Month: October 2024

It was a longer wait than expected for Star Brand #7, as the series is demoted without notice to bimonthly publication. I say demoted because most of the other books Marvel demoted to bimonthly status at the time turned out to be on their final legs — see Dazzler, The Further Adventures of Indiana Jones, and Star Wars. Roy Thomas steps in to script this issue over Shooter’s plot, and Art Nichols comes on as John Romita Jr.’s inker. Stuck in space, Ken finally notices one star brighter than the rest and realizes it’s the sun. Finding Earth, he goes to his apartment, makes a call, and finds out Deb is in the hospital. Barb finally completely kicks out Ken, who’s finding messages from the Old Man — not dead yet! — demanding back the Star Brand. Ken struggles to find him, eventually using Deb as bait. They have a big rematch and Ken appears to fry him for good — there’s a body this time. Everything settled, he goes back to Deb at the hospital for a happy ending? This was Shooter’s last issue — he’d soon be out as editor in chief at Marvel. Star Brand would enter a kind of creative limbo until issue #11, when John Byrne takes over as writer and artist and begins to completely dismantle everything Shooter built.

Ken struggles to do better. His eye wanders at work, where he gets a shot at a sales job. He goes to meet Duck at Denny’s when the Old Man returns and joins them. He says he’s here to warn Ken and they’ll talk later. At home, Laurie acts out, and Barb tries to seduce Ken. Before he can join her in bed, the Old Man shows up with Duck, who’s now in love with him. Ken thinks he’s bamboozled her somehow. Ken doesn’t believe his ears when the Old Man tells him the Star Brand is a weapon, and Ken’s supposed to use it to decide a battle on the far side of the universe. Barb comes down and doesn’t take well to seeing Debbie. The Old Man releases Deb, who later calls and begs to speak to Ken. Barb tells her off and Ken goes to save her, getting in a big fight with the Old Man that goes into space and ends with Ken melting his face off. Once again, Ken’s lost — he can’t see Earth and so doesn’t know how to get home. Rick Bryant joins the creative team, inking some of the later fight pages. His line’s a bit stronger than Williamson’s, but it’s still a nice looking book. There have been no letters columns to date in this series, which is strange for this era at Marvel. There’s no way to see what other readers think of the book, or to announce any creative changes in the book — of which there soon will be many.

Here’s where Ken Connell tries to do better. It’s his birthday, and Debbie the Duck shows up at his door to surprise him birthday sex. Then she hides out in his car for two hours when his parents and pals (including Barb) throw a surprise birthday bash. Even Ken is getting creeped out by how the Duck lets him use her. He decides to observe the mystery woman and her accomplices, following them back to a student residence. He finds guns in their car, exposes them, and calls the police. He then flies to Libya and destroys a military base all on his own. This sequence is pretty cool — no dialog or captions for two pages, just Ken blowing stuff up. He then tries to make up with Barb, which goes well, and break up with Debbie, which does not. The Duck makes like she’ll kill herself if she can’t see Kenny, so he backs off a bit. He then goes to Barbs and plans to tell her about the Star Brand, but thinks twice after her daughter Laurie acts out again. Again, this reminds me of something that might have been tried — and maybe even work — as a superhero TV series in 1986. But as a comic, even the Romita Jr.-Williamson artwork can’t make this feel dramatic or interesting enough to really work.