November 11, 2006
Werewolf By Night Returns in 2007
This is exciting news. At the end of Friday's Cup of Joe in Newsarama, there's a sneaky solicitation for a one-shot special called Legion of Monsters #1: Werewolf By Night. Written by Mike Carey and drawn by Greg Land! This looks like the classic Jack Russell--Land doesn't try to redesign the Ploog model, doesn't try to make him dog-like or anything. (Dog-like Werewolves are my pet peeves, no pun intended.) Here's the blurb:
In the first of three high-octane horror comic one-shots, Werewolf by Night returns to the Marvel Universe! This shocking story by X-Men's Mike Carey and Ultimate Power's Greg Land (in the comic he's waited his whole life to draw!) is a powerful, brutally terrifying tale that will redefine Jacob Russel forever! And as if that wasn't enough - join writer/artist Skottie Young in a no-holds-barred look at the afterlife of the Monster of Frankenstein! It's an extra-length comic at no extra price, and it's destined to keep you sleeping with your lights on…till the upcoming Legion of Monsters: Morbius and Legion of Monsters: Man-Thing!
Greg Land has waited his whole life to draw Jack Russell? Yes, he's a real true believer, and that cover looks fantastic! I can't wait to read this. Nuff said.
Posted by Kid Flash at 10:41 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)October 19, 2005
Werewolf by Night: California Gothic
Marvel dipped its toe into the horror stream cautiously, using Marvel Spotlight #2 (in 1971) as the safest way to introduce a new concept in horror. Bringing the Werewolf legend to modern life (as it was in 71) was no easy task. Aside from “The Wolf Man” movie, there is no definitive work of fiction about lycanthropy. Marvel’s newly appointed editor-in-chief, Roy Thomas, solved this problem with his unique concept: a young eighteen year-old named Jack Russell, who discovers his curse on his 18th birthday.
Jack Russell (yeah, the terrier did have something to do with that name) didn’t live in the Baltic states or New England, as most horror stories did back in those days. He was a California kid, living in Malibu, with his mother, step-father (Philip), and sister Lissa. As he discovers on his eighteenth birthday, Jack is cursed to turn into a werewolf on each night of the full moon. Throughout the series, we often see the Werewolf prowling around Los Angeles and the beaches during the night (click to expand the image above). One memorable sequence had Jack turning into the Werewolf as he drove his car along the Pacific Highway.
It was natural for Thomas to choose Gerry Conway as the first writer of the series. Conway was already writing Amazing Spider-Man and could zero in on young-adult angst like a missile. I’ve read that for a period of time, the Buffy writers admired Conway’s skills at constructing these types of stories. Conway used first-person narration to convey the horror that Jack feels. He avoided making the stories around a Jeckyl and Hyde duality. The Werewolf was Jack. A bit animalistic, but it retained Jack’s basic emotions—it never attacked his friends or loved ones. The Werewolf remembered Jack’s enemies with a passion and pounced on them quickly.
When Jack is first transformed into the Werewolf, he leaves his 18th birthday party in a lurch to prowl the beaches. His mother goes looking for him, and gets fatally injured in a car crash. Jack visits her in the hospital and learns the truth: that his real father was a European warlock who was similarly cursed and killed when he got out of control. Later, Jack discovers that his father possessed a book called the Darkhold—a book of spells that could possibly lift the curse. The Darkhold went on to be used in other series after WBN was cancelled—most notably in the Doctor Strange arc that eradicated vampires from the Marvel Universe.
Werewolf By Night featured the debut of a new superstar artist: Mike Ploog. Ploog was an incredible asset to Marvel, since he had learned the craft of drawing from Will Eisner. Ploog had Eisner’s style down cold, yet he wasn’t a clone. He plugged Eisner’s drawing techniques into the Marvel style of storytelling. Click on the above image to expand; you’ll see that Topaz’s introduction resembles the way we met P’Gell in the Spirit. WBN was Ploog’s first assignment, but he quickly developed his talent. He excelled at drawing a number of great horror characters: Ghost Rider, Man-Thing, and Frankenstein. There’s no other artist that I loved more than Ploog during this period.
The early issues of WBN involved a number of weirdoes looking to get a hold of Jack. Some people want to find the Darkhold using Jack; others want to tap the Werewolf’s spiritual energy; one redneck wants to hunt down the Werewolf. There’s an ongoing sub-plot about his step-father, Philip—did he have Jack’s mother killed to inherit her wealth? And what about Jack’s sister, Lissa—will she become a Werewolf on her 18th birthday? The Werewolf himself has few motivations: only the desire to survive, to be free, to return to the forest and hunt various four-legged animals for meat.
It was the best Werewolf story I had read up to that time. Unfortunately, around issue #8, it started to fall apart. Conway was gone and so was Ploog. The creative teams that filled in weren’t bad, but they were always changing. It became irresistible to the Marvel staff to have Marv Wolfman write a few issues of WBN. He did a good job, finally tying up the Philip Russell plotline, and having Jack meet Dracula. Ploog came back for an even better stint as penciller, helping to introduce Topaz, a blonde witch who would become Jack’s girlfriend. Topaz would also migrate to other series, such as Doctor Strange and Witches.
By issue 17, Ploog had departed for the second and final time. Wolfman was also gone. After a few issues by Mike Friedrich, by issue 20 WBN had a creative team that would see the series to the end: Doug Moench, writer; Don Perlin, penciller; Vince Colletta, inker. If anything killed the book for me, it was this arcane collection of the wrong talent. Moench was a good writer with the right material, but in these years he was too prolific, writing over ten series a month. Perlin combined with Colletta was a nightmarish art team—they might have been better suited for a western like Rawhide Kid. It was too hard to take after losing Ploog.
The first few issues made such an impression on me that I collected WBN until the bitter end. It had one key event: in issue 32-33, Moench introduced the character called Moon Knight. While designed as a new adversary to fight Jack, Moon Knight blossomed into a popular character that garnered his own series.
Moon Knight returned the favor by featuring Jack Russell in a two-part story in MK #29-30. Moench wrote a touching farewell to Russell on the last page of MK 30, using the classic first-person voice. The farewell had a double meaning, because it also seemed to be Moench saying goodbye to the artist Bill Sienkiewicz, who was leaving the series.
Click to expand the image above. It's a great farewell to Jack Russell's spirit: “As a beast governed by no rules but my own, I was simply too stubborn about my freedom. I had to run through the deep night and see what the next shadow might hide. As for the trace of the human within me, it was all made easier by the fact that at least some people cared—and were maybe even praying I’d make it. So I howled, and within the howl, there was a farewell to Moon Knight…”
“…Maybe Forever.”
Nuff said.
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