Alter Ego #91 January 2010 (magazine review).

Another day, another early ‘Alter Ego.’ Accept no hyphens. Just remember this issue came out in 2010 and is still relevant.

The first part of Jim Amash’s interview with comic book creator Jack Katz (1927- ) focuses on his early life and starting in the comic book industry, as well as the artists in New York at the time. I was hoping to learn a bit about his ‘The First Kingdom’ graphic novels, but that will have to wait until I acquire Alter Ego # 92. Knowing the artists and how they met their idols gives him great insight. The kid-gang culture of New York in the 1930s is also touched on, more so as there were anywhere from 50 to 60 members in each gang.

Writer Ger Apeldoom’s second look at the brief moment of parody comics attempting and failing in the wake of ‘Mad Magazine’ in the mid-1950s goes in-depth with their content. This really is a specialised field, and I had to keep reminding myself of their age and what was topical then—less likely today. Even so, it is a demonstration of how the various comic book companies jumped on the bandwagon.

The third part of the look at the Centaur Comic Group companies researched by Lee Boyette focuses on a checklist for the artists who worked for them. A few years back, I would have known less of the names, but TwoMorrows giving more details has added to my knowledge of many of them.

The second part of writer John G. Pierce’s look at the young Steve Gerber focuses on his fanzine days, although more with his story contributions to them back in 1961 on the coattails of the first run of ‘Alter Ego.’.

The ‘Mr. Monster’ section carries the third part of Dr. Lauretta Bender’s testimony that comic books weren’t harmful to children. I think the most telling part was one of her children wrote a violent crime story without ever seeing one in the first place. This should have immediately refuted Wertham’s argument, not to mention their ability to distinguish between reality and imagination.

The Fawcett section is bigger than usual but, like the cover slogan, doesn’t dominate the issue. Production designer, amongst other things, Emilio Squeglio (1927-2012), who originally worked at Fawcett, gives his opinions on modern-day comic books being too violent. I wish I’d read his piece back in 2010 and voiced an opinion back, especially as he liked some modern-day characters, including Spider-Man as drawn by his old pal, John Romita. There’s no way to determine how big a sampling he took and when. On some things, he did have a point, but we saw the problems the original Captain Marvel had when resurrected by DC Comics with writers who didn’t understand the character introducing it to new readers who never had the original comic books to compare it to. I do think you might get some intriguing insights from his piece and certainly have some thinking afterwards.

Lastly, P.C. Hamerlinck looks at the villains of the Marvel Family and Bulletman, who are all Black. That is, ‘Black’ is the opening part of their name. Of course, it denotes villainy, and there are a lot of them, but it did make me wonder why the superheroes don’t denote their goodness by being called ‘White’ something or other. The only example that comes to mind is the White Tiger, primarily due to his unique costume rather than his affiliation with a particular faction. Then again, in the 1970s, the “black” aspect of the name had more to do with skin colour than villainy. It’s remarkable how things have evolved over time.

There are numerous topics worth considering and they remain relevant. Any topic above could give you many hours of debate, and I’m contemplating one on codenames.

GF Willmetts

March 2025

(pub: TwoMorrows Publishing. 82 page illustrated magazine. Price: varies. ISSN: 1932-6890. Direct from them, you can get it digitally for $ 4.99 (US)).

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