Marvel Premiere Featuring: The Coming of Caleb Hammer

Just a slight diversion before we jump back into the Jonah Hex books. Marvel Premiere was Marvel's answer to DC's Showcase, a series of one-shots to see what would work and what. In 1980 they produced this western, written by Peter B. Gillis, penciled by Gene Day, and inked by Tony DeZuniga. Here the, is the story of Caleb Hammer.


The Devil's Starry Anvil

Our story starts in 1890, in Manacle, Wyoming. A young buck walks up to a man in a bar and calls him out. The young man draws and the man, Caleb Hammer, rushes him and knocks him clean out, tossing him into the street. The sheriff comes by, wanting to know what is going on. Hammer explains that he is with the Pinkertons and that he is looking for two men, Crawford McKie and Jake Lovelace.

They took part in the campaign to capture Geronimo but after that they took up bank robbery, murder, and other things. The sheriff explains that they did come through, but Manacle wasn't worth their time and they moved on, up in the valley. The sheriff offers Hammer a drink, but he declines and moving on.

In the morning, Hammer is riding into the valley when the youngster that he trounced the night before comes riding up, saying Hammer won't get away with treating him that way.

FLASHBACK: 1885. A Union soldier storms into a woman's bedroom, calling her Molly. The woman isn't Molly and the soldier shoots her dead, claiming that she cheated on him. A crowd gathers and Hammer is among them. He realizes that his wife has been killed and the soldier, drunk out of his mind, starts shouting that he had the wrong hotel room. Hammer had been training for the ministry and his faith has abandoned him.

Present day: The young gun demands his chance to have revenge. Hammer dismounts, picking up a fist-sized stone. The young gun jumps off his horse and draws on Hammer, who responds with throwing the stone into the young man's shoulder, breaking it. The man goes down and Hammer walks over, picks up his pistols and snaps the cylinders off and rides off.

Night falls and Hammer comes upon a ranch, having followed the outlaws trail. The cabin shows signs of a struggle and when he checks the barn, he snags his boot on a tripwire and the barn explodes, he manages to grab a colt and rescue it from the flames.

FLASHBACK: 1886, the McCormick Harvesting Machine factory in Chicago, Illinois. There is a union strike and as scabs try to cross the picket line a fight breaks out and six men are killed in the riot. One of them is Isaak Hammer, Caleb's younger brother. Caleb was visiting his brother to get over his wife's death, but once again his faith crushed him.

Present day: Hammer notices that there is a cabin on the cliff overlooking the ranch he just found. He spots a reflection from inside the cabin and realizes that his prey is up there, watching the burning barn.

Inside the cabin, Crawford and Jake are sure that 'the Pinkerton' is dead, but just in case, they still have the ranch family as hostages. Nora, the wife, has had enough and demands to be let go because Jimmy has 'got himself a sickness'. The crooks ignore her.

Outside the cabin, Hammer gets closer and realizes the cabin sits on The Devil's Anvil, a solid piece of rock outcropping that offers no cover whatsoever. Hammer realizes that the only weapon that he has is..... fear. He puts his hands near his mouth and start howling like a wolf.

In the cabin, Crawford gets a little spooked but the rancher explains that there are no wolves. It must be the Indian wolf-spirit whose lands they have defiled. Just then they look out the window and spot Hammer outlined against the full moon, his arms raised and draped in some cloth. Just as quickly he vanishes.

FLASHBACK: 1888, Montana. Hammer bursts into a cabin to bring in an outlaw and ends up shooting the man in the shoulder but a huge snowstorm moves in and they are snowed in for five months. Sadly, the shot man dies and when Hammer leaves the cabin he is a man completely devoid of any faith at all.

Present day: The rancher explains that the Devil's Anvil was an Indian holy place and the two crooks actually helped capture Geronimo. The Wolf-Spirit wants to punish them for that. Hammer pulls his ghost stunt once more and the crooks are getting more and more edgy, starting to believe the rancher.

Just then Jimmy falls to the floor in convulsions and one of the crooks takes that as evidence of the wolf-spirit trying to get into the cabin. He lets loose with a barrage of bullets, killing teh boy just as Hammer kicks in the door. He punches the crooks senseless as one of them starts screaming that it was the wolf-spirit that was trying to get them.

It is then that Caleb Hammer realizes that it was the fear that HE instilled in the crooks that led them to kill Jimmy. Hammer picks up the boy's body and takes him outside...to look at the stars.

