Death of Three Robots

Four months after Shogun Warriors came to an end, Doug Moench used an issue of Fantastic Four to give those characters some closure.

Fantastic Four #226 (January 1981) starts with a giant robot stealing a train (the whole train, mind you) full of gold off a track in eastern Europe. When Reed and his family hear about this on the TV news, their thoughts go to the Shogun Warriors--the only giant robots they currently know are extant. Have the Shoguns gone bad?

Of course, they never use the phrase "Shogun Warriors." Marvel no longer had the rights to the characters. The human pilots--Savage, Genji and Carson--were Marvel creations and could apear, but the actual robots could not.

That's what makes this well-written story is actually pretty clever. Not being able to show the robots means a final Shogun story is potentially disappointing or anti-climatic. In fact, we find out that all three robots have already been destroyed by a new renegade robot. We don't see more than bits of debris--not enough of them to risk copyright violation. How can this not be disappointing?

Well, first, the story is a good one. Part of the set up is Franklin reenacting David and Goliath with some action figures, then getting miffed when his dad doesn't pay any attention to this. This seems like a throwaway bit of characterizations, but its setting up future plot point.

Savage, Genji and Carson show up at the Baxter Building to report the destruction of their robots. All three are feeling down--suddenly, the most important part of their lives have been forever taken from them.







But there's no time for whining. The renegade robot is robbing a bank in Japan. The location is near the Shogun's sanctuary (destroyed during the course of their own book). Along with the three former robot pilots, the FF flies off to deal with this.

At first, the robot is too tough a nut to crack, fighting past both the FF and the local military. The pilots, meanwhile, have entered the sanctuary to find out what's going on. The robot shows up and helpfully explains everything.

The robot's pilot is a random guy who stumbled across the ruins of the sanctuary. He found a partially constructed robot and figured out how to finish building it. He also found information about the Shoguns, so made a point of destroying them.

His motive? He pretty much just enjoys being a bully.

The FF regroup and attack again, but are still having trouble finding a weak spot.

But then, Reed proves he was paying attention to Franklin's David and Goliath game. Trying the same ancient tactic, he plants a big rock right between the robot's eyes. This dazes it long enough for the FF to get the upper hand and allow the three pilots to get inside and jump the big bully. Everyone then gets clear just before the robot self-destructs.

The story as a whole is a good one, with Bill Sienkiewicz giving us effective art work. The foreshadowing with Franklin's story is something a lot of readers will probably pick up on, but it still works nicely.

And the last page gives us effective closure for Savage, Genji and Carson despite the absence of the robots. The three had been feeling collectively depressed because they no long had their own giant robots. But all three realize they have productive lives to live. One does not need a giant robot to be a hero. As Richard Carson says: "Heroism is a relative thing--and it can be done in little ways on a small scale--on a human scale."

Not that one would turn down a chance to own a giant robot should the opportunity arise. If anyone has a spare giant robot they are looking to get rid of, I'll take it.

Next week, we'll visit with "the first modern detective."

Shogun Warriors, Part 8

Cover dated July 1980

After a rare weak issue with Shogun Warriors #17, the series ends with a satisfying bang.

Ilongo Savage and his robot Dangard Ace get the spotlight this time in issue #18 when the aliens attack again, sending a giant robot named Megatron to destroy him.

It's just a coincidence that the robot (even bigger than the Shoguns) shares a name with the leader of the Decipticons. The creation of the Transformers mythos is still a few years away at this point. But its a fun coincidence.

The battle is a neat one. An ocean liner is caught in the crossfire, so Savage has to worry about protecting innocents while fighting for his life. It's a situation that Doug Moench and Herb Trimpe have used repeatedly throughout the series, but it makes sense and the variety of monsters the Shoguns have fought keep it from getting stale.

I also enjoy the fact that Savage is desperately calling for help from the other Shoguns. But their communication pendants no longer exist and (at first) neither Carson or Genji happen to be the cockpits of their robots to get his message.

Carson finally does hear the call for help, though, and takes Raydeen through a near-orbit loop to get to Savage quickly. Megatron is big and powerful enough to shrug off even the combined attack of two Shoguns, though. Fortunately, he helpfully acknowledges he can't swim when asked (a contrived moment in an otherwise fun fight scene), so the good guys win by simply knocking him into the ocean.

This, by the way, is the last time we get to see Dangard Ace and Raydeen. The last two issues have all three pilots sharing Combatra's controls. This is a little disappointing, but the story is otherwise coming to a very satisfying conclusion.

