just exploding with like, I needed to get it all. so I very quickly ramped within a few months. I went from like buying one Thor comic at a grocery store off the, off the new stand to like full blown, like I got a pull list at books galore.

Matt - CDWA (14:24)
I was gonna say, did you have a pull list like even? Yeah. Yeah.

Dave (14:26)
Hell yeah, I did. was, and it was out of control. My mom doesn't listen to this podcast, but if she ever does and here's this episode, mom, you should have put some shackles on me. I was out of control for a while there with the comics. You really should have stopped me.

Matt - CDWA (14:31)
as it's going to be.

Yeah. It happens.

Look what it enabled.

Dave (14:45)
Yeah.

Matt - CDWA (14:46)
Yeah, no, I completely get it.

Dave (14:48)
Your story, your story far better than mine. Mine was by happenstance. just, I literally just stumbled into this with childlike curiosity. Like this looks cool. I want to look through it more. And it just, something, the flip switched to not to on, but to like obsessed very quickly.

Matt - CDWA (14:59)
Yeah, no, that's-

Yeah. Yeah, no, it's in my comic journey. Like it was, you know, like the X-Men animated thing is like a huge thing for me. Like that really got me, like got the wheels kind of turning for me. Like I had comics and you know, I read a little bit, but I really didn't get into it until like we met later, which we can shelve that story for a later date. The whole fox and the hound thing. And that's what I like went nuts. But yeah. So yeah, no, it's they're Too good origin story.

Dave (15:35)
I remember that conversation. remember just rattling off some recommendations and before you know it was regular trips to Grove City, poll lists, all of it. irresponsible.

Matt - CDWA (15:42)
Yep, getting yourself in trouble. Five minute, five dollar trade paperbacks and stuff.

irresponsible. Thank god for digital, I guess, but so much fun. I don't know.

Dave (15:51)
It's so good. Yeah. OK, so let's let's go back to let's talk about let's talk about these two comics and our thoughts. Well, again, we'll go cage first and I'll defer to you to kick us off.

Matt - CDWA (15:59)
Yeah.

Yeah, I mean, like you're normally like the recap kind of guy, but like this was like, yeah, like this was just like really like kind of a similar thing. It was a, you know, first collector's issues on the cover and all that stuff. So it was like a jumping one point. They kind of recap Luke Cage's whole like background from the seventies or whatever. And like, correct me if I'm wrong. So the whole plot of this is like this newspaper is trying to follow Luke Cage.

Dave (16:08)
We don't have to recap the whole thing.

Matt - CDWA (16:31)
And they want him to be somewhat affiliated with them because like the Daily Bugle is taking off because of its affiliation to Spider-Man. That's like on the first page. like that is really the plot. There's like these three people. one's a news editor. One was like a heroes for hire, like a fixie and auto counselor with them. And the other guy's a photographer. like they're like the, the brain trust of trying to get Luke Cage, you know,

Dave (16:40)
Yes. Yes.

Mm-hmm.

Matt - CDWA (17:01)
affiliated with this newspaper. Yes.

Dave (17:02)
Yeah, they they basically want to like bankroll him to get the scoops on all of his escapades. This is a very this is a very dated concept here. We're talking about taking our newspaper national.

Matt - CDWA (17:07)
Yes.

Yeah.

Yeah, national. So it was also, thought it was interesting that it was set in Chicago. Cause if I'm correct, like Luke Cage is from like Harlem, I want to say like he's from, so like it was in Chicago, which is interesting. So.

Dave (17:18)
Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm. He is.

That's a thing Marvel does sometimes. They'll take not like one of their AAA characters, they'll take somebody and just put them somewhere new. Remember they put the X-Men in San Francisco for a while. The Kane Scarlet Spider was based out of Houston at some point. So this is the thing they do. They'll randomly just take a hero out of New York and put him somewhere weird. Even Daredevil was in San Francisco for a while.

Matt - CDWA (17:29)
Pull him out.

yeah. yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. Back. Yeah. So there's like this drug dealer or well, no, there's salute cage is trying to break up. Like he's like a, he's not a like strike buster, but he's like there for just like kind of the overall protection because people are striking, but then he's protecting the strikers. But then there's like this rambunctious group that's trying to like cause all this anarchy and the main.

Dave (18:06)
Yeah, he's protecting the strikers.

Well, they're strike there. They're they're union busters. Basically like that. They're to like break up the strike and get these people back to work.

Matt - CDWA (18:18)
their union. Yeah. Yeah. So there's a villain named Hardcore that this did Hardcore. If I was just a little thrown off, it looks like Hardcore has some lipstick on and Dave, don't know. Yeah. I don't know if you remember the fan favorite movie Street Fighter, the Jean Claude Van Damme version.

Dave (18:27)
Yeah, I have questions about him.

But not always.

I sadly do remember that film.

Matt - CDWA (18:49)
Do you remember the dude who played DJ? Like with that flat top? You need to look this dude up. But he looks like the guy from the Jean-Claude Van Damme Street Fighter movie. That's what I thought of when I saw this guy. He apparently... He said, yup. Real quick.

Dave (18:52)
No, I do not. All right.

Matt - CDWA (19:16)
So look, look up the John Claude Van Damme Street Fighter movie from like 91 or two. Yes. Yes. That's a meat. I don't know why. That's what I thought of when I saw this dude hardcore, but, hardcore looks like him hardcore uses. What's the weapon? Gosh. man. It's, I don't know how to pronounce it, but it's a weapon on a chain that has a spike on it and he can like electrify people and stuff too.

Dave (19:21)
Miguel Nunez Jr.

Yeah, I don't remember. They're weird names.

Matt - CDWA (19:46)
But long story short, I'm kind of all over the place, but it invo-

Dave (19:51)
That's okay. I mean, I'd rather just talk about our thoughts on the comic rather than try to recap what we read. Like, it's just a single issue, who cares? And no one's going back to read this, it's 30 years old.

Matt - CDWA (19:55)
Okay. Yeah. So like, yeah. So like the thing I really liked about this and spoiler your story as well too is like they are fairly self-contained and I really miss this era of comic books where like you don't have to read six issues to get like something out of it. Like there's a beginning, middle and end. And I think we're really missing that in comics. I also, I'll save it. I'll save this point for yours. So I won't even go into that.

Dave (20:24)
Okay. Whatever you say.

Matt - CDWA (20:25)
but I also like, I always like, I like more street level heroes and this was like a street level story. So it's pretty, you know, gritty. The one dude, Angel, who was working with, hardcore is like, he worked his way up to be some like drug lord. He did arms deals and stuff, but like the violence they show, like he's like a union buster as well too. And he's just like beating people down in the streets. Like you don't see that kind of violence in like comics now.

Dave (20:31)
Yep. Yep.

Mm-hmm.

Mm hmm. I. I also liked how like angels fall from grace was he lost a bunch of money in Vegas and the mob just owned his ass. Basically, I actually wrote down it looked like in that one panel where they showed him I got a craps table or whatever that Joe fix it was in the background potentially. And I don't know if that was actually Joe fix it, but it sure did look like Joe fix it.

Matt - CDWA (20:54)
People just getting worn out. You see that?

The magic. Yes.

Yes, ma'am.

Really? Yes!

They got my man when he's down on his luck. Like one guy smiling and laughing at him because he lost all his money. But yeah, yeah. Good, good issue. The ending has a little bit of like, who's this shadowy figure, you know, really controlling thing. So like that's kind of your cliffhanger to keep reading. But yeah, no, overall I enjoyed it. Like I thought it was pretty good. I...

Dave (21:27)
That's right. Because they got that ass. They own him now.

Matt - CDWA (21:49)
don't honestly even remember this story. So I'm sure I was like, hey, this Luke Cage comic is cool. I'm going to flip through it as a kid. But like, I sure I didn't read it too much. was collecting for covers. I was the original variant cover guy, you know, I guess. I don't know. So that's Cage.

Dave (21:52)
Yeah

Right. Yeah, yeah. I did. I did notice that it had quite a few words. A lot of words. lot of words. Also, some of those words. I question why Hardcore kept referring to Cage as boy. He'd be like, yeah, you ready for this boy? And I'm like, what is going on? Why are we doing this?