Impressions:
Thirty four years ago I loved the heck outta this book. Re-reading it, Marvel was doing their spin on Jonah Hex with some slight twists (unscarred, not a bounty hunter). Caleb Hammer was a man whose life was full of tragedy but he didn't turn to booze and he didn't shoot to kill. He just turned his back on God and busted guns with his bare hands. Of course, Marvel got DeZuniga to do the inks so that it would even LOOK like a Jonah Hex book.

A lot of this artwork was muddy and in some places they had white letters on a black background, darn near unreadable on newsprint

I can understand why this never took off, the Western was pretty much dead at this point except for Jonah and he only had five years left as a Western himself. It would be fun for Justin and Jimmy to 'borrow' this character from Marvel and clash with Hex once he gets back to his own time.

All Star Western, A brief look.

You may know this about me from prior postings, you may not. Since I have been resurrected and once again find myself perched in front of a keyboard, I shall repeat myself.

 

  Jonah Hex, for me, was never really part of the Detective Comics Universe. Jonah was born out of Weird ___________ Comics, that red-headed left handed step-child of the 70's. He wasn't the good guy western and he took a lot of the western tropes and subjugated them and then he did the same with comic book tropes ("Death of a Bounty Hunter", anyone?). I think that Super-Spectacular was the first time I ever teared up reading a comic (except maybe from laughing at Uncle Scrooge comics).

 

  Then Jonah showed up in Justice League of America and if you ever want to see an abomination against nature, just pick up those two lovely books. The next time he showed up in JLA it was the heroes that were stomping on HIS turf, so it wasn't AS bad. Jonah then got tossed into the future and there were the 'cross-overs' with 'Batman' and the SUPER SPECIAL GUEST APPEARANCE of the Legion of Superheroes. I went along for the ride because it was Jonah Hex and Jonah in the future is more interesting than a comic with no Jonah in it whatsoever.

 

Of course, at the end of that run, a tear stained my cheek. Fleisher could write tragedies like nobody's business (but I must mention that Jonah Hex Vol #50 was another tearjerker for me). And then we come to the Vertigo Hex. Ahhh, yes. Vertigo Hex, the Hex that proved that the JLA stories weren't the negative apex of Hex story telling. Vertigo Hex, that which spawned the sword weilding Heroclix figure. Vertigo Hex, that which stoked the twisted fever dreams of Neveldine and Taylor and spat upon our summer cinema hopes like my great-grandma unleashing her chaw upon the shoes of an unwanted salesman.

 

  Every time that Jonah would be tossed into a story (Kents, Swamp Thing, The Return of Bruce Wayne, Generations) it was always because someone said "Western? Let's toss in Jonah Hex, the fanboys will love that!" and I would grit my teeth, buy it, and tell myself that this was an alternate universe Hex. I could understand Hex in 2050, but Hex hanging out and talking gritty with superheroes? Nahhhh, it wasn't for me.

 

  Rocket forward to All Star Western. Hex in Gotham. Weeeeellllllllll, I can kinda suspend my disbelief. It had more of a Wild Wild West feel (the series, not the movie) to it and there were Easter eggs for the superhero fanboys this time. Overall the story telling was solid and things went along pretty well. And then, Vandal Savage. errrrrr, OK, I guess. Jekyll and Hyde and Eclipso's diamond? Seemed to be just another throwaway story as part of a VAST CROSSOVER EVENT. Meh.

 

  Which brings us to Booster Gold..... Booster Gold. I liked Booster in his own book (the most recent series) but for Booster to be in Jonah Hex's old west was too much for me. But I continued to buy it because it was Jonah Hex, but MORE importantly, it was Palmiotti and Gray Jonah Hex. Booster being Booster, Jonah ends up in present day and has run-ins with Batman-clone, Bruce Wayne, Constantine, Swamp Thing and finally Superman.

 

 All of which brings me to this. I haven't enjoyed Jonah Hex in the present day. There has been some interesting insights and asides to his character, but overall, I couldn't recommend the book to a fan of westerns. The book became a book for folks that read Jonah Hex and a book that is trying to pull in people that read super hero books. I am the former and no longer the latter. But again, let's get back to this issue with Superman. Of the new 52, every book I started reading got canceled fairly quickly or I lost interest. Never picked up any Superman, Batman, JLA. Why? Because I didn't want to be forced to read the VAST ALL ENCOMPASSING CROSSOVER EVENT THAT IS FIVE TIMES BIGGER THAN THE ONE LAST YEAR!. That's why. But I did enjoy Hex's cynical view on how good a job Superman is doing (and my Lovely Wife almost broke her neck doing a double take when I read out loud the line about the "last fella" that tried to help and how "They hung him on a cross")

