The Malev Return (for the 1st time)

   Malev 6 returned in Gold Key Magnus: Robot Fighter #21. This time, it appears as a "nebulous ghostly something", which is a fine explanation for a being composed of Ectotheric Energy.

The two humans call this apparition the Space Spectre and it basically outlines it's ultimate use of Ectotheric Energy. Why they would ever go along with this is a discussion for another day.

The Ecto-Rob grows huge and Magnus, backed by the Ectotheric Energy from Willo's tribe, follows suit. They battle through North Am.



The History of Snake Plissken: Excerpts from the book of the film

I know that a lot of fans may not have been fortunate enough to have ever read the Mike McQuay book adaptation of "Escape from New York", so I figured I'd let you all in on Plissken's backstory. This was adapted from John Carpenter & Nick Castle's original screenplay.

THE FOLLOWING TEXT HAS BEEN SLIGHTLY REFORMATTED. I DID NOT CHANGE ONE WORD OF THE TEXT, BUT REARRANGED CERTAIN PARAGRAPHS AS SNAKE'S HISTORY WAS RECOUNTED IN SNIPPETS OVER THE COURSE OF THE ADVENTURE.

 







"Plissken had picked up the name Snake in the service, and it had stuck so hard that now there was nobody left alive on the face of the planet who knew his real first name. They called him Snake because he had a knack for slithering out of trouble. He commanded a search and destroy squad that had the best record of success in the entire Russian campaign. No one could figure out why the Snake did so well; but the Snake knew. Some people built things with their hands. Others could compose beautiful music or had a head for figures. Snake Plissken had a talent for making war. It was in his blood

He had been a hot shot college boy when they commissioned him as a lieutenant and sent him to the Russian front. Everyone had been real excited about the war when it first came around. It had been, after all, a long time since the last real confrontation and everyone needed to flex their ego muscles a little.

It had started small and built somewhere in the Middle East. It was the gradual build-up that somehow managed to keep the nukes out of it. There had been a conference in Stockholm early on, where the principal nations agreed to avoid the nuclear exchange to protect the nonaligned nations of the world. That was just a smoke screen, of course. In actuality, nobody wanted their *beep* blown away finally and completely.

So they decided on something else, something that sounded very harmless and sophisticated. They decided on chemicals. The chemicals were nasty. He supposed that there was no way of killing that wasn’t nasty underneath it all, but the chemical clouds that continually floated in the atmosphere killed in slow motion. No one was untouched by them. They rolled in quietly, odorlessly and tastelessly, eating away bits of brain cells and nervous systems as they did. The chemicals made people crazy before they killed them. There were crazy people running around all over the place. Lots of them. Millions of them.

Taylor had been with him that morning in the CO’s office in Helsinki when they first heard of the so-called “Leningrad Ruse.” It was early, bleak fall and the low, rolling gray clouds, distended with gas, were dropping a lethal acid rain onto ground already barren and dead from floating poisons. They were forced to go around for weeks at a time in their gas gear, speaking to one another through mikes in their masks.

So it was on that morning when they stood in a tiny office with a man from Special Projects named Captain Berrigan. At least, that’s what he said his name was. Berrigan never took off his mask, not even in the relative safety of that secured bunker. Plissken had always thought that to be a shame, for he never got to see what the man looked like; and he had thought for a long time that he would certainly have liked to find Captain Berrigan and gut him with his buck knife.

Captain Berrigan had told them that one of the Allies’ top Intelligence officers had been taken prisoner by the Ruskies and was being detained in Leningrad. He said that they had to go in and get him out before the man revealed secrets vital to the entire war effort. Plissken’s squad had been especially picked because of their phenomenal record. It was a great honor.

Neither he nor Taylor thought much of the plan; it sounded too much like suicide. But duty was duty. So early the nest morning, they went low over the Baltic Sea and hit Leningrad with the sun. There were fifty of them in Gulffire gliders screaming in at rooftop level, while air support drew fire on the east side of the city.

Leningrad was the Ruskie supply point, and was consequently the most heavily defended city in western Russia. Plissken and his people flew into the maelstrom, and it was far worse than any human mind could possibly imagine. He remembered it mostly as oranges-burning, sizzling oranges-screaming fire flowers.

Success was impossible. Survival nearly so. When it was clear to Plissken that they couldn’t get the man out, they plastic charged the building that he was being held in and buried him under five hundred tons of rock and plaster.