Matt - CDWA (22:12)
yes, there was a lot of dialogue. Lot of dialogue.

Love a good one.

He's also a person of color that doesn't make it as bad, but little bit of boy. Little boy.

Dave (22:34)
But it's but that's why it's confusing because I I am not aware of black men referring to other black men in that way.

Matt - CDWA (22:42)
You boy, you know?

Dave (22:43)
Is this just like, is this just my white ignorance? That do I just not know about this?

Matt - CDWA (22:48)
I normally don't walk around and see every black person call him boy, but you never know, you know? Whippin' this dude with a chain and callin' him boy, I don't know, you know?

Dave (22:53)
Okay. Okay.

just thought it was, you know, I'm, I'm, I just, I'm positive that the writer was white.

Matt - CDWA (23:03)
I guess you would. Who's it Ralph McHugh or not?

Dave (23:06)
I don't know, I don't remember.

Matt - CDWA (23:08)
Mark McLaurin, I'm going to guess he is white, but I don't know him for sure. I don't know his-

Dave (23:13)
How do you, is it marked with a C?

Matt - CDWA (23:15)
Yes.

Dave (23:17)
Mac laurian or MC.

Matt - CDWA (23:21)
M-C-L-A-U-R-N.

Dave (23:26)
Uhhh... Can I get a picture of this dude?

Matt - CDWA (23:29)
Dewayne Turner on the pencils.

Dave (23:31)
The Mark McLaurin the insurance coach definitely not that Mark McLaurin and Mark McLaurin 2020-2021 men's roster. No Marvel database. Okay, Marcus Mc

yeah, that's a white guy.

Matt - CDWA (23:47)
You don't have to say it like that.

Dave (23:50)
That's a white guy. Born in the 60s too.

Matt - CDWA (23:54)
boy.

Dave (23:56)
So, I mean, you know what? I don't know Mark McLaurin and I don't want to, I don't want to, I don't want to judge his character, but maybe there's a tad bit of internalized racism that found its way out to the, I just think that sometimes you do those things and don't realize it.

Matt - CDWA (24:02)
Yeah, we're not gonna slander that man.

Don't do this, don't do this, not this. No, no, no, no, no.

No.

Dave (24:17)
Okay, okay. Okay, well, you I mean, you tell me was, was that was he writing these black characters authentically?

Matt - CDWA (24:20)
Perfectly upstair.

I think there was good. I think he could work on some of his jive talk, also not the 1990s. I love anytime there's black characters, there's got to be some horrible slang. So that comes with the territory.

Dave (24:37)
Yeah, there sure is. There sure is. Yeah. How did you, how did you feel about that one panel where Cage had that woman up against the wall with like both arms and was like, the look on his face was a little uncomfortable for me. I'm like, what are we doing here?

Matt - CDWA (24:45)
You had her hand up, yeah.

It might, it might be a part of that, was it alias run? One of your favorite Luke Cage stories that I'm not fancy that you went there. You don't need to share.

Dave (24:57)
I just about to bring that up, actually. I was going to say I do know Cage to be a little sexually aggressive. For those that don't know, I'm not going to spoil it. I'm not going to spoil it, but I urge you to read. The alias run published under the Max insignia by Marvel.

Written by Brian Michael Bendis. This was before I decided that I don't like anything Bendis does. This is this is the good years of of Michael Bend, Brian Michael Bendis. We're a fan of these years. It's only three volumes. It's. Jessica Jones is alias in the Alias Investigations, Jessica Jones. She is a very, incomplete and broken person during this run, but by the end of it.

Matt - CDWA (25:31)
Great use.

boys

Dave (25:47)
You know, she really does kind of find yourself and it leads kind of directly into her and Luke being together and being on the New Avengers together and sort of the overall like Bendis controlled Marvel Universe for what, like 10 or 12 years in the 2000s. But man, that alias run is so good. It's one of the very few Marvel trades that I still have on the shelf. And there's one scene in particular where Jess does hit up

Matt - CDWA (26:04)
Yeah.