 

But let's get to the musem, shall we? Sadly, I only pick up my books (two of them. Jonah and Afterlife with Archie) based on whenever I can get to the comic store and thanks to everyone on Facebook,  ended up knowing of the main display in the museum. The whole museum made me smile. We had the nice nod to Tony DeZuniga as the collector of memorabilia and we saw Jimmy (and I think that was Justin) walking around the exhibit. On a side note, that docent, whom I imagined in my mind was named Dwayne, didn't look like me whatsoever. Oh, well.

 

But back to the story. This issue was the highlight of the series for me so far based purely on the conversation with Supes, the Museum, and the Aftermath. The Aftermath. I capitalize it because it deserves it. The panel with Hex riding into the oncoming light while calling Tallulah's name... my stomach was in knots as I turned the page, knowing, yet dreading what was coming. And there is was. The marks on the road, the smashed bike, and finally Hex's crumpled body on the asphalt. We know that Jonah lives and we know that he gets back to his own time (I've seen the solicit for #30), but it is HOW he lives and how he gets back that will be the interesting part.

 

  I know I'm being selfish, but I hope when he comes back to the Old West, it's more devoid of the DC Universe than what we have been seeing.

 

  I'll be back next week, trying to pick up where I left off in reviewing Jonah Hex Vol 2.

  Until then, you kids stay offa my lawn.

I ain't dead & I'm coming back

There have been rumors, but I am not dead.

Tuesday I will be back in the saddle and on the keyboard talking about All-Star Western, Hex, and other stuff.

Til then.....

Jonah Hex #17 V2 "The Ballad of Tallulah Black: Part 2"

Jonah Hex #17 V2 May '07

"The Ballad of Tallulah Black: Part 2"
Justin Gray and Jimmy Palmiotti, story - Phil Noto, art and cover

Twice as Mean and Twice as Ugly - We open with a little target practice. A man stands with his arms outstretched, a bottle in each hand, a wanted poster (of him) pinned to his chest. Hex is using the man to train Tallulah how to shoot. Finally Hex instructs the man to place a bottle on his head and then straps a gun belt on him. Hex instructs the man that he can shoot Tallulah, but she HAS to shoot the bottle before she shoots him.

The man draws and the bottle topples from his head, Tallulah takes a bullet in the leg and shoots the bottle and the man with one shot. Hex has her strip off he pants and he sears the wound with a heated knife (since the bullet passed through).

Later the night, the dead man lying nearby, Tallulah and Jonah are sitting by the campfire and she starts questioning Jonah, Is he ever gonna hang up his guns, why not just become a sheriff, is there a woman and a farm in his life? Jonah puts an end to the questioning and goes to sleep. Tallulah sits there staring at Hex and slowly reaches out to him. Jonah tells her to go to sleep and she responds with venom at being rejected.

That night Tallulah has nightmares of being raped and disfigured and Jonah eventually has to slap her awake and then they find themselves in an a lovers embrace.

Been a Long Time Comin' - Next day, Hex is dragging the dead man behind his horse and Tallulah is riding alongside. She wears a bandanna over her face and then dismounts and goes into the saloon while Jonah collects his bounty. She walks up to the bar and inquires of seven men, former Rebs now working for the government. The barkeep keeps asking questions and finally Tallulah pulls down the bandana and announces that she is in the company of one Jonah Hex and she aims to have her vengeance. Just then the men in question come strolling down the stairs, full of liquor and accompanied by 'ladies' . 

Tallulah finishes her drink, turns and opens fires, killing three men and wounding a woman. She turns and heads into the street, luring the remaining four out into the open. She quickly dispatches one as Hex and the sheriff come out onto the boardwalk. The sheriff starts to intervene but Hex wards him off.

Tallulah takes one in the shoulder and Jonah shoots a man (who had snuck up behind Tallulah) in the back. She kills one more and finally it is just she and the ringleader. He shoots her in the leg and then they are both out of bullets. He starts to plead for his life and she starts to reload. He spies a pistol dear one of his dead partners and he lunges forward, grabs it and shoots Tallulah in the gut. He starts to crawl away toward another gun but she shoots him twice and he falls backwards. She stands over him and then falls down herself.

Hex picks her up and takes her to the doctor.

