A tribute to Martin Pasko

[JulianPerez]

Martin Pasko was one of the brighter lights of DC's Bronze Age, an incredible talent whose plots are clean, sharp, and correct, who certainly numbers amongst such greats as Cary Bates, Elliot Maggin and Alan Gold.

One of Martin Pasko's most incredible stories was one that ran in SUPERMAN #312-314 (1977) featuring Superman needing to cure the Flash of a deadly fatal illness by acquiring the healing Rondor horn of the Phantom Zone criminal Nam-Ek, who at the time was partnered up with the deadly space pirate Amalak. It featured a Superman/Supergirl team-up, and a thrilling conclusion where the deadly pirate Amalak steals Kanjar Ro's gamma gong and attempts to trick Superman into believing he had "killed" him.

Martin Pasko's work on WONDER WOMAN should not be ignored, either. My favorite is his participation in the titanic "Twelve Labors of Wonder Woman" story arc in 1975, which featured Felix Faust bringing the Statue of Liberty to life (!) to attack Wonder Woman, had male chauvinist aliens attempt to brainwash the world's feminist leaders (!), a battle with Doctor Cyber on a ski-lift where the villain goes hurtling to her doom and Wonder Woman wonders if she will see Doctor Cyber again (did you find a body? No? THEN YOU WILL SEE HER AGAIN, WW). In the last story is captured by the duplicate of an evil Walt Disney-esque tycoon, who belives that by stealing Wonder Woman's "Amazon Energy," he can bring the original Disney back to life (!).

WHY HAS THIS STORY NOT BEEN PLACED IN TRADE PAPERBACK? Seriously, people. Martin Pasko's endless imagination is never more on display than here.

Under Martin Pasko, Wonder Woman battled golden female robots, the fire god Haphaestus, the Nazi Red Panzer...amazing.

Alan Brennert may be one of the comics medium's greatest geniuses. So, if you want him to plot a story, who would you have him work with? That's right: Martin Pasko! Brennert's tale of the Earth-2 Wonder Woman could not have been possible, however, without Pasko breaking ground with an Earth-2, Earth-1 Wonder Woman team-up in the pages of WONDER WOMAN #228 (1977).

This, however, presents a very interesting implication: as Earth-1 Wonder Woman time travels to 1943 and tells Earth-2 Wonder Woman of the existence of Earth-1, this means that the Flash was NOT the "first" being to learn of the existence of the other earths, because Wonder Woman of Earth-2 knew all the way back in 1943!

Martin Pasko's work on Supergirl began for six issues starting in SUPERMAN FAMILY #211 (1981), the very same issue that was the first appearance of the Huntress. Pasko got the lead story, a Supergirl tale called "The Man With the Explosive Mind!" This awesome tale featured the Mind Bomber, who when using that old steady Supergirl supporting cast member Lena Thorul, learns that Supergirl is really Linda Danvers and as usual for a story where someone finds out a hero's secret identity, she died shortly after.

It is however, in animation that Martin Pasko has left his mark. At any given point he was co-writer of the BATMAN ANIMATED SERIES (including co-writer of what many consider to be the finest depiction of Batman in the movies, MASK OF THE PHANTASM), as well as having penned episodes of THE TICK (the "Breadmaster" episode), G.I. JOE, and was the co-creator of the MR. T cartoon along with Steve Gerber.

If you want to see the best episode of the Filmation cartoon BLACKSTAR, check out Martin Pasko's. And Pasko easily wrote the best episode of the Neal Adams creation, BUCKY O'HARE AND THE TOAD WARS, which in a more just world would have become the phenomenon that NINJA TURTLES became.

Pasko was along with Steve Gerber, one of the more influential writers in THUNDARR THE BARBARIAN. It was his idea to give Ookla his name. While going out with his pal Gerber, Martin Pasko passed by the UCLA campus and said, "Hey, why not call the character Ucla?"

[Cash Lone]

Pasko could write a good Swamp Thing yarn as well.

[Ontir]

JP, you are indeed brave! To post another praise thread, after the thrashing you took over Johns!

My first experience with Pasko, was a Plastic Man story in the early 70's. I've always enjoyed his work, and especially his re-launch of Swamp-Thing in the early 80's. After that, he appeared whiny in the comic press. I don't know, maybe he was well justified in whining, but he just seemed negative, and then he disappeared. I'd love to see him return and write something though.

It's funny you should mention "Ookla." I'd forgotten the character, but I'm in Westwood a few times a week, and every time I look at the UCLA sign, I say "ookla." To myself, generally, I don't want to seem mad to people around me, although there are a great many mad people, roaming the streets of Westwood, so I may well not be noticed! ;)

[JulianPerez]

After that, he appeared whiny in the comic press. I don't know, maybe he was well justified in whining, but he just seemed negative, and then he disappeared. I'd love to see him return and write something though.