Sometime during the fighting a frag cracked Plissken’s left goggle, and the nerve gas went to work on his eye. Somehow he ordered the withdrawal and got back to base. It was like his whole head was on fire, bright orange fire. When the gliders touched down again, there were only two of them left. Just two.

He spent a month in the hospital before they even let Taylor come visit. The man was in a leg cast; his knee had been shattered in a crash landing getting back into Helsinki. He was pale like an albino when he came in, and his eyes were just as red.

“It was all a trick,” Taylor said to him there in that sterile hospital room. “A lousy, *beep* trick.”

It turned out that the “Intelligence officer” was actually a corporal in masquerade who let himself be captured to give false information. Plissken’s squad had been sent in just to lend the whole thing an air of authenticity. To make matters worse, it didn’t work. The man hadn’t fooled them for a minute.

Snake Plissken’s life began to change at that exact instant.

Plissken walked alone down the deserted airstrip toward the distant hangar, the hangar lights casting long, shimmering reflections on the lonely puddles beneath his feet.

There wasn’t a blackbelly in sight. Normally, that would have made him happy, but the fact that he was left unguarded made him feel that they accepted him as one of them. He couldn’t think of a single thing more disgusting to him in the whole world. It also tended to reinforce Hauk’s assertion that they actually had planted bombs within him.

There he was, Snake Plissken, going back off to war. Of course, he had never stopped going off to war. Every hour of every day of his life, Snake Plissken fought his battles. Sometimes they were internal, and sometimes they were wild and freewheeling like at the Federal Reserve. But the feelings were just the same.

None of it made any sense to him. What was one President more or less? What was one summit meeting? It was a President who decorated him after Leningrad, a President who thought he could buy his love and loyalty with a cheap slug of bronze and a bit of colored ribbon. It meant nothing to him. Less than nothing.

That was a different President, of course. How many had there been since - four, five? It didn’t matter; there were plenty more where those came from. When the medals didn’t buy him off, they offered him a high position in the fledgling USPF. When that didn’t work, they cut him loose, just gave him a discharge and sent him home.

Home.

Orange fire.

They had sent him home, but there wasn’t a home to go to. Some crazies had taken his home and held his parents hostage. The USPF didn’t care a whole lot about that; they just went in with their flamethrowers and took out everybody. They buried his parents together in a paupers’ grave, then the state took away all their savings. They tied them all together with the criminals and said that their money would be used for “restitution.”

The day that Snake Plissken came home, he blew up a state vehicle with a Molotov cocktail. It was the only thing that made him feel any better. He had done something of the like every day since then.

He felt the anger bolt through him and fought it back down. He needed his wits about him now.

It sometimes occurred to him that maybe he was crazy like the rest of them. Although crazy people, it seemed, would not realize that they were crazy. Everything would seem perfectly logical and natural to them. That was the one feeling that made him think he was still shuffling the right deck. He could look around him and know, really know, how out of control the whole business was."

Creative Writing: Circa 1988

NERO 

by Dino Lorenzo

 

   My father always said that I should make sure I told the truth no matter what anyone says. So, I'm gonna tell my story to you all. Ain't nobody ever believed it before except Nero, but that don't help me none 'cause he was just a dog. Even if he could talk, he couldn't help me now. That's pretty much what this story is all about, so I guess I better tell you about Nero before you can understand the rest.