I also enjoy some dialogue where Savage calls out the aliens on their motives. They claim they must strip us of advanced tech because we're too primitive to travel into space without endangering the rest of the galaxy. But its the aliens who are showing a complete indifference to innocent lives. That's actually setting up an important plot point for the next few issues.

Cover dated August 1980

The pilots realize they need some help and decide to start by contacting the Fantastic Four. The aliens, who are monitoring all this, are fine with it. Reed Richards, along with all the rest of Earth's super-smartypants guys, is on their hit list. So Primal One--the alien leader--figures this is simply getting all their eggs in one basket.

But there is trouble afoot for Primal One among his allies. We learn he's part of a galactic federation in which various races are sworn to help one another. He's calling on an alien named Captain Cymell to use her really, really, really big robot (named Gigantauron) to help destroy the Shoguns and the FF. She's reluctant to do so, having second thoughts about Primal One's mission. But she's sworn to help, so soon Gigantauron is threatening to literally stomp down a big section of Manhattan.




Reed volunteers the FF to help man Combatra's various components, though I'm not sure he uses his resources in the most effective way. He and Sue will act as pilots, while Ben (who is one of the world's most skilled pilots) is left in the Baxter Building to handle traffic control. Smartest man in the Marvel universe, my eye.

Still, it works out okay. Unable to hurt Gigantauron from the outside, the Torch carves a hole big enough for Genji to get inside. She finds and messes with the robots gyroscope, causing it to fall down and go boom.

Cover dated September 1980

That brings us to the final issue. Cymell uses a tractor beam to recover her robot, but that allows the good guys to follow in Combatra and find her big mother ship. Ironically, she had pretty much decided to quit and leave, no longer able to morally follow Primal One's genocidal lead. But now she feels she has to defend herself.









Combatra finds a way into the alien ship through a disposal chute. Kind of reminds you of the Death Star's thermal exhaust port, doesn't it? Alien ship designers really need to take a safety class on that sort of thing.

The FF fight Cymell's ground troops while Combatra whacks aside some flying robot craft. Eventually, they find Primal One, who appears to be an energy being. It's a chance for Combatra to destroy him, but Genji can't force herself to pull the trigger on a living being. This is the final straw for Cymell, convincing her she's fighting for the wrong side.

 Sue, meanwhile, does some invisible scouting and discovers that Primal One is really an avatar for Maur-Konn, the series' original bad guy. It turns out he (and the Followers of the Light) were all part of the same Galactic federation. Maur-Konn had been kicked out for... well, for being Maur-Konn. He'd been posing as Primal One to trick the federation into helping him destroy the Earth.  It turns out he was also responsible for aiding and funding Dr. Demonicus, tying all the major Shogun Warriors story arcs together.

So, with his final defeat, Shogun Warriors comes to an end. It was a fun book. Doug Moench gave us several interconnected epic-level story arcs that were well-written and followed the logic of a comic book universe very neatly.



 I've early mentioned that Herb Trimpe seemed to be channeling his inner eight-year-old when he designed the various monsters & robots that the Shoguns fight. A giant hand whose fingers detach into separate weaponized vehicles? How cool is that? When an artist uses his sophisticated skills as an adult to channel the imagination of his inner child, it can't help but be cool.

But what will happen to the Shoguns now that their own book is being cancelled? Doug Moench will get a chance to give them a send-off in another book a few months later. We'll take a look at that next week.

Shogun Warriors, Part 7

Wow. Shogun Warriors #16 (May 1980) is a surprisingly brutal issue and a game-changer for the title.

I will get one complaint out of the way right up front. We know before we even read the story that the Shogun Sanctuary is destroyed and the Followers of the Light all killed. We know this because THE DARN COVER TELLS US SO! I know that covers sometimes lie, but this one is telling the exact truth. Gee whiz.

The story starts in California, where the Shoguns are getting in some practice near Richard Carson's house. Carson's gal Deena is still feeling some jealousy towards Genji, but she recognizes this as irrational and is actually going to get a few Crowning Moments of Awesome in the upcoming story.

This is an effective bit of characterization. Deena is given enough flawed humanity to make her seem like a real person, but she's still likable and the character moments enhance rather than hinder the main plot.

