Nothing can be said to be certain, except death, taxes and occasional grounds in your cup of joe. “Tricks and treachery are the practice of fools, that don’t have brains enough to be honest.” Benjamin Franklin was a man of many talents, not the least of which was being one of the founding fathers of the United States of America. Most of us are familiar with his exploits as a diplomat, a statesman, a scientist (think of kites) and a postmaster. What they didn’t teach in my history books, however, was how much he was a ladies man. In today’s scintillating story, the Master of the Mystic Arts, Doctor Stephen Strange, comes face to face with “The First American” in an adventure which began in the previous issue, Doctor Strange #17. The Sorcerer Supreme and his lovely companion, Clea, traveled backward in time to investigate a tome which theft from his Sanctum Sanctorum was thwarted – a tome named “New Atlantis”, by Sir Francis Bacon! Coinciding with the U.S. Bicentennial, the attempted theft of a text written by one of America’s most influential statesmen and philosophers is too much of a coincidence. Thus, our hero and heroine ride the sorcerous […]
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How about a large ooey-gooey eggplant pizza for his Holiness? Why is it that spiritual teachers must always originate from the Orient or remote parts of Tibet? I mean, when somebody from England, Germany or America tries to spearhead a spiritual movement, they are always called a cult leader. Or at best, a kook! When you hear the word “lama”, it’s always in reference to a high priest, a holy guide or a venerated spiritual master. In my neck of the woods, someone who meets that definition typically has his own televangelist show. But what if the Western world produced a bonafide holy man who grew up on Happy Meals and music videos? Would he be embraced as a source of great wisdom or rejected as an impious fraud? Thanks to Doctor Strange, we’ll learn just how such an occurrence might come about!
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People are strange when you’re a hero – Faces look shocked when powers are shown – Villains are wicked causing us sorrow – Fiends do evil till they’re put down! Comic book fans have a few areas of disagreement. A minor one has been the question of the precise date which marks the end of the Bronze Age of Comics. As an unabashed fanatic of all works by Boisterous Bill Mantlo, I place that date firmly in the late 1980s, at the point where he retired from his illustrious scripting career to become a public legal defender (in effect, becoming a real-life super hero).
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