Dave (26:16)
Luke Cage for a little bit of a booty call. And I mean that literally. And that's all I'll say.

Matt - CDWA (26:26)
I'm good with Cage. And with that, I think we're good with Cage.

Dave (26:32)
I mean, you know what? That's one of my favorite issues of that run.

Matt - CDWA (26:36)
I know it is. I know it is. You were a big fan of the cage run, so...

Dave (26:44)
That was alias, man. That wasn't Luke Cage.

Matt - CDWA (26:47)
I just, I have cage like imprinted in my head when you talk about that just because of that, yeah.

Dave (26:51)
Fair enough. Yeah, fair enough. I mean, he was in that series more than once. And anyway, moving on to the Mighty Thor number four thirty three. So I have some thoughts about like looking back and how I feel about this comic now. But I'll at the I'll get to that at the end. This was really like a totally new direction for Thor. And I don't I didn't remember any of this until I went back and reread it today. But.

Matt - CDWA (27:15)
Yeah, this is...

Dave (27:21)
Thor kills Loki and then is banished. Like he's like, just, he gets just like sent away and the power of Thor passes to Eric Masterson, who was just like a dude who lives in New York. He's just an architect. Previously, Thor and Eric Masterson were sort of joined together in an effort to teach Thor humility.

Matt - CDWA (27:24)
Yeah, do that.

Okay.

Dave (27:50)
Odin banished him to Earth and forced him to live as basically live like a human life. And whenever he was needed, Eric would tap his cane and he would turn into Thor and then you know, the Thor would take over.

Matt - CDWA (28:04)
Eric or Don Blake?

Dave (28:07)
maybe it was Don Blake. You're right.

Matt - CDWA (28:09)
Donald Blake is the original guy. I didn't.

Dave (28:14)
Wasn't there an Eric Masterson tie there too? You're right though, because Donald Blake was a doctor. Yeah, you're right. You're right.

Matt - CDWA (28:18)
I don't, Donald Blake is the original, he was the doctor, but I don't know, I don't know the Magnes, that's all you, I don't know that.

Dave (28:28)
OK, maybe. Obviously, I don't I don't remember any of this stuff, so I'm like I'm conflating two different characters now because I moved on from Thor not too long after getting this comic. I didn't stick with Thor. I pretty much wrote out the Eric Masterson version of Thor because basically what happened was Eric Masterson just turned into Thor like he had the power of Thor. He was worthy of holding the hammer like he just turned. He was Thor for all for all intents and purposes. Eric Masterson equals Thor, the actual Thor Odinson gone.

Matt - CDWA (28:41)
Okay.

That's what.

Dave (28:58)
This is like when he's Thor, he just talks like a regular dude. He talks like Eric Masterson. There's some really funny like inner inner monologuing. Like the first time he tries to fight you like and you know, it was a more lighthearted comic than I remember. But also I didn't really remember. That like the real Thor wasn't there.

Matt - CDWA (29:02)
Yeah, that's what I kinda got.

Yeah?

Dave (29:23)
And I think, and that's sort of the point that I was alluding to at the beginning of this, which was, think the reason why I liked this so much was because it wasn't like typical Thor. wasn't the old English speaking Thor. And there wasn't, you know, he wasn't in Asgard and traveling the cosmos and doing all of this Thor cosmic stuff. And it was just.

A Thor that's grounded in reality. He's based in New York City. He's just like an imperfect dude trying to figure things out and for whatever reason, 10 year old me really connected with that.

Matt - CDWA (30:02)
Is it crazy if I say, this is the nineties pal. Those days are over. That old speaking Thor.

Dave (30:06)
No, because Eric Masterson says that twice in this comic. Which I thought was hilarious. Like, this is the 90s, man.

Matt - CDWA (30:13)
Yeah, I just, I wrote that down. was like, it's this 90s. It's the 90s. There's a similar crack in the cage comic, not as over the top, but there was something similar said. But yeah.

Dave (30:25)
Little did they know that the 90s were also going to mean Chapter 11 bankruptcy for Marvel and a massive restructuring that we were still feeling the effects of today while Sony cranks out shitty villains movies because they don't want to give up the Spider-Man license that they bought during this Chapter 11 restructure.