   There wasn't a better dog to ever walk the earth than Nero, or a bigger one. He stood damn near to my elbow, and if he raised up on his back legs, he was taller than I am. I weigh near to two hundred pounds and I ain't at all sure that he didn't weigh half as much as me. He ate more than me, that's for sure. 
   Nero used to belong to Mr. Turley, this rich dude from the east side of town. Sometimes he would come over to the poor areas to play cards with us common people. I guess with a dog like that with him, he figured he was as safe as he could be even in the roughest neighborhoods. One day, we was taking him pretty good and he ran out of money right in the middle of a hand. I was the only one still in when he said he would put up Nero to balance the rest of the pot. I didn't know how much a dog like that was worth, but I figured he must have had a hand and a half to be risking him like that. I was just gonna fold when I looked over at Nero. He was looking at Turley's cards and I swear to you that dog was sneering. So, I stayed in and it turned out that Turley was bluffing the whole time.
   I don't even know what kind of dog he was; we sure didn't have no dogs like that where I grew up. Turley told me once but I never could say it right. All I knew was that he was big, he was white and I was glad he was on my side.
   Anyway, I never had a problem feeding a dog that ate more than most grown men. Seeing as how I didn't have a job at that time, I couldn't exactly afford to buy dog chow or anything like that; but the thing was, the place I was living in wasn't exactly the high rent part of town, and it sure didn't hurt for people to know that the biggest dog in the world was living in the same building they was. So, everyone who lived there would save scraps and bring them down for Nero to eat. Sometimes after dinner, he would go out and sit on the front step, and he would look just like one of them statues like they have on the building fronts over on the east side. He had this way of sitting there that made you feel he thought he owned the whole building, and when I thought about it, I wasn't so sure he wasn't right. I didn't think Nero was ever afraid of nothing, and I always felt like nothing could hurt me when he was sitting there.
    There was this one time when we was on our way home and we took a shortcut through this alley. Behind the alley's buildings was the Sluice-way, an artificial channel that was made to steer excess water into the river. As we were walking past it, these three big guys jumped out and started waving knives in my face. Nero started growling way down in his throat, and I mean it made your teeth hurt just to hear it. His ears were all laid back and he was standing in the shadows with his teeth showing around his mouth, and it looked like his eyes were glowing all by themselves. I remember thinking that if I ever saw anything like that and it was growling at me, I would just die of fright right then and there. Them guys just started backing off real slow, and all of a sudden they took off running. I never seen anyone run faster than them three guys did that night. Anyway, it always seemed like Nero never knew what it was to be scared, and that's what makes what I'm gonna tell you so hard to figure.

   It all started when was on our way back from the market. Old Mrs. Cameron, she lived right above us, had given us some money for groceries. She was an elderly widow and couldn't get around much anymore, so she would buy us some groceries if we would pick up hers. We was just coming around a corner when all of a sudden, Nero stopped. He was crouched down low and all his hair was standing up. It was like he was growling and whining at the same time. He started backing up real slow and growling louder and louder. Now, I could see down the whole street and there wasn't nothing I could see to be afraid of. Far as I could tell, the place was empty.
   I started to walk past Nero, but he just growled louder and got in front of me. He was really acting scared and since I had never seen him like that before, I started to get scared, too. I figured if anything could make Nero look like that, I didn't want to be in the same place with it whether I could see it or not. So, we backed off and went the long way around. All the way home, Nero kept looking like he was ashamed of himself, but he never stopped looking all around and his body never did relax until we were back in out little room with the door locked.
   It wasn't until the next afternoon that I heard about the guy they found cut up all over the sidewalk. When Bob told me where they had found him, I felt cold all over. They found him right in the middle of the street that Nero wouldn't let me walk down.
   Whoever he had been, the guy sure wasn't the last victim of the "Mangler", as the press guys took to calling him. Four men and three women were found butchered in the next month and the cops never did come up with any leads. I didn't tell them about what happened to me, 'cause I really didn't need to be seen down at the statioon in those days. Not that I did anything bad, you understand, but just 'cause I hung around with people that wouldn't think much of me if I associated with police types.
   Our town wasn't that large of a place, and this was, for sure, the biggest thing that had ever happened here and our police department really wasn't big enough to handle it. So, before the first couple of bodies had become old news, the whole place was crawling with feds. All of the killings seemed to take place on our side of town, which most people figured was 'cause of what they called the "poorer element".

