Six months after his debut in Martian Manhunter #0, Malefic already had a profile page, a handful of appearances, and this one page introductory story named after him (in quotation marks-- so "clever.") Meanwhile, most of the Vile Menagerie were only ever given a single appearance, and virtually none of them have ever been mentioned in any reference book (or in Professor Hugo's case, they got his name wrong-- in the 70s!) So excuse me while I continue to hate on this prefabricated "nemesis."
The story is pretty basic Marvel Age Annual/DC Sampler fare. The White Martians had only been loose from the Still Zone (to our knowledge) for a short time, and Martian Manhunter had converted their ancient headquarters, Z'onn Z'orr, into his new secret hideout in the Antarctic. It just so happened Manhunter's evil twin brother *shudder* Ma'alefa'ak knew all of this, since he had nothing better to do since H'ronmeer's Curse wiped out their race than tool around alone on Mars. You see, after Ma'alefa'ak engineered that plague, he figured he was all done, and spent the years since watching reruns of old Ray Walston sitcoms. Having learned J'Onn J'Onzz was still alive, Ma'alefa'ak teleported to Z'onn Z'orr, assumed Martian Manhunter's identity, and began ruining his reputation before killing him. Cue purely expository internal monologue, maniacal laughter and series plug...
"Story" by John Ostrander. "Art" by Tom Mandrake.
You could make a case that MM's rogues gallery is as underrated as Superman's. Thanks for this! There's some gold in them thar hills!
ReplyDeleteI was wondering if you'll ever spotlight the different races living in the Solar System in the old MM stories. I was stunned to see so many different races referred to in the 2nd DC Showcase book, and thought that would make an interesting set of articles. There's a Saturnian race that doesn't look anything like J'emm...
I'll grant you Ostrander's (and a lot of other writers) weakness when it comes to viewing the bigger picture of Mar's demise. I too would have appreciated a little more care in Malefic's origins. What was he doing on Mars all this time? Did Mandrake really expect other's to draw all those chain's all the time? heck, did he? One of the strength's of Morrison's JLA was he referenced the past, didn't treat it as if it didn't happen as many reboots do. Triumph, JLI, the Shaggy Man, etc. all got at least lip service. Ostrander was playing pretty fast and loose, and for all the guest appearances, didn't tie it into a larger narrative, at least not one outside of his own work.
ReplyDeleteOh, how I love me some scare quotes. They are like the best invention ever, short of the hyphen.
ReplyDeleteHey-now-Liss! You've been reading my-blog long enough to know about my excess-hyphen-love. It's a "weakness."
ReplyDeleteSphinx, that's one of the 2.7 billion things I'd like to do with this blog when I'm granted infinite time by the Powers That Be. Instead, I gotta keep slaving for the Man and sneaking blog time in as best I can. Also, I've got one more 50s Captain Comet synopsis to do at ...nurgh... that happens to feature a Saturnian redhead.
Speaking of weaknesses and 2.7 billion things-- M.C., I do hate me some Ostrander on MM. I love his work on gritty properties like Grimjack and Suicide Squad, while The Spectre straddled the line, but his take on proper heroes is a history of fail. So basically, I agree with everything you said, to a factor of 10, with far too many add-ons to note here. And I'm oh so not done with "Malefic..."