Matt - CDWA (30:30)
I'm selling all their rights to everything.

Good call, yeah.

Dave (30:45)
And we've brought it full circle. Yeah, I mean, I don't think there's too much to say about this Thor comic. It's like a good like it's it's funny because it almost reads like your typical teen teenager getting powers and figuring out how to be a hero and kind of screwing it up a few times. But it's like a grown man who's just nervous about living up to Thor. There's one scene where Captain America calls Thor on his Avengers ID badge and the dude just like Thor's out to lunch because he's embarrassed about.

Matt - CDWA (30:47)
Absolutely.

Dave (31:16)
Like not being a good Thor. I don't know. It's funny.

Matt - CDWA (31:18)
Yeah. Was this a crossover with Robert Kirkman's invincible? Because how did, who made that costume for him? This, this, you can just, a tailor can just make you an indestructible costume that you could just fight Ulick. I mean, the best part is that the best part is after he gets the costume, the woman that the clerk clearly wants to have sex with him, like clearly wants to have sex with him. Like just out there.

Dave (31:28)
Taylor, what do mean?

Yeah, just don't worry about it. Listen, there's the 90s man.

Yep. yeah That's the I mean multiple multiple women throw themselves at eric masterson Both what he is regular eric masterson and thor

Matt - CDWA (31:49)
This

That mullet, dude.

Yeah, this is like, this is...

Dave (31:59)
Whoever was right, I think it was Tom DeFalco and somebody else did the work together. Ron friends, that's right. Horny dudes, very horny dudes.

Matt - CDWA (32:03)
Ron friends Ron friends Tom DeFalco. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, it is what it is. I'm just saying. But yeah, good stuff. Classic. Like, you know, hero gets his ass beat, gets a new costume, comes back. Like that was the arc. And it ended in. I was just like this code blue. These are like law enforcement he's working with or something. They're like.

Dave (32:17)
Yeah, yeah. good, sorry.

They have like super cops.

Matt - CDWA (32:30)
Yeah, they're like GI Joe kind of, not nearly as cool. Yeah, like what is...

Dave (32:33)
Yeah, dudes doing flips and stuff and. But they actually never really do anything like they shoot their guns a couple of times and then like Thor shows up and they just go, whoa, he's got it.

Matt - CDWA (32:39)
Yeah, they get... Yeah. Yeah, exactly. I was like, code blue, man. Whatever.

Dave (32:47)
Code blue, Interestingly enough, when Thor came back, there were enough people that really loved the Erik Masterson Thor that they found a way to keep him around and they just called him Thunderstrike. And he had a different hammer. I think the story was that because he was so worthy of holding Thor's hammer that Odin gave him a similar hammer and granted him the powers of Thor, he like,

Matt - CDWA (32:50)
Good stuff.

Really?

Dave (33:16)
tied his hair back into a ponytail but kept the beard and he was called Thunderstrike. He wore a vest. He was a cool dude, man. I liked Thunderstrike a lot.

Matt - CDWA (33:23)
Badass. Badass.

Okay. I was just a little skimming. That's cool. Yeah. I definitely remember seeing that character, but God, I this.

Dave (33:35)
I forget what teams he was a part of because he definitely was on a couple of teams Maybe it was something weird like secret defenders or something. I don't really remember Am I here?

Matt - CDWA (33:44)
You're right. I have the wiki up. Avengers Secret Defenders The Kthorkor.

Dave (33:52)
The Thor core. That's what the frog Thor two right frog Thor's in the Thor core. Got click click is going to be Beta Ray Bill Thunderstrike the frog Thor. Probably one more.

Matt - CDWA (33:53)
and yeah I don't the link's not clickable but out

It's not clickable, give you

Yeah, beta rate bill is definitely in there. Members.

Dave (34:16)
has to be.

Matt - CDWA (34:21)
Mr. Horse Loki Eric Masterson I don't think I don't see Frog Thor in there I don't know Mr. Ed I don't know it's like Mr. Horse

Dave (34:28)
Mr. Horse?

