Blood & Judgment Conclusion
By Howard Chaykin
Aug 1986
- the Shadow's operatives (including Harry and Margo) go to work digging up information, wonderfully disjointed; 4 pages of operatives doing their thing and then reporting back to Lorelei
- page 5, finally get a glimpse of Lorelei, and her monkeys, didn't realize she had them until now; her word balloons are heart-shaped which implies something about the way she talks to The Shadow
- Preston Mayrock reveals to Mercy that they have AIDS, which came a bit out of left field and wasn't really followed up on, or maybe it was in the way she dealt with him later
- the Shadow locates Mayrock who reveals himself to be Lamont Cranston, he didn't die after getting thrown off the mountain in 1922 (64 years ago) but he has aged, unlike Allard
- flashback as Mayrock reveals what happened to him, how he survived and ultimately thrived after being left for dead
- Cranston thinks that he holds all the cards but then everything goes sideways for him, his wife, and his son
- first his wife shoots him, killing him, them his son kills his wife, and then the Shadow sends Cranston and his son through a window and plunging to their deaths from the top floor of his casino
- in the end Allard decides to not to return to Shambala, his sons opt to stay with him
- Mercy - she was originally game show hostess, that's where Cranston spotted her; love the way Chaykin draws her especially her hair; she is in love with the Shadow
- Mavis Lockhart - only has a cameo appearance, what happened to her, has she really changed her tune, is she seriously calling him master un ironically or is the reader supposed to read sarcasm into her use of the word master?
- Chaykin is focused on telling a story, not on explaining everything, if you want all the loose ends tied up you are going to be disappointed
- as I suspected it is revealed that the missile with the nuclear warhead is a SAM, unclear how that could carry enough to destroy NYC, was this a mistake on Chaykin's part or Mayrock's or is it true and I'm the one who is wrong? I can see such a missile having an impact, killing a lot of people, causing a lot of damage but not wiping out NYC
Chaykin & the Shadow
- there are a couple Shadow series that were published by DC in the next few years but other than the cover to one issue Chaykin didn't work on them at all, he didn't return to writing and drawing the Shadow until 2014
- 1st work on TS: inked a couple pages of Shadow 4 (Apr/May 1974)
- this mini-series was his second piece of work on TS
- next work cover to TS (1987) Annual 1 (1987)
- after that nothing until 2012
Showing posts with label Shadow Blood and Judgment. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Shadow Blood and Judgment. Show all posts
Saturday, March 26, 2016
Wednesday, March 23, 2016
The Shadow (1986) 3
Blood & Judgment Part 3
By Howard Chaykin
Jul 1986
- the bigger picture finally starts to come into focus even though the style of storytelling continues to obfuscate and keep the reader from seeing things too clearly, which seems completely appropriate considering that the Shadow is the title character
- Allard sends Margo and Harry with his sons to a safe house because none of them are safe staying at Margo's mansion, Pres has sent men to kill them all, but he keeps Mavis with him
- the Shadow deals with the killers while the others escape, then he and Mavis take off in his flying car
- there is a transition from Allard and company to Mayrock and family that I particularly like, both groups are watching the news
- it becomes explicitly clear in this scene what Mayrock wants, although it is his wife doing the explaining; he wants to travel to Shambala and have his brain transplanted into his son's body; his young wife loves the idea, his son seems very blasé about the whole idea
- the murders are all just to bring the Shadow out in the open and the nuclear weapon is a bargaining chip
- Mavis argues with Allard about his approach dealing with the killers, she hates it but is also attracted to him, in one panel they are arguing and a couple panels later it looks like they might be kissing
- When Allard is communicating with his agents over the radio he uses a different voice which is signified with double square word balloons, which is a nice touch
- Allard is definitely not a bleeding heart or knee jerk liberal, that becomes apparent from his interactions with Mavis, the way he deals with criminals, and his meeting with retired police captain Cardona, which leads him to the Pink Rat Social Club
- he sends Mavis, in disguise, she seems inept but it all turns out to be a ploy to lure one of the flunkies into a trap at another club, Thorazine, in the hopes of getting information out of him
- the Shadow is disguised as the lead singer of the band on stage when the flunky walks in, it was a nice trick, I didn't see it coming
- finally we see Mayrock explaining that he wants to get revenge on the Shadow, although still no explanation as to what TS did to piss him off, and go to Shambala or he will use his nuclear missile (looks like a SAM) on the big apple
- did Mavis sleep with Allard? It is implied that she did; first he asks her to be his friend and confidant, she laughs and asks if Marho got the same proposal years before, and then a couple pages later she is changing clothes in front of him while he lounges about in a robe, hmmmm? And there's also the possible kiss
