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November 5, 2001

ONE OF THE ALL-TIME GREAT COMIC BOOKS — and a rare example of individual style and statement over a long run — was Sheldon Mayer's Sugar and Spike.

Mr. Mayer was one of the pioneers of the industry as an editor.  He was one of the first to see the potential of a little thing called Superman and he later presided over some of the best super-hero titles, like Flash and Green Lantern.  But he came to hate editing and wanted to get back to his first love, which was cartooning, and DC Comics finally allowed him to do so.  He did wonderful work with Scribbly, The Three Mouseketeers, Doodles Duck and a few others...but Sugar and Spike was his magnum opus.  He wrote and drew the tale of two baby-talking children for 15 years.

For years, a small but fervent band of fans have lobbied DC Comics to reprint the strip, preferably in some kind of fancy "keeper" volume.  They're not going to do that but, next May, they're coming out with a facsimile reprint of Sugar and Spike #1.  And the same month, their toy/novelty division (DC Direct) will be releasing soft toys of Mayer's irresistible moppets.  The pic above is not of the final versions, but it's close, and I'll sure be buying the set.  You might want to alert your comic shop owner that you want one, too.

MY PAL Buzz Dixon recommends this link to an article about things like bio-terrorism, chemical warfare and other so-called weapons of mass destruction.  It's by a retired military weapons expert who says that such tactics are not as easy nor as lethal as some think.  In other words, it's a fear-calmer, and it's about time someone wrote one.

In a week, it'll be two months since we all stared open-mouthed at the scenes of destruction on "The Day of Infamy."  Is it just me or do phrases like, "Everything has changed," uttered as gospel at the time, now seem a bit overwrought and hysterical?  Things have changed in the sense that things always change, and we have a lot of issues before us that weren't there in the good ol' days of Gary Condit and Monica.  But I think we're a lot closer to normal now than we thought we'd be...and probably also farther from some sort of satisfying victory over the Forces of Evil.

I mean, a few days after 9/11, when it became clear that this Bin Laden guy was the baddie, did you think we'd be sitting here, almost two months later, hearing the Secretary of Defense saying, in effect, "Well, maybe we won't catch him"?  I sure didn't.

Things seem amazingly normal to me.  We've had the World Series, we've had the Emmy Awards, the Republicans are finding ways to shovel more of the treasury at wealthy Americans (especially those in the oil/energy business who gave money to the G.O.P.) and the Democrats are doing little more than saying, "Shame, shame."

BUZZ DIXON also sends along this link to Monster Kid Magazine, an online "publication" in the spirit of the old Famous Monsters of Filmland.  It's put together by Kerry Gammill, whose artwork is sadly missed these days around the comic book business.  You might especially enjoy Bill Warren's article about visiting the set of one of Boris Karloff's last films and meeting the man himself.

AN OLD PAL OF MINE, Jay Zilber, is running a good political/news commentary web page and I've placed it on my "check out almost every day" list.  If you'd like to sample it so you can consider adding it to yours, click right here.

LET'S ALL THANK Ed Golick for calling my attention to a great article on Soupy Sales so I could call it to your attention.  It's in the Detroit News and you can read it by clicking here.

A FEW YEARS AGO, Playboy Magazine ran a pretty good interview with Albert Brooks.  An Albert Brooks fan site has posted it; in fact, they have a version of it that includes some stuff that Playboy trimmed for space.  Here's that link.

I'VE ADDED an article here about my search for a special brand of orange juice (here's that link) and another one about my high school days.  Here's the link to that one.  Ciao.

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