That main plot involves the "men in black" guys who had been seen sneaking around Carson's home in previous issues. They return with a vengeance, hitting the heroes with a gas that weakens them and taking the pendants that allow them to communicate with the followers. The "men in black" guys" turn out to be robots and the three pilots (along with Deena, who wields a mean shotgun) manage to take a number of them out and get to their robots.

They quickly fly to the Sanctuary, but the bad guys have gotten their first and destroyed the place, killing the Followers. Abruptly, the Shogun pilots are on their own.

It is indeed abrupt. But it works in terms of effective storytelling. The appearance of the Men in Black in previous issues let us know something fishy was going on. This provided enough foreshadowing to give the plot twist dramatic viability without taking away the shock of what happened.

It's showing the stupid plot twist on the stupid cover that takes away the shock. Though I guess I might be a little unfair--experienced comic book readers would have known that covers often distort or mislead for dramatic impact, so perhaps this cover is a sort of double-bluff, causing readers to assume the event was really just an illusion or a holographic training program.

Anyway, a dragon-like alien shows up. This is the creature responsible for destroying the Sanctuary--it now tries to talk the Shoguns into simply abandoning their robots. It's logic is that humanity is advancing technologically too quickly. They might be heading into space too soon, bringing death and destruction with them. Their motivation is very similar to Klaatu's mission in the film The Day the Earth Stood Still, but their methods are more overtly aggressive. The alien has destroyed the Sanctuary, but also plans to kill Reed Richards, Tony Stark and pretty much every other really smart guy on the planet.

The Shoguns defeat the the alien, but now they are on their own, without a safe place to store the robots and without anyone who knows how to do maintenance on them.

From a really good issue, we now arrive at what is so far the only really weak link in the series. The pilots need a new place to store their robots. Savage can store his in an underwater cavern near his lab in Madagascar. Genji, who is relocated to San Francisco, and Carson make the bizarrely dumb decision to store Combatra in an abandoned tenement building--a completely unsecure location--and Genji doesn't even bother to turn off the "shimmer tube" that allows access to the robot's flight deck. Genji has been presented as an intelligent woman for 16 issues, now she metaphorically leaves the car keys in her unlocked Giant Robot of Death. It is a rare instance of poor storytelling from Doug Moench and Herb Trimpe.

So when a family of migrant workers decides to sleep in the tenement, the kid in the family stumbles into the shimmer tube, ends up on the flight deck and accidentally causes Combatra to take off. Carson has to follow in Raydeen and spend most of the issue trying to force Combatra down without hurting the kid.

It is a weak and uninteresting issue. It also brings up an interesting point about the future of the Shoguns. The kid keeps accidentally firing off Combatra's weapons, many of which are missiles and rockets. With the Sanctuary destroyed, how are the Shoguns' getting ammo reloads? I would give them a pass on their fuel--we can assume that the advanced tech of the robots includes power plants that last a long time or perhaps can refuel by solar energy. But they are going to need a steady supply of missiles. Remember that I'm reviewing these as I read them for the first time, so I'm curious to see if this is becomes a plot point. To be fair, there is only a few issues left, so the story might come to an end before ammunition shortages become an issue.

Next week, we'll see the first of two "Comic Books Take on Real Life" with a look at a comic book biography of Crazy Horse published in 1950.

Shogun Warriors, Part 6: Giant Robots vs. the Yakuza

Shogun Warriors #15 (April 1980)  is a filler issue, with Steven Grant (writer) and Mike Vosburg (artist) taking over for Doug Moench and Herb Trimpe. (Trimpe still did the cover.) But it's a really good filler issue, telling a truly exciting story.

The Shogun pilots are all back in Japan, getting in some training together. But all three of them are awkward in their control of the robots.

There's a good reason for this. Richard Carson isn't really Richard Carson. He's a member of the Yakuza--the Japanese mafia--wearing a Carson mask. The real Carson has been kidnapped.

The fake Carson has been slipping neurotoxins into Savage's and Genji's food, which is making those two groggy and uncertain when they pilot their Shogun Warriors.

The plan, of course, is for the Yakuza to gain control of the robots, since heavily-armed giant robots can be an enormous benefit to a criminal organization. If the local shopkeeper isn't paying his protection money, a visit from a 300-foot tall metal monster will probably get him to cooperate pretty quickly.

This story, by the way, is apparently a flashback, as the next issue will pick up right after the end of the Dr. Demonicus story arc.