   On the night of the next killing, Nero and I were asleep in our first floor apartment when I was woke up by the sound of him growling. He was facing the window which opened out to the street, and as he started sounding more scared, I don't have to tell you that I was too frightened to move. Nero just stood there, backed all the way against the wall across from the window, growling as if there was something out there. I still couldn't move as I watched his eyes follow something passing in front of the window from right to left. 
   When I thought that whatever it was had past by, I forced myself to get up and look out the window. Nero was still scared and wouldn't come any closer to the window, but when I looked out,  I couldn't see anybody anywhere. 
   I figured I wouldn't get anymore sleep that night, but it wasn't more than an hour before I did. Suddenly, Nero started that whining growl again and I sat up. This time, he was looking at the other side of the room - at the side with the door. I was so scared that I almost couldn't breathe... and then the doorknob slowly started to turn.
   Nero almost went crazy when the door started to open and sprung, flying across the room and slamming the door shut. Whatever was on the other side of that door tried to force it open, but Nero was strong and scared stiff. I was wide-eyed with fear as I watched him trying with all his might to keep that door shut. Just when I thought he was going to give in, the door slammed the rest of the way shut. Nero didn't stop though, he was sticking to that door and there wasn't nothing that was gonna get him away from it. He stayed that way all night, even when we heard the screams from upstairs and on to the morning when the cops came. It took me nearly twenty minutes to get him to let the police guys in when they came to the door. Finally he slumped, let out this big sigh and went over to his spot and laid down. Wasn't no time at all until he was sleeping like a big dog will, sounder than anything.
   Well, them cops weren't too taken with my story, especially the part about the killer almost forcing the door open past my, like they said, humungous dog. They kept trying to find some connection between the other stiffs and Mrs. Cameron, who wasn't going to be buying us anymore groceries. They weren't letting anyone in her room upstairs, but from the smell, I didn't think I much wanted to go in there anyway. 
   They took us all downtown for questioning, and that's the only time I recall Nero acting like he was glad to be away from that building. The feds were real nasty to me, like they thought I was hiding something. I guess the way things turned out, they kinda did. 
   After they let us out of the station house, we went over to Bob's for a couple of beers. Bob let me buy my beer on tab, and I always took whatever money I happened on into him - the part that was left after my landlord took my rent anyway. I was kinda like famous at Bob's that night, having lived just below the latest victim and being there at the time and all. Guys kept buying me beers and wanting to hear my story, and one of them even bought Nero a beer. This other guy said he would give me five hundred bucks for Nero, but I wouldn't have sold him for a million dollars. that dog saved my life more than once, and I figured I owed him whatever I could do for him as long as he lived. Anyway, we kinda forgot the time, and it was near to two in the morning when Bob told us we had to go home 'cause he was fixing to close up for the night.

   Even with my dog with me, I didn't feel too safe that night, so we stayed on the streets that had the most lights. We was halfway home when Nero started to shy away from the side of the building we was passing.  Since he wasn't growling, I figured it was probably safe to take the shortcut through the alley, past the Sluice-way and we'd be home in minutes. I had only gone a little ways in when I smelled the stink. It was almost as bad as the one from Mrs. Cameron's room.
   I was about ready to turn and run when I saw the legs of a young woman sticking out from behind a trash can. I ran over to see if she was still alive, and when I saw the rest of her it was easy to tell that there wasn't nobody that could have helped her. The smell was so bad I was almost sick. I ran past the Sluice-way and down the alley towards home so I could call the police, but I was only about halfway there when I ran into Nero. He was backing up, growling real loud and looking more scared than I ever saw him before. He was staring at something coming down the alley towards us, but I couldn't see nothing nowhere. I backed up with him until I almost slipped, and when I looked down I saw I was standing in the poor girl's blood. My heart was beating so fast I felt like it was shaking my whole body.
   Then, Nero jumped into the air right in front of us, in full attack mode. While I backed up against the wall, he was thrown against the back of the building, almost ten feet away. His whine while he slid down that wall was the worst sound I had ever heard in my life. Somehow, he got back up and sprang back into the center of the alley. His head snapped to the side and big gashes, three of them, opened up all by themselves on his neck. Blood ran down the side of his head and stained his white coat. He went down in a heap. I stood there, frozen, as more cuts appeared in the side of his body. 
   I had to do something, anything. I owed him my life, and I just couldn't let him die like that. I felt something under my foot and when I looked down, it was a knife. I guess the girl had tried to defend herself while she still could. I grabbed the knife and started running toward my dog. A box on the ground between us was swept away like in a high wind, but there wasn't even a breeze. I held the knife in front of me, but I still couldn't see anything to stab. The first thing I felt was a blow to my side; I felt my skin rip apart and I wondered what it would feel like to die. Then, something hard struck the bottom of my chin and I flew backwards against the building. I lay there and waited - there wasn't anything else I could do. 
   I was about to close my eyes when I saw Nero. I'll never know how, but he had gotten up again and was attacking the air about three feet in front of me. What happened next was probably the most awesome fight for survival there ever was. Lots of times, he fell down, but he just get getting back up and tearing at whatever it was, blood - that wasn't his - beginning to stain his snout. Nero was biting and snarling and gaining ground, backing whatever it was toward the Sluice-way. For a second, I thought I could see something. It was big. Really big. It looked like it was made out of all claws and teeth. The whole area seemed to be red, then I figured it was my blood running down into my eyes. Nero sprang one final time and caught the thing in it's neck, savagely ripping out it's throat. The creature grabbed at it's fresh wound and teetered on the edge of the Sluice-way... and then, it fell and was gone.
   Nero lay still for what seemed like forever, then looked over at me. He dragged himself over to me on the three legs he could still use and licked my face. I hugged him to me as he slumped to the ground with his head in my lap. He let out one last big sigh and lay still. I held him there, knowing that he was dead and that I was alive because of him. And that's why there never was a better dog than Nero, and never will be. 
   The cops found me there like that, with the bloody knife next to me and my prints all over it. When the knife turned out to be what had made at least some of the wounds on the girl, they figured they had all the proof they needed. They figured they got the "Mangler". My story? All that got me was an insanity defense. At least that's what my high-falutin' lawyer guy called it. 
   So, that's why I'm here, and that's why I'm gonna ride that chair tomorrow. For the murder of ten people and one dog. Since there haven't been any more killings, everyone figures it must have been me, but I know better. I don't mind being in here; after what I've seen I really don't want to be alone at night anyway. And I don't even mind that I won't be alive after tomorrow; that means I only have to make it through one more night with my dreams.