Is that not also Beta Ray Bill?

Matt - CDWA (34:35)
No, it's a horse with a gold armor set. Beta Ray Bill's in there, but yeah.

Dave (34:41)
okay. All right. corrected then. That's okay. I guess maybe Frog Thor was just a version of like the regular Thor Odinson, but turned into a frog. I don't know my Thor all that well. I just know Eric Masterson Thor and then Thunderstrike. Yeah.

Matt - CDWA (34:45)
Sorry.

Yeah.

That's all you need to know. I've never met like a crazy Thor fan, like someone who's like really into Thor. I'm sure there are, but I If you are, please let us know. Please, please... Like I know a lot of people like Captain America, obviously, but like not a lot of crazy Thor.

Dave (35:02)
Yeah, do they exist?

Yeah, tell us in the discord.

Yeah, but he's one of Marvel's big three, you know?

Matt - CDWA (35:17)
Yeah. Yeah? I don't

Dave (35:21)
Maybe not big three. Maybe he's like big five. Big three today is probably Iron Man, Spider-Man and Deadpool. If we're talking commercial success. It makes me sick. But those are the three that everyone knows like they're the they get the most attention like Iron Man because of the MCU, Deadpool because of those those movies and well, I guess also Spider-Man because of those movies.

Matt - CDWA (35:29)
That makes me so sad.

And everything. You're dro- You're drilled in the spi- getting Spider-Man content when you're like a child all the way up to you, so it doesn't matter.

Dave (35:52)
Yeah, I Spider-Man's had movies forever since I was in high school.

Yeah. Yeah, anyway. So looking back on these. Which which which did you like better?

Matt - CDWA (36:13)
I like the Thor one better. Yeah. It was just funnier. Like all the sexual passes. Who is this woman? Like, just, there was more intrigue for me. Like this woman's in a hospital bed and I don't know why. Like Thor is like, Donald Blake is just gone. Loki got killed. We have this GI Joe police force with this woman or dude doing these flips and people are shooting guns.

Dave (36:15)
Really? Okay.

Yeah, fair.

I know why. I know why. It's because...

Matt - CDWA (36:40)
Ulix in downtown wherever destroying shit like it was just the Thor what I thought was funnier than the whole costume thing. It's just yeah.

Dave (36:50)
Okay, fair. I mean, I like that or two. Yes. So many words. And the I don't think the art was as strong in cage either than the like the fight sequences weren't drawn super, super well. Which is a shame because, you know, I'd like the character a lot. A lot. The 90s were tough for Marvel. 90s were tough.

Matt - CDWA (36:51)
Cage had a lot of words. Cage was a lot of like, I know. Like, I get it. There's a lot of words. No, no.

No. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. When Angel was beating people down, breaking, being a union breaker, had some good art. Then it trailed off at the end of the issue, like we got a filler artist.

Dave (37:27)
okay, so hardcore and his lips. Sometimes both lips were pink. Sometimes only one lip was pink. Sometimes no lips were pink.

Matt - CDWA (37:29)
Yeah.

Yeah, inconsistent art, dude.

Dave (37:37)
I don't get it. is this man, like, does he, does he just have naturally pink lips? Did we just forget to color them? Does he wear lipstick? I don't know. His accent was also super hard to read. And it was only there, like a couple of words per word bubble. that, it was tough. It's tough.

Matt - CDWA (37:49)
I

I don't know man, I don't know.

Tough stuff. yeah.

Dave (38:05)
What about favorite cover?

I honestly I like both of these covers. I think that they're both they're both very 90s. And, you know, when you look, I look at them on my my iPad, like my downloaded section in in the Kindle reader and side by side. Honestly, these covers look very similar. The heroes are in very similar poses. The background coloring is very similar. The style of the logo is very similar. The only real difference is there's a bunch of like people in the background on that cage cover.

Matt - CDWA (38:13)
Yeah, they're both cool, like...

Yes, the pops.

They look, they do look fake.

Yeah.

Dave (38:41)
And he's like ripping his old costume, whereas Thor has this just has sort of like action explosion behind him and he's swinging the hammer. But otherwise, these are almost identical covers.

