Apparat comics by Warren Ellis.

 A while back I reviewed Simon Spectre by Warren Ellis which I quite enjoyed. In that review I said that I’d chase down the other three books in the series.

The basic premise is Warren Ellis had a though experiment what if the various genres of pulps directly transferred to comics without the influence of super-heroes. 

Simon Spectre was the hero pulp and I liked it.

Let’s look at the other three experiments and if they lived up to that first comic.

Firstly there is no links between the books these are four one shots with a self contained story.

Angel Stomp Future (art by Juan Jose Rip)

What if Pulp Sci Fi continued.. Ellis rightly points out that it did in magazines like Galaxy, Analog, Interzone, etc but he felt that the wild imagination had gone along with the wild covers that screamed PICK ME UP!  

To me, Angel Stomp Future didn’t work.  We follow Dr Angel Antimony in this weird dystopian future – Lord knows how far in the future where cyber implants and biohacking are passe – children do amputations and surgery in first grade. 

And there is this idea of memes not genes.  There’s a lot of talking about concepts but not much story.

We open with a pregnant Dr Antimony, pregnant with an angel baby complete with wings.  How she got pregnant no idea.  The pregnant woman steps in front of a train and a not pregnant Dr Antimony steps out of the train.. and it gets odder from there.

Ryp’s artwork is fantastic but the story doesn’t work for me.

Frank Ironwine (art by Carla Speed McNeil)

What if hard-boiled detective/Crime stories continued…Another one that didn’t go away – I can find crime fiction in almost every book store.  Hard Case crime has made a whole line of books reprinting classic crime fiction, lost works by masters of the genre and given new works a chance.  TV shows like the Law and Order Franchise, FBI franchise, NCIS, The Rookie and more all play in that crime/detective genre with various levels of hard boiled crime. -

Ellis seems to have an issue with CSI elevating the forensic detective to solving crime with interacting with people – dissecting farts he calls it .

Frank Ironwine is an old school cop, in many ways he reminds me of Det John Munch or Dannie Reagan.  Ironwine is the hard drinking detective who talks to people, knows the history of the city and the patterns of crime.  There is nothing new under the sun. 

Coming off a three day bender, Ironwine is woken from his slumber in a dumpster by his new partner De Groot to solve a murder.

Of the three books, I liked this one the best – not as much as Simon Spectre but a solid second place.

Quit City (art by Laurenn McCubbin)

What if the aviator hero continued…I agree with Ellis that airflight has become mundane and there are significantly less stories about aviator heroes but there are still some out there Top Gun (1984), the Iron Eagle series (4 movies 1986-1995), Airwolf (1984-1987), Blue Thunder (1983 movie, 1984 TV Series).  Science fiction still brings us the pilot as space adventurer – tell me that Han Solo isn’t an aviation hero.

The success of Top Gun Maverick (2022) and forthcoming sequels would suggest the genre isn’t dead.

Ellis was not doing anything to really bring the genre back with this one. The heroine Emma Pierson returns home after quitting Aeropiratika, a Blackhawk style group that were told has cool aviator adventures but we don’t see that.  Emma is introduced landing her plane in her home town and not returning to it instead talking to old friends and confronting the ghost of an old boyfriend.  A deconstruction of the aviator hero – “counterintuitive” Ellis calls it in the postscript essay.  Ellis tells us that the hero abandons the mission and verse into the postmodern action story. Except Quit City doesn’t have any action.

I can think of two series that give us the aviator hero forced to retire from flying and does something else.

JAG (1995-2005) was described as Top Gun meets A Few Good Men as the lead hero Harmon Rabb Jnr (played the David James Elliot) is a former Naval Aviator forced out of combat flying because he suffers from night blindness.  Harm then became a JAG lawyer but is still able to fly as part of his investigations.

In the Scarecrow series by Matthew Reilly (1998 to 2012 and a cameo or two in other Reilly works), Shane Schofield is a former Marine aviator shot down, captured and tortured.  His eyes were injured during the torture and he is no longer able to fly, instead he retrains to lead a Marine Recon Team.  Like Harm he still has the ability to fly as part of his adventures.

Both these were exciting stories – I don’t know what Quit City is.

I didn't enjoy McCubbins' work in the Sable & Fortune miniseries more because the stark contrast it was to original artist's work.  Here I liked it better but wished it was in a story I liked better.

Final Thoughts

Hands down Simon Spectre is the best of the four stories with Frank Ironwine my second favourite.  It’s not necessarily that the stories are bad but I think that Ellis and I are coming from this thought experiment from different angles and frames of reference.  In 2025, I have the benefit of over 20 years of stories that appeared after these comics were published in 2004 to round out my perspective including the new pulp movement. 

Ellis’ distain for CSI science makes more sense as there were three CSI series on the air in 2004- the recent revival series CSI: Vegas was cancelled after three seasons in 2024.    Forensics do play a role in modern detective fiction but they are not the be all and end all. There is limited forensics in the Benoit Blanc movies or Rian Johnson’s other project Poker Face.

