Comics I Bought This Week: September 29, 2012
I’m back from the comic shop this week and I got six new comics plus a hard cover collection:
And now for a review of something I’ve read recently.
”Spirit World” by Jack Kirby
Here is a comic that I never knew existed before this hardcover reprint of it was announced. It’s what became of what was once an ambitious attempt to make an interesting new type of magazine in the early 1970s. How it came to be is told in a text piece by Mark Evanier so it’s best if you read that there. I’ll go on to tell you what it is.
What it is is some good Kirby storytelling. It reminds me most of the 1970s TV show “In Search of…” and other things of that nature. Shows like that abound on cable TV these days and they were a bit of a fad back in the 1970s too. Kirby delves into the mysteries of Nostradamus, spontaneous human combustion, psychic detectives, lost civilizations, reincarnation, and other topics familiar to those of us who have watched any type of “In Search of…” show.
Content-wise there is nothing new added to these “Mysteries” but the stories Kirby tells with them are good. “Toxl the World Killer” especially stands out as a classic Kirby action story. Most of the book is filled with stories told by a professor type. I would call him the host of the book but he’s really more of a main character. He’s there for pages and then disappears as all but a narrator.
As a person who makes a lot of “Talking Heads” cartoons I was impressed by how well Kirby, who is not known for such comics, pulled off so many pages that were just talking people. He often used a dramatic foreground, middle ground, and background shot just when one was needed. Good stuff.
This isn’t a comic I’d recommend to the casual fan. It’s too much of an oddity. But if you’re a fan of Kirby or odd comics in general then this is one you should have.
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