By Howard Chaykin
Jul 1986
- the bigger picture finally starts to come into focus even though the style of storytelling continues to obfuscate and keep the reader from seeing things too clearly, which seems completely appropriate considering that the Shadow is the title character
- Allard sends Margo and Harry with his sons to a safe house because none of them are safe staying at Margo's mansion, Pres has sent men to kill them all, but he keeps Mavis with him
- the Shadow deals with the killers while the others escape, then he and Mavis take off in his flying car
- there is a transition from Allard and company to Mayrock and family that I particularly like, both groups are watching the news
- it becomes explicitly clear in this scene what Mayrock wants, although it is his wife doing the explaining; he wants to travel to Shambala and have his brain transplanted into his son's body; his young wife loves the idea, his son seems very blasé about the whole idea
- the murders are all just to bring the Shadow out in the open and the nuclear weapon is a bargaining chip
- Mavis argues with Allard about his approach dealing with the killers, she hates it but is also attracted to him, in one panel they are arguing and a couple panels later it looks like they might be kissing
- When Allard is communicating with his agents over the radio he uses a different voice which is signified with double square word balloons, which is a nice touch
- Allard is definitely not a bleeding heart or knee jerk liberal, that becomes apparent from his interactions with Mavis, the way he deals with criminals, and his meeting with retired police captain Cardona, which leads him to the Pink Rat Social Club
- he sends Mavis, in disguise, she seems inept but it all turns out to be a ploy to lure one of the flunkies into a trap at another club, Thorazine, in the hopes of getting information out of him
- the Shadow is disguised as the lead singer of the band on stage when the flunky walks in, it was a nice trick, I didn't see it coming
- finally we see Mayrock explaining that he wants to get revenge on the Shadow, although still no explanation as to what TS did to piss him off, and go to Shambala or he will use his nuclear missile (looks like a SAM) on the big apple
- did Mavis sleep with Allard? It is implied that she did; first he asks her to be his friend and confidant, she laughs and asks if Marho got the same proposal years before, and then a couple pages later she is changing clothes in front of him while he lounges about in a robe, hmmmm? And there's also the possible kiss
Friday, March 18, 2016
The Shadow (1986) 2
Blood & Judgment Part 2
By Howard Chaykin
Jun 1986
- mostly an origin story
- opens where the previous issue left off with The Shadow showing up but not in costume
- the reactions to his return vary quite a bit; it has been decades (30 years according to an angry Margo Lane) but he looks just as young as he did the last time they saw him
- he says it is the murders that forced him to re-emerge and to explain he tells them the story of how he came to be the Shadow
- the story begins in 1922; after serving as a spy in WWI he stayed in Europe, eventually making his way east across Russia to Vladivostok and then south into China to Shanghai
- that's where Kent Allard met Lamont Cranston; Cranston hires him to fly his plane along with some passengers and some sort of previous cargo, which appear to be caskets filled with bodies
- they just barely manage to get airborne when they are attacked by Chinese soldiers, although the plane is damaged which forces them to crash land when they are flying over the Himalayas
- Allard wakes up to find himself and Cranston in the hidden city of Shambala, the rest of the passengers of the plane were forced out of the plane by Cranston when it was still aloft, although he refused to jettison the caskets
- the people of Shambala have healed Allard and improved him, Cranston made it through the crash landing without serious injury
- the city is much more advanced than the outside world
- once Allard is healed Cramston decides he has had enough; he drugs the locals, steals a flying vehicle, and escapes with Allard and their benefactor Rudra Cakrin (the one wh operated on Allard and has provided for them in Shambala)
- Cranston forces Allard at gun point to fly them to the site of the crash where the secret of the caskets is revealed, there is heroin stashed in the bodies
- Allard and Cranston get into a fight, Allard throws Cranston off the side of the mountain and then returns with Rudra to Shambala
- with training he gains the abilities that will later serve him well as the Shadow
- in the final scene of the issue the focus shifts to the elderl, wheelchair-bound Preston Mayrock, Mercy (his young wife) and his adult son; the big reveal here seems to be that they have a small missile with a nuclear warhead and that they want to use it to take out the Shadow
- Shambala bits of the story is reminiscent of the movie Lost Horizon, although only in passing
- I don't have a lot of history with The Shadow and I always thought his real name was Lamont Cranston not Kent Allard, and that Cranston was someone else