Really? What sort of things did he say?

I love it when creators speak their minds in interviews. There was one with Len Wein a while back in WIZARD where he gave a thumbs down to WATCHMEN's ending, and as someone who has always loved Alan Moore, but who has never really understood what the big deal is about WATCHMEN, it was a vindicating thing to read!

It's funny you should mention "Ookla." I'd forgotten the character, but I'm in Westwood a few times a week, and every time I look at the UCLA sign, I say "ookla." To myself, generally, I don't want to seem mad to people around me, although there are a great many mad people, roaming the streets of Westwood, so I may well not be noticed!

That's a pretty funny story.

As far as university graduates go, one of the prouder ones is Marty Pasko's fellow Schwartz Superman scribe, Elliot S! Maggin, who graduated from Brandeis (as valedictorian, no less). There are plenty of Brandeis references peppered all over Maggin's work.

It's a commonly held belief that Jack Kirby created THUNDARR, owing to the similarities to KAMANDI. However, the character designs were done by Alex Toth, whose incredible, clean lines were on display, as were the imaginative looks that you'd expect from the guy that created SPACE GHOST. But Pasko, Mark Evanier, and Steve Gerber, those guys were tops.

[Captain Jim]

Pasko recently posted about his work in this thread (http://forums.comicbookresources.com/showthread.php?t=54795).

[Ontir]

Really? What sort of things did he say?

When Moore replaced him on Swamp-Thing, he began doing the kinds of stories that Pasko hadn't been allowed to do, in terms of a more adult nature. Instead of stopping him, as the editors had Pasko, they gave it a warning label, and let him go ahead. Pasko was not happy with this. That's the one thing that stands out, but it was one of several comments that I believe appeared in Amazing Heros, a magazine I really miss. To compare it to Wizard, would be like comparing People to th Enquirer. I was going to say Time, but that's always been the Comics Journal.

[Apathy Boy]

The first few issues of Pasko's BLACKHAWK were tremendously good. A nice mature take on adventure comics.

Unfortunately, the series spiralled into crappiness thanks to a never-ending and nonsensical storyline involving body-swapping (and Jan getting the Clap). But I always got the sense that the series' lack of direction was more the fault of the editor than of Pasko.

[dancj]

Is Marti Pasko dead or something?

[hondobrode]

I never knew that he had wanted to do more adult stories in Swamp Thing before Alan Moore broke that ground.

Yeah, is Marty dead ? It's almost as if people are talking that way. I think he's gone in the sense that he has moved on to other venues i.e. tv, iirc.

[Captain Jim]

No, he's not dead. I just told you he recently posted here. Go to the link; he talks about what he's doing now.

[Sir Tim Drake]

Is Marti Pasko dead or something?

He is certainly not dead. Or if he is, God forbid, then we now have conclusive proof that ghosts exist (http://forums.comicbookresources.com/showpost.php?p=3077336&postcount=15).

[JulianPerez]

it also should be noted that Marty Pasko, back in ACTION COMICS #468 (1977) established that Morgan Edge was Jewish, but had changed his name to hide his heritage. Which was a very, very nice touch and a cute story.

[dancj]

He is certainly not dead. Or if he is, God forbid, then we now have conclusive proof that ghosts exist (http://forums.comicbookresources.com/showpost.php?p=3077336&postcount=15).

Jusst checking. It's just the way some of the posts were phrased gave that impression.

Dan

[Ontir]

it also should be noted that Marty Pasko, back in ACTION COMICS #468 (1977) established that Morgan Edge was Jewish, but had changed his name to hide his heritage. Which was a very, very nice touch and a cute story.

This is interesting. I don't remember whether it was Elliot S Maggin, or E Nelson Bridwell, but one of them described Lex Luthor as being a non-praciticing Jew, which means two of the most dangerour, if not outright evil people in Superman's life are both Jewish.

[JulianPerez]

This is interesting. I don't remember whether it was Elliot S Maggin, or E Nelson Bridwell, but one of them described Lex Luthor as being a non-praciticing Jew, which means two of the most dangerour, if not outright evil people in Superman's life are both Jewish.

Well, I wouldn't call Morgan Edge evil, but that's probably because I don't work for him. :p

The story back in ACTION COMICS #468 (1977) was very cute because Pasko also made Morgan Edge act human instead of a cobra-grinning asshole boss, having him meet his long-lost mother who worked as a cleaning lady. For Pasko to do this in six pages is really something.