   The only thing I hate is... I just wish that everyone could know what Nero did for me, and what he did for them, even when it killed him to do it.

THE END

Jonah Hex: Reinhold Borsten's Origin:

 

Jonah Hex: Road Reapers Logo

   I'm working on a new 1/6 scale Jonah Hex project and need a pic drawn up like the "Road Reapers" motorcycle gang's colors. Here are a few shots from the 1980's "Hex" series, where Jonah is time-warped to the future. It's widely regarded as a huge mistake fro the character and only lasted 18 issues, but I think it was good old sci-fi fun with a character I loved. A cheap, easy read!

   I any artists want to donate a design, I would greatly appreciate it!

The Malev Empire

   I love the Valiant Universe. And one of my favorite titles in it was Magnus: Robot Fighter, the tale of a man in the robot polluted 41st Century who was raised and trained by robot 1-A to combat robots who have gone "freewill" and rebel against mankind... and most times, he identified more with the robot's views, but did what he had to do to please the populace and his politically driven future father-in-law, Senator Clane.

   One of Magnus's greatest enemies were the Malevs, a race of robots dedicated to ruling the universe. And we're gonna trace a bit of their history, mainly because there seems to be no Malev fans ANYWHERE online, except me!


SOLAR: MAN OF THE ATOM #20:


   Needing a break from his mounting pressures with his girl, Solar takes off into space and encounters what he believes is an alien ship.

   Before he knows what's happening, the ship starts to drain his energy.

   Solar manages to distract the ship with an energy being he makes real and escapes. Realizing the ship is too powerful to destroy, he decides to help it on it's journey!

Magnus: Robot Fighter (vol. 1)  #7:


   Magnus first encountered the Malev Empire in Gold Key's Magnus: Robot Fighter # 7 when he was taken to their planet, Malev 6.

   Malev 6 goes on to explain it's origins.

   As Magnus fights for his life against Malev 6's endless supply of robots, Leeja Clane, Magnus's main squeeze, is learning from an elderly telepath named M'ree that when 1000 minds are brought together, they can harness and incredible mental energy (more on this in the next post!). Using Leeja's love for Magnus, 1000 people gather together and use their minds and allow Magnus to destroy the planet...

   As is often the case in comic book land, the enemy did not stay dead for long. In fact, when the Malevs returned, it would mark an incredible change in the direction of mankind.

NEXT TIME: The Malev Return (for the 1st time)

Evil Dead 2 Piano Sheet Music by Joseph Joe LoDuca?!

As long as I have loved the Evil Dead films, I have also loved Joseph LoDuca's scores. You could actually see his work strengthening and HEAR him getting better and better with each subsequent score (and NOT just the Evil Dead films).

Being a piano player, I have always dreamed of getting the sheet music to the hauntingly beautiful piano piece that Ash (Bruce Campbell) plays at the cabin, while his girlfriend dances around in the "vacuuformed" shirt. Well, now, thanks to eBay, I can!

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Evil-Dead-2-Dead-by-Dawn-Soundtrack-Sheet-Music-by-Joseph-LoDuca-RARE-OOP-/220971338603?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item3372eb0b6b

It seems a bit pricey, but for some seriously RARE sheet music, it just may be worth it!

*Anyone looking for the sheet music for this piece? It's available for $9.99 Shipped (in the USA). Email me!