The Yakuza plan begins to unravel when they decide to tie Carson to the seat of a car and drive the car off a cliff to crash on top of the Shogun base. Carson, remember, is a stunt driver. So, even though it means driving with his feet, he manages to steer the car away from the cliff and down a road.

I really enjoy that scene. Vosberg does a great job choreographing the action and it shows Carson being clever as well as having fast reflexes.

Carson's escape blows his double's cover, which leads to a straight-on fight between the robots. Unfortunately, the two good guy pilots are still groggy from the toxins they've been fed. The Yakuza begins to wipe the floor with them.

But if the good guys can't win the fight on their own, they can at least distract the villain. This allows Carson to get on board Raydeen and, after getting punched around himself for a few panels, finally get the drop on the Yakuza. After that, it's pretty easy to catch the remainder of the gang.

So Shogun Warriors #15 is indeed a filler issue--a break from the usual robot vs. monster stories with guest writers/artists stepping up to the plate. But it's what a filler issue should be--telling an exciting story in its own right that remains true to the characters and spirit of the book.

Next week, we'll travel with British commandos through the Sahara desert.

Shogun Warriors--Part 5

Shogun Warriors #12 (January 1980) is the first of a three-part epic adventure that takes the robots into space and finishes up the story arc that began back in issue #8. Remember that the robots have been getting attacked individually by weird monsters arriving on Earth inside meteors. Now, a particularly large meteor--big enough to destroy civilization--is heading for Earth.

The Followers summons all three robots to deal with this situation, but not before we get a little more characterization. Genji is now on the run from the Japanese government for supposedly stealing the prototype plane she was flying way back in issue #1. (So far, it hasn't been explained why the Followers of the Light haven't themselves returned the darn plane to help clear her. Actually, I hadn't thought of that myself until just now, but I'm not a mad scientist genius--just a regular genius.)

So Genji flies Combatra to the U.S. and asks Richard Carson if she can stay with him. Carson's gal, Deena, is a tad annoyed that a hot woman shows up out of nowhere and asks to live with Deena'a boyfriend. She throws a tantrum, which might have been a bad direction to take with a character we are supposed to like. But an immediate knee-jerk reaction like that is actually understandable and Deena is ready to apologize a few moments later. Unfortunately for her, Carson and Genji are beamed away to deal with that darn meteor.

I haven't the faintest idea if I have any female readers. But if I do, please allow me to advice you never to fall in love with a Giant Robot Pilot. It's just plain embarrassing when they get beamed away just as they are proposing, about to say "I do," or buying you a cupcake.

Anyways, the Warriors fly into space to break apart the meteor, which they do with dispatch. But this has taken them to the far side of the moon, where they spot a really, really big space station.

Over the next few issues, we find out what's going on. The villain here is Doctor Demonicus, a mad scientist who specializes in making giant monsters. He had originally appeared in Godzilla #4 a few years earlier, using his monsters to take vengeance on a world that he felt had rejected him. Godzilla had helped put a stop to that. It's interesting to see how writer Doug Moench and artist Herb Trimpe handle the necessary exposition, since Marvel Comics could no longer mention Godzilla by name. We are simply told that Demonicus was originally defeated by "a rather extraordinary agent." The captions we would normally expect to see identifying the specific issue in which this happened is simply not there.

Anyway, Demonicus had sent the monsters that had fought the robots over the previous three issues, testing the robots before deciding to add them to his stable of monsters for his eventual conquest of Earth. First, he plans to destroy civilization with yet another meteor. Then he'll come down with his monsters and giant robots to take over whatever remains.

So when the Shoguns approach the station, they get hit by a force beam. Combatra and Raydeen are sent flying into space at speeds too great for their retro rockets to stop, while Dangard Ace smashes into the moon. The impact knocks out Savage.

Shogun Warriors #13 (Feb. 1980) has Dangard Ace brought into the space station and supposedly imprisoned. But Savage manages to trick Demonicus' soldiers into thinking he's damaged more severely than he is, then breaks free and starts breaking stuff.

The other two robots use some passing asteroids to reverse their direction and head back to the Moon. It annoys me that I can't figure out if the physics they use to do this actually makes real world sense, but it sounds good in terms of Comic Book Science, so works fine in context to the story.

The three robots reunite and begin to search the space station, curb-stomping a batch of monsters they encounter.

But SW #14 (March 1980) shows us that the tactical situation has changed. The robots encounter the three monsters who nearly defeated them on Earth.