Yeah, it was Maggin that said that Luthor was a non-practicing Jew, back in a comics fanzine. And this makes sense, especially how Maggin wrote him, as having this absolutely wonderful, very Semitic sense of humor; Luthor was streetwise, he was Brooklyn, with sentences like "Charity is for sob sisters and bleeding hearts." People complain about Hackman's portrayal, but personally, I think he did it just right, with statements like "You know, there's a strong streak of good in you, Superman. But, nobody's perfect." It's great to see that Mark Waid is going by Luthor's Maggin characterization, and brought back his humor, the single most interesting thing about Lex.

Some people say that Maggin wrote the "definitive" Superman. I don't agree; Cary Bates wrote the "definitive" Superman. The S!-man on the other hand, wrote the "definitive" Luthor:

[Ontir]

Wasn't Morgan Edge connected to Intergang, and thereby Apokalips and Darkseid?!?

[Captain Jim]

Yeah, IIRC I think he first appeared in Jack Kirby's "Jimmy Olsen." I believe it was later established that this Edge was a fake, though.

[Cei-U!]

Brennert's tale of the Earth-2 Wonder Woman could not have been possible, however, without Pasko breaking ground with an Earth-2, Earth-1 Wonder Woman team-up in the pages of WONDER WOMAN #228 (1977). This, however, presents a very interesting implication: as Earth-1 Wonder Woman time travels to 1943 and tells Earth-2 Wonder Woman of the existence of Earth-1, this means that the Flash was NOT the "first" being to learn of the existence of the other earths, because Wonder Woman of Earth-2 knew all the way back in 1943!

Except that the E2 WW's memories of this encounter (and its sequel in #243) were erased courtesy of the magic lasso.

Cei-U!
I summon the catch!

[MartinPasko]

(I started writing comics when I was 16.) A thank-you to those who have pointed out that I am, in fact, still alive. After seeing myself spoken of in the past tense in so many posts, I was tempted to set the record straight, but I didn't want to appear "whiney."

And thank you for the kind words, Julian, and all of you who echoed them.

[Ontir]

Sorry, Martin!

I knew that was gonna come back to haunt me! :eek: I tried to clarify. It was an opinion remembered from a long time ago. In fact, I remember my opinion more clearly than what you actually said, so weigh it accordingly. I also said, maybe you had reason to. I know something happened on this site just yesterday that I've whined to several friends about, and feel quite justified in having done so! :D Having re-read my initial statement, it also included "appeared in the comcis press..." and of course editing can make someone sound/seem different than who they are, or what they said.

Anyway, what are you writing now? Any comics on the horizon? I really did like your Plastic Man, which was my first exposure to the character, also to either Aztec or Mayan ruins. (Sadly the issue in question didn't survive a rather "expressive" bought of flu one winter, so I can't reference it very well!), but because of the South American artifacts referenced in that story, I started looking for information, and found out about Aztecs, Mayans, Toltecs, and Incas. A "SO THERE" for all those who claim comics aren't educational!!!

With my heartfelt apologies for the "whiny."

[MartinPasko]

I wrote the whininess reference with tongue deeply in cheek, Ontir. No offense taken.

You might be remembering some essays I wrote for the early newsstand "fanzines" (pre-WIZARD), in the period when my friends Frank Miller and Steve Gerber were loudly challenging the acquire-all-rights policies of comics publishers -- an activism I gladly joined as a card-carrying member of several writers' guilds and unions, and which led to the eventual introduction of royalties to talent.

Latest comics work is the SUPERMAN RETURNS adaptation, out in July.

Don't remember a PLASTIC MAN job with a Meso-American theme, but there was an arc in the DR. FATE series I did with Keith Giffen in the back of FLASH that played with that imagery and the Aztec cosmology (one of my own personal favorites). Maybe that's what you're thinking of.

Hey, you guys who remember my work fondly, you should be aware that writers who made their reps back in the day I did rarely get work in comics now: the Editorial assumption is that the current readership assumes we're "old fashioned" and won't touch our stuff, and "edgy," contemporary submissions count for little in challenging the bias. And, in any event, writers of that vintage never get books without pitching an original concept (and giving it away for peanuts, now that the days of big paydays for talent are waning, thanks to America being in the grip of corporate hegemony). Then someone -- usually a highly-placed executive who's a contemporary and former colleague -- needs to take pity on the writer and exert downward pressure to make the project happen.

But at this point in my career, I'm thankfully comfortable enough not to need to chase after mercy f***s. So if you're gonna ask when I'm gonna write some more for DC, the question is better posed to Dan DiDio or Bob Wayne. If they think you guys are a viable market and they can leverage, say, my past association with Superman for a few more bucks, who knows...?