I think Ellis takes his personal piloting experience too seriously (he got to hold the controls for a few minutes and he is the last great figure in aviation history).  I gave two examples of how one might play with the pulp aviator and there are more set the series in a remote community, Alaska, outback Australia, the middle of the Gobi desert. 

The aviator becomes a heroic figure as they are the lifeline to these communities – the Australian comic strip Airhawk and the Flying Doctors (1959- 1986 and a 1981 TV movie) operated on such a premise.

It may simply be that I cannot see what Ellis was trying to do or that Ellis missed the mark.  There were no further adventures in these worlds. 

Ellis would print the one shots Crecy (historical fiction), Aetheric Mechanics (steampunk/Sherlock Holmes), Frankenstein’s Womb (Mary Shelley meeting a monster at Castle Frankenstein) and the sixteen issue series Doktor Sleepless (a mad scientist tale) under the Apparat imprint.

Razor Shi

 

For the longest time I thought that there were two Razor Shi crossovers – Shi’s first appearance in Razor Annual #1 (1993) and a sequel that appeared in Razor and Shi Special (1994) and I was kinda right and kinda wrong.

Razor Annual #1 has the story Death Watch over 18 pages (pages 2-19) and the story is to be continued.

 The Razor and Shi Special reprints those original 18 pages and an additional 6 pages making a complete 24 page story. 

So, kinda right and kinda wrong – there’s no text explaining this anywhere in the Razor and Shi Special.  I had the Special for ages and spent forever tracking down a reasonably priced copy of Razor Annual #1 only to find that I already had the story. A little annoying.

But let’s look at the story itself.  It opens with a young runaway on the streets of Queen City at 4am.  The runaway is flirting with a couple of gang members, who decide that they’d rather beat up the young girl.

Razor attacks the pair to protect the girl and in the ensuing scuffle Razor is shot and more gang members appear.

The Balls gang members chase Razor and she escapes into an abandoned building, which she discovers is the headquarters of the gang.

Razor prepares herself for the final stand when an Asian woman with her face painted white appears with a katana and throwing darts and defends Razor.

There is a scuffle and Razor pulls out some flash-bangs and the pair start their assault.  Razo refers to Shi as “China Doll.” Shi decapitates a guy.

This is where the story ends in the annual, a cool action shot with our two heroines in action.

The story continues with the pair killing the rest of the gang members.  Shi offers to tend to Razor’s wounds but Razor tells her she can look after herself.

The pair talk and Shi introduces herself as Shi, which means … DEATH! With a skull reflected in her eye. (great panel)

Razor says “Hey China Doll, thanks for saving my life.”  Shi replies that Razor is welcome and Shi is Japanese. 

The story ends with Razor realising that she is not alone and Shi is a friend.

It’s a simple story that shows us what Razor and Shi are about.

From what I could gather this annual was published in December 1993 between issues 4 and 5 of the regular Razor series.  Razor appeared in issue 0 in July 1991 and the first issue appeared in October 1992 and subsequent issues appearing quarterly.

As a Shi fan, her actions here feel a little out of character.  Also in her first two panels (pages 12 and 13 of the story), Shi has a grey circle around her right eye (it’s a black and white comic), which disappears for the rest of the story.

The soon to be published Shi: Gatecrasher revives Billy Tucci’s original concept for Shi was a character named Ran (Japanese for Rebellion) who had a red circle over her right eye exactly like the one seen in those first panels. 

It’s crazy how late in the process that Shi’s appearance and attitude wasn’t fully locked down.  We don’t even find out her name until Shi #1 (later retitled Shi: Way of the Warrior) in March 1994.  The Razor and Shi Special was published in July 1994.

This is an interesting introduction to Shi that certainly makes me want to know more about both Razor and Shi.  Interestingly Razor and Shi never cross paths again but both would go onto have many crossovers. 

It’s a solid start for Billy Tucci in both art and writing it’s a simple story but it’s well told.  With the exception of Ran becoming Shi – all characters stay on model and are easy to identify.  It’s not perfect but it’s clear that Tucci has talent and one of the joys of this reread is to see his growth as both a writer and artist and his ability to work with other creatives. 

The Great Comic Reread: Shi

Recently I finished collecting all the Shi Comics (well almost, I still have one Lethargic Lad crossover and the Shi CGI preview to find but neither are important to the story of Shi) and then of course Billy Tucci then announces more comics specifically Shi: Gatecasher and a crossover/team-up with La Muerta (another character I collect who also has a number of similarities to Shi)  - so I figure it’s time to read the complete Shi in preparation for these new releases.

Shi is the story of Ana Ishikawa, a young woman whose father and brother were murdered by the Yakuza when she was a girl.  She was trained as a Sohei warrior monk by her paternal grandfather – an unpopular move among his brethren not only because of her gender but the fact that she is half American and a Christian.   Now Shi is trying to take revenge against the man who killed her family and is now a high ranking member of the Yakuza in America.