Initially, Genji, Carson and Savage are disheartened by this and are themselves nearly curb-stomped by the monsters. But a rousing speech from the head of the Followers allows them to pull themselves together. They discover that by working together, they can destroy the monsters one-by-one.

But Demonicus still launches another huge meteor at Earth. The Shogun Warriors end up using a chunk of the space station to knock it aside before it hits the planet. Demonicus and his minions are then dropped off where Dum Dum Dugan and a SHIELD task force can find them.

Taking the action into space is a great change-of-pace after nearly a dozen issues of wrecking cities on Earth. The fight scenes are all cool, with Herb Trimpe still channeling his inner eight-year-old to come up with bizarre but incredibly fun monster designs. The fights are also well-choreographed, laying out the action logically and with the robots employing tactics that make complete sense in context of a Comic Book universe.

Doug Moench still displays his tendency to put in a lot (and I mean a lot) of dialogue and expository captions. Sometimes, this is to the detriment of his stories. But here, it works. Moench and Trimpe manage to spread the action out across the story in such a way that the overall pacing is fast enough to keep things moving.

There's also a few nice character moments mixed in with the action. I especially like Carson and Savage arguing over which of them must risk their lives to stop the meteor by employing a particularly dangerous maneuver, then having Genji jump in with a "Stop it, both of you" and telling them they both need to take the risk.

So this wraps up the second long story arc of the series. I'm still reviewing these as I read them for the first time, but I did notice that issue #15 is a self-contained tale--probably a good idea after two long stories. So when we return to the Shogun Warriors, we'll take a look at that particular issue.

Next week, we return to World War 2 and once again deal with dinosaurs, taking a look at how the whole "diinosaurs vs. G.I.s" thing got started.

Fingertips of Doom!--Shogun Warriors, Part 4

With this post, we're a little over halfway through with our look at Marvel's 1979-80 series Shogun Warriors.

The last couple of issues centered on Richard Carson and his robot Raydeen, fighting a monster of unknown origin along a California beach, with his girlfriend Deena getting drafted as Raydeen's co-pilot.

With Shogun Warriors #9 (October 1979), more mysterious monsters start popping up--each time near one of the Shoguns. Illongo Savage investigates a meteor that landed near his research center in Madagascar, taking along his lovely assistant Judith. The meteor hatches like an egg, spawning a weird monster they dub the Starchild.

Savage summons his robot Dangard Ace. Rremember that each pilot can now request their robots be teleported to them when needed. It's a handy ability to have when you're stuck in traffic. Judith has to distract the monster to give Savage time to reach the robot, but soon he's ready to go.

I'll stop to say right now that I am loving Herb Trimpe's monster designs. Cerberus (the monster Carson fought last issue), Starchild and the Hand of Five creature that will soon pop up are all bizarre and incredibly fun designs. It's as if Trimpe is channeling his inner 10-year-old, bringing to life the sort of creatures an imaginative kid would sketch on notebook paper while not paying attention to his teacher.

Each monster has weird abilities to match their weird appearances and their fights with the robots are all exciting and well-choreographed. A series like this is anchored on just how cool the robots & monsters are, as well as how fun their fights are. Shogun Warriors has been succeeded admirably here. This is the reason Giant Robots and Monsters exist, by golly.


Anyway, poor Dangard Ace has a bad time against Starchild. The fight starts underwater, moves to shore and rolls into a nearby city. Savage and his robot make no headway against the monster and soon spend much of the fight saving innocent bystanders.

Then it turns out that Starchild was only in its larvae stage. When it grows bigger and sprouts wings, it looks as if Savage is doomed. But the monster seems to lose interest and simply flies away. Was Dangard Ace being tested?

That brings us to the next issue, in which Genji (who is back in Tokyo) is being grilled on where the prototype airplane she was flying back in the first issue has gone to. She assures them the plane is safe, but refuses to explain further.

I'm still not sure this makes sense. This series is set firmly in the Marvel universe, even if the usual stable of Marvel characters hasn't yet appeared. Genji's story (getting drafted by ancient aliens to pilot a giant robot and fight monsters) really isn't all that unusual in the world in which she lives.

But the point becomes moot when one of Trimpe's most bizarre creations--the Hand of Five--attacks. This guy is a hand-shaped monster with five heads on its fingertips, which are able to detach and fight independently.

Gee whiz, I wish this book and Marvel's Godzilla had been published simultaneously and crossed over with one another. The Big G vs. the Hand of Five is a fight I would really like to see.