Matt - CDWA (38:48)
Yeah.

I feel like the Thor cover would be one that would sell for more money. It just looks more like, I don't know why that just, it looks like more of a retro kind of like seventies cover to me. Like the cage is definitely, I don't know. I like the cage one. do like, I like, I like the purple, the purple, anything with purple and like yellow. I just love that color scheme for some weird reason, but they're both good. Like, yeah, no, they're, they are both solid covers.

Dave (39:09)
I do, I like both of them.

I wish whoever did the cover art on this cage comic would have done the interiors as well. And maybe he did and just the interior is sloppier. I don't know.

Matt - CDWA (39:27)
Yes, yeah. Dude, I'm telling you.

I need good art. I just can't do it sometimes.

Dave (39:36)
Who's the penciler? Dwayne Turner. I know Dwayne Turner. Not personally, but.

Matt - CDWA (39:45)
I know of his work.

Dave (39:47)
Yeah, I'm familiar with him as a a creator in comics. Yeah, I don't honestly I don't think I could pick a favorite cover. I think these are both really good covers and I'm horrifically biased because they're both 90s Marvel and I love the 90s. I love 90s comics. I'm a sucker for this stuff.

Matt - CDWA (39:51)
Yes.

Yeah.

It's good stuff, man.

This is gonna- yeah go ahead. This kinda makes me wanna read the Simonson Thor. That's been on my list for a long time. Walt Simonson Thor, yeah. I've heard-

Dave (40:10)
Well, I, good, no good.

Really?

You get a lot of Doth thou feel that Doth is the mightiest of mites. I don't know if I could do that.

Matt - CDWA (40:25)
Yep.

Yep, you sure are a lot of dialogue. Something to read before bed, but...

Dave (40:32)
Honestly, I did think to myself, I'd like to read this Eric Masterson Thor run, you know, because I don't know how long I really lasted. I don't remember how long before they brought Thor back. So I kind of want to like dig in a little bit, but I know I don't have the time and I got some other stuff I got to read.

Matt - CDWA (40:50)
Yeah, dude.

Yeah, I get it. There's just so much to read now.

Dave (40:55)
But yeah, but you know, I this was fun. I actually this is this was credit to Matt. This was his idea. He may have had a horrible idea and making us read The Boys in twenty twenty four, but this was one of his better ideas. I got to give credit where it's due. This was fun. I love the story of you getting this cage comic your first time. That's that's such a wonderful story. I truly like thank you for sharing that because I have never heard that story before. And it shits all over my story.

Matt - CDWA (41:14)
No problem, man.

No, you have a good story. Your story is perfectly fine. I just went to a hive of scum and villainy at the age of six to get comic books.

Dave (41:24)
of like, give me that. Nah, nah, yours is better. Yours is better. I love it.

If I ever get to see your dad in person again, I got to thank him for getting you that comic so it it ultimately led to you and I connecting about comics many years after the fact and has been one of like the the the core the core interests of our friendship and one of the biggest intersections and one of the things I think that has brought us closer together over and over and over again is our love of comics and

Matt - CDWA (41:40)
For sure.

Sure.

Dave (42:02)
you know, sharing this with each other and talking about on the podcast now too. So, you know, I, I, owe him a debt of gratitude.

Matt - CDWA (42:10)
That's awesome.

Good stuff. That's it.

Dave (42:13)
All right. Well, that's it. I'd like to do something like this again. I don't know how we we can't recreate our first comic ever, but All right, Matt's got Matt's got ideas. He's idea guy now. He's on a roll. All right, we're gonna roll with it Okay, so we'll be back in a couple of weeks with what I don't really know yet But in a couple of weeks, you'll see us again Until I guess you'll hear us again. You'll see us again if you follow us on Instagram and tick-tock, but you You won't see us unless you're there

Matt - CDWA (42:17)
absolutely.

I got ideas. I got ideas.

And that is... that is...

Dave (42:43)
Until then, my name is Dave. Take care of yourselves, everybody. Bye bye.

Matt - CDWA (42:45)
And I'm Matt.

Peace.