It's a simple plot (some would say the oldest - revenge) and the interplay between the deadliness of her martial arts and her Christian beliefs make for some interesting tension. Which forms the first series Shi (later subtitled Way of the Warrior)

And then it gets more complicated and the range of stories quickly widens with demons, super-soldiers, werewolves, and kitsune all coming into play.  Shi also became a legacy character appearing in the 12th Century, the 17th Century, World War Two and a dystopian manga future.

Shi also was one of the poster girls for the Bad Girl Art movement in the 90s (a label Tucci doesn’t like) with characters like Razor, Lady Death and Witchblade, featuring strong female comic book characters with cheesecake art, anti-heroines often battling supernatural threats. 

Shi appeared 130 odd issues across 50 miniseries and one shots published by several publishers – London Night, Crusade, Image, Dark Horse, Avatar. 

It’s fascinating Shi made her debut in a Razor annual and that Tucci seems to operate on the idea that a rising tide lifts all ships and Shi appears in multiple crossovers with other independent characters like Grifter, Cyblade (a crossover that introduced the Witchblade), the Horseman, Lethargic Lad, Eenie Weenie Comics, War of Independents, Ash, Jetta, Fallen Angel, Vampirella as well as Marvel characters like Daredevil and Wolverine.

I really enjoyed the adventures of Shi and it was interesting that Tucci and his fellow writers have built a comprehensive and mostly cohesive history for the character.  I am looking forward to the new adventures to see where they will go.

Let’s explore the world of Shi over the next few posts.

Super-Heroes: the Fact Behind the Legends by Gyles Brandreth, illustrated by David Symonds: Knight Books 198

I remember getting this book out of the library in the late 80s. I remember three things: 1) The title “Superheroes” coming out of the cover with no pictures.

2) there was an illustration of James Bond casually filing his nails with a Bond behind him as he is surrounded by henchmen with guns; and

3) There was an entry for Paddington Bear.

Now I know we all have our definition of what is and what is not a superhero and where I might disagree with you, I can typically follow your chain of logic.

BUT PADDINGTON BEAR???????

Surely my memory is faulty, I’d mixed up Superheroes with David Pringle’s Imaginary People or some other reference work that I had read at the same time.  I mean it was like 40 years ago.  I must have been mistaken. But I was so certain of those three things it would pop into my head every now and then.  Recently, the thought popped up again and I decided to track down the book and put the whole thing to bed.

Easy peasy you say a book called Superheroes with no author. Let’s pop “Superheroes” into the title search on Abebooks or some other online book search tool.  Over 12,000 hits.  Let’s scroll through the results

“Superheroes don’t clean their rooms”

“Your Guide to Superheroes”
“Marvel Superheroes”

“Big brothers are Superheroes”

And many many many more that just aren’t the book.

However, I did know that the book was likely published in the late 70s or early 80s and I had a feeling it was British. 

So I start limiting the search by time which would knock out many of the results and I find Gyles Brandreth’s book.

The cover had the title coming out of the page that I remembered but had a subtitle and a guy in a plain white superhero suit (I wonder if Mark Millar saw this book and that was the inspiration for Nemesis)

But that cover might just be another printing or I just misremembered but I found a copy at a reasonable price and ordered it.

The book arrived and I flick through and there is the James Bond illustration almost as I remembered but the Bond girl was not there.

I am not doing well on my memory for this book, maybe I was wrong about Paddington Bear.  I flick a little further in the very thin book and DAMMIT the bear is there.

I read the introduction and Brandreth gives no rules or rationale for what he sees as a superhero. He merely states that these are characters are his favourite characters.

Looking over the 35 entries there are several that I certainly would not have considered superheroes, Robinson Crusoe, the Hardy Boys, Nancy Drew, Dan Dare, Peter Pan and Tin Tin just to start.

If the book had been titled Adventure Heroes or Action Stars or something similar these would have made more sense.

The entries themselves are fine a nice two or three page profiles but there are some errors, Alan Scott’s successor as Green Lantern is referred to as Hal Gordon instead of Jordan (but that could be a confusion with Flash Gordon or a simple typo).  Look I get it I’ve written my own similar non fiction works and errors happen.

Perhaps more egregious is Dr John H. Watson is referred to as Dr Henry Watson.   I mean the H might stand for Henry but there is no Henry Watson in the Cannon of Conan Doyle Stories.  Speaking of Cannon, he says that Irene Adler is the love of Holmes’ life – that’s not in the Doyle stories that’s from several of the continuation authors.  Ideally you should only reference the Conan Doyle stories or make it clear that you are referencing a continuation work (such as Baring Gould’s Sherlock Holmes of Baker Street for example).

For adventure heroes, this is not a bad quick reference work for a young reader of 10 or so.