But Genji, flying Combatra, does pretty well for herself. The fight is a doozy and perhaps the best of the series so far, with the Hand and Combatra both separating into their individual components, rejoining, then separating again as the fight rages across Tokyo and the tactical situation becomes fluid. It is a superb example of imaginative fight choreography.

The battle spills over into Shogun Warriors #11 (December 1979). Genji does better against the Hand than Savage did against the Starchild, using several clever tactics to eventually damage the monster.

But then the Hand of Five--like Starchild--suddenly breaks off the fight and flies away. The issue ends with the Followers (the guys who built the robots) detecting another meteor approaching Earth and theorizing that this might hold the answers to the presumably connected monster appearances. Genji, meanwhile, takes her robot and runs for it, knowing that she's still suspected of treason and likely to be blamed for the carnage.

While all this is going on, Richard Carson has attracted the attention of a Men in Black-type organization.

In addition to the cool fights, I like the way writer Doug Moench handles the human characters. This is always a danger in stories like this--I guess we do need a few human characters to identify with, but we don't want them to distract us from the cool stuff. When this happens, we end up with a Michael Bay Transformers film. And no one wants that.

Though Moench (as was common in his writing) can be a little too dialogue-heavy, the humans are an integral part of the story. In my last post, I mentioned that I thought the pause to give Richard Carson some character development was perhaps a page or so too long, but now the action is flowing smoothly.  Each of Shogun pilots is given a close friend who now knows about their robots. Each is given more personality, with information about them seeded throughout the story arc without ever interfering with the overall plot and the action. It's very skillfully done.

I recently re-read Moench and Trimpe's run on Godzilla, which had been published a few years before Shogun Warriors. Both series involved bizarre monsters whose presence is explained by convoluted but clever science fiction plots. Both had great fight scenes strongly illustrated by Trimpe. Both had likable human characters (though Godzilla had a really annoying kid hanging around who was the poster child for the need to spank children).. When I finish reading through Shogun Warriors, it will be interesting to finish up the reviews with a comparison of the two monster-oriented series and see which one seemed the better of the two. Unless Shogun Warriors takes a sudden downturn, it's going to be a close call.

Next week, we visit with the Marvel Family as they are asked to join a circus.

Shogun Warriors, Part 3

 I'm a little torn about these two issues (Shogun Warriors #7 & 8--August & September 1979). The first big story arc has been brought to a satisfying conclusion with Maur-Kon's monster-making base destroyed. So this is the dramatically appropriate place to put in a lull and give us some background on the human characters.

And, since the Shogun Warrior robots are essentially weapons systems without personalities of their own, it makes sense to give us some in-depth characterizations for their pilots.

Writer Doug Moench does give us likable protagonists with clearly defined personalities. Richard Carson rejoins his girl friend Deena (also a stunt driver), Ilongo Savage returns to his research on dolphins (this was right smack in the middle of the "dolphins-can-be-taught-human-language" phase of science fiction). Genji Odashu has to explain what the heck happened to the prototype airplane she was flying when the Fellowship of the Light teleported her away and drafted her into anti-robot combat.

It's all good stuff and we really do like these guys. But the first half of the seventh issue undeniably drags a little. Moench's tendency to write dialogue-heavy scripts is probably a negative here. In a Moench story, no one ever says anything in just one sentence when they can drag it across three or four sentences.

Oh, well. It's not as if half a comic is all that long a time. The action picks up again soon. And that action is well worth waiting for.



Also, I do wonder why the Shogun pilots have such trouble getting anyone to believe their stories. One presumes monster fights through the streets of a city would make the 6 o'clock news even in a comic book universe. And it is a comic book universe--we will eventually learn that it is set firmly in regular Marvel continuity. So getting teleported away to be the pilots for giant anti-monster robots isn't all that unusual.

By the end of the eighth issue, Genji's been arrested, while Savage is about to investigate a strange meteor that landed near his location. But the action centers mostly around Carson and his robot Raydeen.



A mysterious new monster shows up along the West Coast of the U.S.--fortunately not far from where Carson and Deena are shooting a film. The Followers teleport Raydeen to the area. Carson soon has to bring Deena aboard the robot with him to keep her out of the crossfire once the fight begins. But that turns out to be a good thing--she proves to be a skilled co-pilot.

The monster, by the way, is a really dandy one. It's called Cerberus because it has many heads--
actually, five detachable vehicles that can rejoin as its head in different combinations to give it different capabilities.