On the Spirit Trail - The doctor does what he can and then Hex pays him to go to the saloon and leave them be. Jonah goes inside and starts talking to Tallulah...

Statistics for This Issue
Men Killed By Jonah - 1
Running Total - 605 (432 past, 55 future, 15 Vertigo, 113 V2)
Jonah's Injuries - None
Timeline - This issue starts 3 months from last issue (this comes out during the campfire discussion) and covers a few days.
Rape Percentage - 41% (7 out of 17) 

This was one great issue and one of the high points was the relationship between Hex and Tallulah. The tension between Hex treating her like a human and like a pain in the ass teetered back and forth throughout the issue. The ending with the young girl being in the dream made one wonder if the girl was Death or just Tallulah's innocence. Of course, when we get to issue 70 even more questions are raised regarding the little girl.




Next Issue - Bear steaks, Mystery Meat and never get involved in a domestic dispute.

I just can't get excited about comics anymore

  I tried getting wow'ed about the NEW 52!!!! but I have to admit that it fell flat for me. That's probably my own fault because I didn't want to buy in to tons and tons of comics in order to follow a storyline. The books I bought?

Dial H - I loved the wacky idea behind this book. I actually enjoyed that I had to READ the book to understand what was going on but the art......ARRRGH the "art" on this book is such a pain to look at. But I keep on going with it right up until it gets canceled!

Men of War - What a mishmash of crap. The art was mediocre and the storyline was more about 'close encounters' with meta-humans in a war setting, something that might be interesting, but wasn't even remotely close to being readable. I bailed on issue 6 of 8.

Resurrection Man - Knew nothing of it and I took a chance. Stuck with it for 6 of 12 issues.

Birds of Prey - I liked the First Birds, wasn't that jazzed about the Second Birds (which lasted 15 issues before this reboot) and I have to admit, I'm just not emotionally vested in these characters anymore. I will probably drop this book.

Green Lantern and Green Lantern Corps - Never wanted to get into Red Lanterns or the Multi-colored Lanterns (with Kyle). I enjoyed the books buy it started getting into "Ya think THAT was something? Watch THIS!" and at the end of Jones run we got the First Lantern, Parralax, Black Lantern Corps, Nekron and everything was wrapped up soooo quick and tidy. I found myself staring at the book and wondering why I wasted my money. I'm dropping both of these.

G.I. Combat - The War That Time Forgot and the Unknown Soldier features in this book were boooring. When they finally brought out the new spin on the Haunted Tank (and the War Wheel) I found myself actually Whooping with joy to read the book. But they canceled it with issue 7.

All-Star Western - I'm a Jonah Hex fan. Followed it through Hex, read the Vertigo, watched the movie, and I have been a fan of All-Star Western. I'm not so sure about bringing Hex into present day Gotham but I'm not in control of things around here. What worries me is that All-Star Western doesn't show up on any September solicitation lists. So they will bring Jonah to modern day Gotham for two issues and leave him here? Can't the guy catch a break? At least it will give Susan Hillwig another time travel story to write.

I'm not a guy that wants to buy 12 Superman books a month or 27 Batman books a month or 8 Justice League books a month to enjoy a story or understand what is happening. Heck, when I was a kid, I bought DC over Marvel because I COULDN'T get every issue of a series. DC was more contained and was easier to pick up and read. But now...now.... sheesh, every year is the NEXT BIG THING THAT WAS BIGGER THAN THE LAST BIG THING and frankly, I don't have the emotional time nor the money to invest in it anymore.

I'll reread what I have and keep buying Jonah Hex books, but folks, I'm tapped out. I'll keep blogging about Hex and what else lies in my collection, but until something worth my money comes along, I'm sitting on the sidelines with the current books.

The Real Origin of Batman, Inc.?

Here is a an old Hollywood Palace video that MIGHT be the inspiration behind Batman, Inc.

The answer starts at 11:54 (I can't figure out how to get the embedded video to start at that point)

Jonah Hex #16 V2 "The Ballad of Tallulah Black"

Jonah Hex #16 V2 Apr '07
"The Ballad of Tallulah Black"
Justin Gray and Jimmy Palmiotti, story - Phil Noto, art and cover

The Cruel Kindness of Children - A young girl is fishing and pulls in her catch. She calmly takes a rock and smashes in the fish's skull and then heads out. She comes upon Jonah Hex. Hex is leaning against a tree, watching a man that he has hung slowly strangle to death. The girls asks if Hex hung him and if he will cut him down. Jonah says that the man brought it on himself and that he promised Hex his boots. The girl states that it isn't very Christian of Hex and then she jumps up and grabs the man by the feet, hanging her full weight on him and thus snapping his neck. Hex replies with "They teach ya that in church?" and the girl heads on home.