- the way that Chaykin tells the story visually makes it tough to digest it in a single sitting; he doesn't mince words or waste panels; every panel is important in that it conveys information that is crucial to understanding the story as a whole; also there are no standard page layouts in this story, from one page to the next the panel layouts vary sometimes quite a bit
By Howard Chaykin
Jun 1986
- mostly an origin story
- opens where the previous issue left off with The Shadow showing up but not in costume
- the reactions to his return vary quite a bit; it has been decades (30 years according to an angry Margo Lane) but he looks just as young as he did the last time they saw him
- he says it is the murders that forced him to re-emerge and to explain he tells them the story of how he came to be the Shadow
- the story begins in 1922; after serving as a spy in WWI he stayed in Europe, eventually making his way east across Russia to Vladivostok and then south into China to Shanghai
- that's where Kent Allard met Lamont Cranston; Cranston hires him to fly his plane along with some passengers and some sort of previous cargo, which appear to be caskets filled with bodies
- they just barely manage to get airborne when they are attacked by Chinese soldiers, although the plane is damaged which forces them to crash land when they are flying over the Himalayas
- Allard wakes up to find himself and Cranston in the hidden city of Shambala, the rest of the passengers of the plane were forced out of the plane by Cranston when it was still aloft, although he refused to jettison the caskets
- the people of Shambala have healed Allard and improved him, Cranston made it through the crash landing without serious injury
- the city is much more advanced than the outside world
- once Allard is healed Cramston decides he has had enough; he drugs the locals, steals a flying vehicle, and escapes with Allard and their benefactor Rudra Cakrin (the one wh operated on Allard and has provided for them in Shambala)
- Cranston forces Allard at gun point to fly them to the site of the crash where the secret of the caskets is revealed, there is heroin stashed in the bodies
- Allard and Cranston get into a fight, Allard throws Cranston off the side of the mountain and then returns with Rudra to Shambala
- with training he gains the abilities that will later serve him well as the Shadow
- in the final scene of the issue the focus shifts to the elderl, wheelchair-bound Preston Mayrock, Mercy (his young wife) and his adult son; the big reveal here seems to be that they have a small missile with a nuclear warhead and that they want to use it to take out the Shadow
- Shambala bits of the story is reminiscent of the movie Lost Horizon, although only in passing
- I don't have a lot of history with The Shadow and I always thought his real name was Lamont Cranston not Kent Allard, and that Cranston was someone else
- the way that Chaykin tells the story visually makes it tough to digest it in a single sitting; he doesn't mince words or waste panels; every panel is important in that it conveys information that is crucial to understanding the story as a whole; also there are no standard page layouts in this story, from one page to the next the panel layouts vary sometimes quite a bit
Thursday, March 10, 2016
The Shadow (1986) 1
Blood & Judgment Part 1
By Howard Chaykin
May 1986
- confusing at first, well, for most of the chapter
- lots of murders, at least 5, the murders are layered in with the introductions of characters who will presumably play important roles in the story: the Shadow, Harry Vincent, Mr. Mayrock (plus his young wife and son by an earlier relationship), Mavis Lockhart, Margo Lane, and Ching Yao Chang
- a reporter (Mavis) who turns out to be the daughter of a former associate (Harry) of the Shadow
- a journey from a city high in the Himalayas
- finally the Shadow, at the very end, although he was in it all along
- very disjointed and choppy in the way the story is told, which from all appearances is intentional
- definitely worth reading more than once as it is a little easier to read on subsequent readings, and much easier to put the pieces together
- nice intro to the Shadow and the publication and radio history of The Shadow by Anthony Tollin
- interview/conversation about the genesis of this story between Joe Orlando and Howard Chaykin
3/10
By Howard Chaykin
May 1986
- confusing at first, well, for most of the chapter
- lots of murders, at least 5, the murders are layered in with the introductions of characters who will presumably play important roles in the story: the Shadow, Harry Vincent, Mr. Mayrock (plus his young wife and son by an earlier relationship), Mavis Lockhart, Margo Lane, and Ching Yao Chang
- a reporter (Mavis) who turns out to be the daughter of a former associate (Harry) of the Shadow
- a journey from a city high in the Himalayas
- finally the Shadow, at the very end, although he was in it all along
- very disjointed and choppy in the way the story is told, which from all appearances is intentional
- definitely worth reading more than once as it is a little easier to read on subsequent readings, and much easier to put the pieces together
- nice intro to the Shadow and the publication and radio history of The Shadow by Anthony Tollin
- interview/conversation about the genesis of this story between Joe Orlando and Howard Chaykin
3/10
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