[Ontir]

Sadly the issue was lost long ago, but Plas and his buddy were in a museum, and there were South America antiquities about. I was drawn in by the intricacies of them. Maybe that was the artist's addition, but it caught my attention that years later, when Giffen did that arc of Dr. Fate as a back-up in Flash, I was brought back to Plastic Man!

Looking forward to the "SR" book!

It always amazes me that companies can be so eager not to compensate the people responsible for their riches. I remember Steve Englehart talking about Scorpio Rose having originally been a Madame Xanadu proposal that he withdrew from DC after a round of "Screw the Freelancer!" Maybe I'm some whackadoo utopian, but it seems to me, that if I'm running a company, and I've got people doing a book that's selling, and I'm making a great deal of money from, keeping the people responsible happy is going to work out well for me! Sometimes I think the problem isnt' that people are greedy, but that they're to short-sighted about it. Why be petty with an ore truck, when being a bit more giving can get you a greater percentage of the mine?

[MartinPasko]

Let me be clear about something: I'm in no way slamming the people who run the companies day-to-day, the Levitzes and Richardsons of the world, or whoever's running Marvel this week. It's the corporate parents I'm wary of, the suits who are now "taking a interest," to borrow a phrase from "Barton Fink." These sleeping giants are now being wakened by Wall Street's conviction that comic book publishers don't need to develop new properties so much as better exploit what they already have. Supposedly, comics publishers have untold hidden "assets" -- their libraries -- that should be "monetized" more effectively for "shareholder value." (The Street can't be expected to understand that the overwhelming majority of these properties are products of their time and need massive revision before they can even hope to be exploitable in the contemporary, post-digital pop culture environment.)

Predictably given Wall Street's assumption, however, the conglomerates' CEOs can't understand why the comic book managers would have voluntarily given away a piece of the back end starting in the late '80s -- especially without comic-book equivalents of the DGA, SAG, WGAw, etc., forcing management to make concessions by walking out.

But the hands-on managers -- the actual publishers themselves -- have seen to it that great strides in fairer compensation for talent have been made over the past two decades. Indeed, in the Image-spawned boom time of the early '90s, that compensation often became lavish, even for writers and artists who weren't part of a self-publishing consortium.

The tide the publishers can't beat back, however, is that comic book content, specifically the super hero genre, has become Big Business now (though not the books themselves, tellingly), thanks to the technology boom. By that I mean tech in general, resulting in the general population becoming more familiar with, and accepting of, science fiction tropes -- not unlike what went on in the late '60s, the tail end of "The Space Age." (Specific applications like CGI, allowing more believable super heroic imagery in feature films, are only a small part of the picture.)

This increasing appetite for SF or science fantasy content dovetails with another phenomenon, that of increasingly immature adults maintaining well past adolescence the child's simplistic world view, dividing all people neatly into "good guys" and "bad guys." This tends to afflict the culture in times when the pendulum swings toward conservatism, either because of or in sync with, an atmosphere of general anxiety. The last time we saw this was in the early 1950s, when the pervasive nervousness of anti-Communism and fear of The Bomb created a cultural climate in which disingenuously idealistic cop shows proliferated on TV. Meanwhile, in films, the Western, which previously had been largely the province of the Saturday morning matinee crowd (with the exception of the occasional John Ford or Howard Hawks film), morphed into "adult" fare packed with strained metaphors, as in "High Noon" or "The Left-Handed Gun." Substitute Al Qaeda for Commies and super heroes for Westerns, and you see the pattern repeated today.

But no one except a marginalized minority wants to read now, so the printed spawning ground of the super hero genre is pushed to the sidelines -- much as the tables of videogame manufacturers and film companies are literally pushing the comic book dealers' tables to the perimeter of the exhibit hall at conventions -- as the other, "cooler," "sexier" media that borrow from comics take center stage. Hence the increasing reluctance to profit-share: stressing the goal of keeping the comic book talent happy -- indeed, preserving the model of comics as a talent-driven business -- starts to make less sense as arguments abound that no giant media conglomerate really needs comic books in the first place. Just as many successful super hero properties have been created directly for films in recent years as have been adapted from comic books; one no longer needs the name-recognition value of a "pre-sold property" to get audience sampling.

With the increasing trend of entertainment companies divesting themselves of their publishing operations, I can't help but wonder if it's only a matter of time before the conventional wisdom goes something like this: Greater revenue streams from hardcover collections and graphic novels notwithstanding, it makes more sense for entertainment conglomerates to keep their spider- and super-men in their libraries of intellectual properties, available for exploitation in perpetuity (to the extent allowed by ever-evolving copyright and trademark law, that is), but to shut down that tacky, low-margin enterprise called publishing comics.