Eight More Slept On Comic Book Titles AKA A Poisonous Paragraphs Comic Book Nerd Special Edition

I haven't done one of these since early January so I was due. I decided not to use any of the titles I dug up in my history of Black superheroes post in February with the exception of Marvel Premiere. Let's get it in!:



Marvel Premiere was a title used as a testing ground of sorts for older and new characters created by Marvel staffers between 1972 and 1981. Some of the odd and varied heroes and villians featured in those pages include Black Panther, Tigra, Wonder Man, Satana, Dominic Fortune, Jack Of Hearts, 3-D Man, Soloman Kane, Woodgod, Monark Starstalker, Star-Lord and Paladin. Several of these creations never saw the light of day again.



Longshot was a bioengineered humanoid created by Mojo to compete in reality based action television shows on Mojoworld. He was given the power of extreme luck and he could incur bad luck in his foes helping him to do the seemingly impossible during combat and escape harm. He led an uprising against Mojo, escaped to Earth and became a member of the X-Men. Ann Nocenti and Art Adams collaborated on the mini series.



Chris Claremont wrote this pivotal tale of Kitty Pride’s coming of age. She becomes a full fledged samurai, gets mindwashed and used as an assassin. Then Wolverine bring her back to normal, they fight the Yakuza, saves her father and she emerges as Shadowcat. Wolverine never called her “kid” again once they got back home from Japan.


Bill Mantlo’s title about a stuntman/martial artist turned hero involves the tale of a man who becomes trapped inside the suit made for him to play a villain in a monster movie. This offbeat title about a man who reluctantly fights demons and becomes a weirdness magnet. Eventually, Blue Devil accepts his role as a superhero and he even joins the Justice League Of America. This titles also features early work by Mike Mignola (“Hellboy”).



Rocket Raccoon is easily one of the weirdest heroes of the 80’s. He hails from a universe overrun with automatons, robots and humanoid animals. He had some interesting adventures while trying to liberate his neck of the universe from the stranglehold of evil and is arguably the inspiration behind Nintendo’s Starfox. He is still active in the Marvel Universe.



Roy Thomas and John Buscema’s answer to DC’s Justice League Of America was Squadron Supreme. They existed in an alternate universe where they created a utopia and kept the peace on Earth. Their only opposition was the evil supergroup Squadron Sinister. Classic mini-series.



Mike Baron’s Badger was based in his hometown of Madison, Wisconsin and was about a Vietnam vet martial art expert with multiple personality syndrome that made him think he had the ability to communicate with animals (he didn’t). He often ran afoul of those who were cruel to animals or “raped the land”. A lot of people didn’t get that this comic book was actually a parody of other hero comics. Badger was another classic title from First Comics.



Chris Claremont and Jackson “Butch” Guice told the tale of the first appearance of extradimensional super villain The Entity. He tried to take over The Microverse from Earth, attracting the attention of Baron Karza and The Micronauts. They chased The Entity to the Earth dimension and encountered the X-Men and New Mutants. Eventually, they team together and fight The Entity. Classic Marvel material.


Tomorrow comes another yet another edition of What's New In Dart's iPod. Go Celtics!

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