That's just cool.

Herb Trimpe continues to give us great battle scenes, with this particular fight spilling over into the next issue.












Except for a few scenes to set up Savage's and Genji's respective story arcs, the battle lasts through the eighth issue, given extra flavor when Carson/Raydeen needs to take time to rescue a Coast Guard ship (and give them a talking too for shooting at him as well as Cerberus).







A few minutes after that, Raydeen has to save people in a cliff-side house that's been knocked loose by a stray shot from Cerberus.

Cerberus is eventually forced to retreat. Its origin is still a mystery, but it's no longer endangering anyone.

All things considered, these two issues continue to provide us with real fun and adventure. I even realize that my criticisms above can be seen as unfair--we do need to have some effort to flesh out the human characters. It's just that the poor people are competing for attention against robots and monsters. No mere mortal can ever stand against that.

Next week, we'll return to Gotham City and watch Batman.... beat up some blind guys? Gee whiz, Bruce!

Shogun Warriors, Part 2

Last time we talked about the Shogun Warriors, I covered the first five issues and planned on covering the rest of the 20-issue run in three more 5-issue lumps. But I'm having such fun reading these for the first time that I've decided to take a little more time--with each entry covering from 1 to 3 issues. That'll let me talk about them in a little more detail without making any one post too long. (Not that any of you read my blog while you should be working and so need post entries to be relatively short. That would be wrong.)

Today, I'm just going to cover Shogun Warriors #6 (July 1979), because it really is a rolicking and particularly fun story that I don't want to gloss over too quickly. Remember that the previous issue ended with the robots Raydeen & Danguard Ace fighting the science/alchemy hybrid Mecha-Monster, while Combatra back-tracked the monster to the villains' lair. (I really loved writing that sentence, by the way.) Both Combatra  and its pilot Genji were captured.

Mecha-Monster is a pretty tough cookie, but the Shogun pilots come up with a strategy that allows Raydeen to fire an explosive arrow down its throat, blowing it up from the inside.

With the monster out of the way, the two robots follow after Combatra, only to be find out that robot is now being piloted by Maur-Kon, the leader of the bad guys.


Meanwhile, Maur-Kon's lieutenant Magar is still up to shenanigans. Maur-Kon and Magar have a
relationship that might remind modern readers a little bit of Megatron & Starscream--though those two characters didn't exist in 1979, so the parallel is coincidental. Also, the parallel isn't exact. Magar doesn't want to take over simply because he's an arrogant jerk who wants power. He also still objects to Maur-Kon giving up sorcery and turning to pure science to create monsters.

So Magar hangs Genji over a pit of magma, planning on sacrificing her and using her life force to create another monster. Magar has messed up with this once already--that's why Mecha-Monster was rampaging around without still being under the villains' control. But Magar is nothing if not single-minded.

Well, he's also kind of incompetent. Things go awry again when Genji wakes up and swings aside before the magma can reach up to her. Apparently, you should never play with the food of magically-animated magma, because it instantly decides to try to eat Magar instead. The magma ends up destroying the base in its efforts to catch its dinner. Whether Magar gets away made isn't clear--I have a feeling he might reappear in the future as a monster.

While all this is happening, Maur-Kon is using Combatra to clean the collective clocks of the other Shogun Warriors.  Fortunately, Genji shows up in a "borrowed" tank and knocks Combatra's block off with a surprise shot.

Maur-Kon gets away, but his organization seems to have been defeated. This brings the premiere story arc to an end, with the three pilots all told they can now go home and try to explain to friends and family just where they've been for the last few weeks. Each has an amulet via which they can be summoned if needed again.

This is a really fun issue. Trimpe's art is great and both the major action set pieces (The fight against Mecha-Monster and the Shogun vs. Shogun battle) are effectively choreographed. It's completely fulfills the mission of all giant robots vs. monsters stories by giving us nifty looking robots, bizarre monsters and exciting battle scenes.

We'll return in the about a month for a look at issues #7 & 8, which will begin to expand on the human characters. That's always a little bit dangerous in a book where we come for the robots and monsters. If the abysmal live-action Transformers movies taught us nothing else, it's that you don't spend too much time with puny humans when you have giant robots in the story. But we'll see how it works out for the Shogun Warriors.

Next week, Ben Grimm puts together a poker game with some friends--but he should know by now that his poker games always include something other than poker.