Tales from the Yellow Pages.
I can’t help it.
I have some sort of fixation with Marvel’s What If…? books. When I find them for cheap I can’t pass them
up. I’ve recently added two more to my
collection of gems.
Reviews: Cody "Madman" Miller
What if...The Punisher’s family had not been killed?
Writer: Doug Murray
Penciler: Rik Levins
Inker: Bob Mcleod
I’m sure anyone reading this is already familiar with
the Punisher’s origins. His family gets
murdered after witnessing some super shady mob happenings. Well, the first thing I noticed on the title
page was that the sneaky bastards at Marvel had covertly added “In Central
Park” to the end of the advertising title from the cover.
Frank Castle’s family survives that fateful day in the
park and life is good. But Frank Castle
is destined to eat a shit sandwich no matter who is filling in his fluffy
little thought bubbles. Poor poor
Frank. Frank ends up joining the police
force.
Franks partner turns out to be dirty. Frank, being a “good” man, narcs his partner
out to the captain. Predictably the
captain is a mob lackey and orders a hit on Frank. Yep, Frank’s family is still gun downed by
the mob, just not in the park. Frank
still becomes the Punisher. The world
still spins.
My favorite parts, and where I get my dollar’s worth,
are the two half page panels of What If ..? spoofs
The Thing was an Elvis Presley impersonator?
And….
What if……….Hawkeye used golf clubs instead of a bow
and arrows?
I’d pay more then a Washington for that Thing comic.
I
could see myself starting a cult and worshiping that book, so it’s probably a
good thing I don’t own it.
What if…#21 Spider Man had married the Black Cat?
Writer: Danny Fingeroth
Penciler: Jim Valentino
Inker: Christopher Ivy
I snatched the Punisher “What if,” just for shits and giggles
but I picked up this here tale of forbidden love because I was actually curious
and I needed this arbitrary question answered.
Danny Fingeroth pretty much just paints Black Cat as
some psycho jealous bitch. Peter has
been beatin’ down the bad guys while teamed up with Silver Sable and her wild
pack. Black Cat is not okay with
this. Then, Mary Jane sends Peter a
birthday card and she continues to rage for a couple pages.
Some old bald guy with green feathery wings shows up
and fights the super union. Cat shows up
and fights the super union. Cat ends up
killing the vulture, but the powers that be pin it on Spider-Man. Sable aims to bring down the “murderous” web
head. Blah Blah Blah. Cat takes MJ hostage blah blah Paladin
empties a few clips into the Black Cat.
Spidey saves MJ and they fall madly in love.
The world still spins.
All in all both of these books were good for a few
laughs. I’ve been squirreling away random back issues for the last couple of
months, to get me through another Midwestern winter or the impending Zombie
Apocalypse.
What the hell?
Why not? Just another building
block in my path to total enlightenment.