The Ballad of Tallulah Black - Seven men stand in front of a log cabin, holding the entire family in their crosshairs. They state that homesteaders should have surrendered their land and they are here to take it. A woman comes out of the cabin and starts berating the gunmen as cowards and the ring-leader starts by shooting the family. The woman rushes at the men and they shoot her in the left eye, dropping her to the ground. The men burn the house and then ride off to tell the "Sergeant" that the land has been abandoned.

Time passes and the woman, Tallulah, opens her eye after being poked awake by the little girl that was fishing. The girl invites Tallulah home for supper, but Tallulah declines, saying she has bodies to bury. The girl leaves, warning that there is a bad man in the woods.

One year later - Several men walk into a bordello and they recognize Tallulah from their earlier encounter. She now has an eye patch and is doped up, sitting on a couch. Simon, the leader, indicates that he would like to have Tallulah for the night but the Madam suggests someone more lively. Simon insists and then takes Tallulah upstairs, throwing her on the bed. Tallulah can't tell if she understands her reality and when Simon assures her that he is real, she attacks him, scratching deep gouges in his face. He punches her and then drags her around the room by the hair before pulling a knife  and then everything goes black.

Tallulah wakes up to see the Madam and the doctor standing over her.

Time Doesn't Heal All Wounds - Three weeks later.  Tallulah stands in front of a mirror, her face a jigsaw of scars and the madam telling her of a man who is "a killer to the manner born" (I LOVE how Justin and Jimmy write dialogue!). She gives Tallulah some money and a pistol and the advice that this man, Jonah Hex might take pity on her since she is now as scarred as he.

Three more weeks later. Three men are hidings amongst some rocks hollering that they KNOW that Hex is out there. While they are weighing their options a stick of dynamite comes tumbling over the outcropping of rock and explodes below them, shearing off the ledge where they were perched. They fall backwards into the canyon, one getting his head crushed along the way. Hex walks up...

We next see Tallulah sitting under the remnants of a tree when three men atop two horses comes riding by. They are running from Hex and they stop and quickly rob Tallulah of her horse.

Out of the Frying Pan - Tallulah, now forced to walk across the desert, stumbles upon a ramshackle town and falls, literally, into the general store. The storekeeper bends down as if to take care of her....

Tallulah wakes up to finds herself tied, spread-eagle, on a bed and clothed in large dress. She hollers for release and the storekeeper walks in and says...

Just then a customer comes into the store and the storekeeper exits to tend to them. Meanwhile Tallulah attempts to gnaw away her bonds and then starts screaming for help. The storekeeper tells the patron that his wife is sick in the head, fighting her way against the evils of liquor. A pistol is placed against the storekeeper's head and the patron demands to see the "wife".

The storekeeper walks into the room, followed closely behind by Jonah Hex and his pistol. Hex cuts Tallulah loose, hands the knife to her and exits the room. A few minutes later, Tallulah emerges from the store, blood staining every inch of the dress. She determines that her savior is, in fact, Jonah Hex and offers him a few hundred dollars to kill the seven men that destroyed her family and her life.

Hex turns down her offer because the men aren't wanted and it ain't enough money for seven men. Tallulah states that she wants to learn how to kill them, not have Hex do it for her. Jonah ain't interested. She says that what they done to her is even worse under her clothes but...

To which Jonah responds "We're gonna have ta work on yore aim."

Statistics for This Issue
Men Killed By Jonah - 3
Running Total - 604 (432 past, 55 future, 15 Vertigo, 112 V2)
Jonah's Injuries - None
Timeline - This issue covers a year and six weeks
Rape Percentage - 43% (7 out of 16)

An incredibly cruel story with some odd undertones that won't become apparent until issues 50 and 70 regarding the identity of the little girl.

And what can we say about Tallulah? A beautiful strong woman who is brutalized in ways that would drive most people into madness and who eventually will almost steal the limelight away from Jonah Hex in his own book. She is probably one of the strongest supporting characters to have come into comics in the past 10 years and sadly, in the Jonah Hex movie, she was reduced to a groan inducing fanboy Easter Egg.

This is a great story, difficult to read at times because of the terror visited upon Tallulah, and it is definitely a turning point in the story of Hex.

Next Issue: If it is even possible, things turn uglier than they already are.