Siegried & The Dragon

Here's a beautiful Craig Russell piece from the 2nd issue of Epic Illustrated, more a fragment than a story, adapted from Wagner's Ring Cycle, and came out I think, just after Russell's first Opera comic, the Parsifal one-off book for Mike Friedrich's Star*Reach.

You can see Russell stretching his muscles here, revelling in the chance to do his own thing, and starting to subtly move away from the Marvel style of Killraven.

It's not often noted what a great colourist Russell is, as well as everything else. His later works The Magic Flute and Fairy Tales Of Oscar Wilde have some of the best colouring you've ever seen anywhere, and it all starts here.

Interestingly, this is a piece with two slightly different endings: Siegried was originally due to run in the 5th issue of Imagine, the companion title to Star*Reach, before Friedrich's money troubles brought his publishing empire to a close, and he realised he couldn't afford to print it.

Epic picked the story up, but editor Archie Goodwin didn't like Russell's last page, where the bird speaks in modern day New Yoik, and asked him to redo it.

Mike, not seeing what the problem was, went ahead and printed the original ending as the back page of Imagine's final issue. So here's the version Archie preferred:

And here's the original:

Newton The Rabbit Wonder

For what was basically a piece of fluff that seemed made up as it went along, Newton The Rabbit Wonder sure had some heavyweight talent behind it. Newton was Steve Leialoha's contribution to Quack! and later Eclipse Magazine, and was generally about whatever Steve wanted it to be about.
Each episode follows the previous one only in the vaguest sense, as Newton hips-hops through sci-fi, sword & sorcery and, in this example, western parodies, but each strip is an absolute belter.
Drafting in Sergio Aragones for The Rabbit Wonder, and Alex Nino for The Rabbit Wonder Meets The Barbarian Bunny, by the time of this piece, Leialoha's going it solo, but it's actually the best piece. Check out pgs. 6 & 7 to see how a master cartoonist uses negative space. And how a horse called Smega can steal your strip right out from under you if you're not paying attention.

Frank Brunner's Duckaneer

Here's the strip that convinced Star*Reach publisher Mike Friedrich there was money in them there ducks, starting short-lived adult funny animal book Quack! solely to get this great little piece into print.
At this point, Frank Brunner was still slightly chafing at not being allowed to write / co-write Howard The Duck, wanting to put out his own version that he could legally own, and Friedrich bit his hand off when offered the strip.
So what you have here is sort of a missing issue of Howard, complete with Beverly Switzler clone, but lacking Steve Gerber's unique worldview. You do miss Gerber, but Brunner is on blistering form here and Duckaneer would fit nicely in between Howard's #1 & 2. Here it is, along with both men's introduction.

Adam Warlock Superstar

Or Jesus Christ Superhero. Or The Most Blasphemous Comic Ever according to some of the letters pages at the time.
Before Jim Starlin blew our minds, and launched an all-out assault on the Catholic Church AND the comics industry with his Warlock series, Roy Thomas & Gil Kane were plotting just about the most heavy handed Biblical allegory ever done in this, or any field.

Our old pal The High Evolutionary has created a new Earth on an afternoon off, which thanks to serpent-in-the-garden The Man Beast, is soon just as awful, bad and evil infested as this one. The fresh out of his cocoon Him is transformed into Adam Warlock, man-angel from beyond the stars, who pleads with his new father figure not to destroy Counter Earth and that only he can bring peace, love and harmony to the failed experiment. Whew, and that's just the first issue.

Warlock soon gets himself a few disciples, such as well meaning middle class drop-out David, twins Eddie & Ellie, and angry black brother Jason, all of whom left home presumably to join up with Green Lantern & Green Arrow on the road.
At first it seems like Jason will be The Golden Guru's Judas / Carl Anderson, but it turns out to be the mysterious and underwritten Astrella ( Spanish for star, sort of ) who regularly disappears from the narrative so she can always come back in the nick of time and be even more mysterious.
For your money, you also get a good Dr. Doom, and a Reed Richards who transforms into a Hulk-like creature called The Brute, I guess to prove that we are on Counter Earth.

In nearly every issue, The Man-Beast sends another of his monstrous minions against Adam, though few of them are particularly impressive or memorable. But I'm not here for the fight scenes, even if they are by Gil Kane, Tom Sutton & Bob Brown and are therefore spectacular.
I'm here for the overwrought dialogue, '60's flower children, and breathtakingly obvious Biblical rewrites. And the endless speechifying about non-violence while punching out a mutated warthog.

Roy The Boy's prose throughout is at it's absolute purplest, and is a joy to read, if you like that sort of thing, which I do. Mike Friedrich later takes over and Gil's Star Hawks buddy Ron Goulart even writes one issue. But it all reads like Roy. Throw in a mysterious politician named 'Carpenter' alongside Astrella, both of whom were clearly meant to be something other than what they're eventually revealed as, and you can see that the focus of this book changed on a month by month, and writer by writer basis. Making it a fun, but ultimately frustrating reading experience.

It's not a great comic, but it is a fascinatingly flawed one, constantly trying to be all things to all people, while different creative teams flail around madly, trying to make sense of it all.
Here's a 'typical' issue: