The Human Fly #13-16

HUMAN FLY #13.
COVER TITLE. Chasm of Fear!
INSIDE TITLE. Slope of Death!
COVER DATE. September 1978
COVER PRICE. 35¢
COVER ARTIST. Bob Lubbers & McLeod
NUMBER OF PAGES. 17
WRITER. Bill Mantlo
PENCILLER. Frank Robbins
INKER. Frank Springer
LETTERER. D. Wohl
COLORIST. G. Roussos
EDITOR. Bob Hall
EDITOR-IN-CHIEF. Jim Shooter

It starts with a nightmare by new Human Fly believer, Harmony Whyte. The Fly will perish performing a stunt in a snow jump. She tells the man his dream but he is not frightened. He deals, as he says, with technology, skill and luck, and could no be delayed by a vague foreboding.

Then he inform us where the money he raises go to. It feeds a foundation that proves new frontiers of science in an effort to discover a way to regenerate damaged organs, muscle and bones.

The stunt consists of being the first man to ski America’s tallest mountain, Mount Whitney. The entire crew is wearing oxygen helmets to breath the rarified air. They are connected by open-channel radios. Bellow, Arnie, as the Fly’s public relations man, reports to the newsmen that come all around the world. He remembers Yuiciro Miura, the man who skied down Mount Everest in 1970 and shows the reporters the parachute that will slow the speed before he reaches the ravine at the bottom of the slope.

Harmony will monitor every word that the Human Fly and his crew (she is now one of them) speak from the beginning to the end. New equipment will be proved, like the piton-gun and a telephoto tape-camera.

Another expedition, leaded by Carl Braden, owner of West-TV, the broadcast that Harmony worked for, is there to shoot footage. He is so mean that he is there to expose the Fly as a Charlatan. The Fly skis towards Braden to return him a microphone he has found. He will not be bugged. But Braden is not so easy to tire, and he kept recording all the stunt. They wear a similar equipment than the Fly’s crew. Raf Abrams is the second unit cameraman.

Ted cameras are synchronized with monitors and whatever happens will be recorded for posperity. Now we can see the effords the Human Fly is taking. We can see him slipping and Blaze being pulled loose herself while Ted holds them on. With the piton-gun, they recover a safe slope and resume climbing.

I really love the way Mantlo describes this issue. He uses the cameras of the characters as a narration tool. From one angle to another because the cameras have zooms. It is like a movie on paper. Harmony follows both signals, so she is the point of view we can relate to.

Harmony gives the signal (is that a finger??!!!) and the Human Fly starts the descent. Braden runs along the Fly in his snowcycle. Too close for the Human Fly’s comfort. He is putting both of them in danger. Braden is so single minded that did not listen to the Fly’s warnings.

The Fly swerved away from Braden just in time, but Braden is headed directly for the ravine. The Human Fly races to Braden, but Ted activates the parachute (in fact a dragchute). Our hero cuts himself loose of the tires of the parachute and both of them are headed for the cliff, just as in Harmony’s nightmare. Down the reporters receive the flash news. This could be the story of the decade!

The Human Fly stopped right at the edge of the ravine. Harmony faints. The Fly intercepts Braden, grabs him and shoots his piton-guns. They are safe!

Much later, the Human Fly and his crew visits Carl Braden in the hospital where he is recovering from his injuries. He is sorry and re-contract Harmony, but in her own terms.

This issue is one of the best of the series. The outfit, the action and the values presented in this adventure are an epitome of the Human Fly character. If issue eleven was so great, this one shines with his own light. A jewel to be remembered.

Ah! I almost forget that the cover art will be taken by the same artist. The hand of Shooter is well noticed. Continuity is the best argument a series could present to his readers.

First a letter from our hero himself. He is thankful for the great response the comic book has received and the appreciation of the Human Fly. He was writing from a hospital bed, recovering from the injuries produced in the Montreal accident that is a remembrance of the 1971 accident in Ashville, North Carolina. But fret not, he is not discouraged. He goes ahead with his hopes of becoming the world’s greatest philanthropic daredevil.

Then we get to know that he has a musical career and now is returning to a recording studio to tape his first album. It would be the Human Fly Rock Show! Stunts and Rock and Roll, great!

Alex McCort ask for a Marvel Treasure Edition devoted to the Human Fly. PMM Matt Kaufman concerns about the accident in Montreal and Steven Allan Bennett praises issue eight because the Fly thought and acted like the Human Fly would do, not as a crime-fighter. He considers the Human Fly a man of positive action, who responds to duty with great integrity.

HUMAN FLY #14.
COVER TITLE. Fear Over Fifth Avenue!
INSIDE TITLE. Death Rides the Big Balloons!
COVER DATE. October 1978
COVER PRICE. 35¢
COVER ARTIST. Bob Lubbers & McLeod
NUMBER OF PAGES. 17
WRITER. Bill Mantlo
PENCILLER. Frank Robbins
INKER. Steve Leialoha
LETTERER. Rick Parker
COLORIST. Don Warfield
EDITOR. Bob Hall
EDITOR-IN-CHIEF. Jim Shooter

New York is the city that will sponsor the First International Airship Race and the Human Fly will perform a stunt in his flagship. But no one has seen the to kids that come into one of the balloons. They are Paul and Marissa and they are escaping the horrors of a Juvenile Home to find a distant aunt in California. They are speaking-impaired and use the hand signal language. The balloon they step into is a pilotless drone. Arnie is visiting his parents, so he will not appear in this issue.

Back to the race, dirigibles come from all over the world. The Fly will walk a Highwire between two moving blimps hundreds of feet above the Hudson River. The Human Fly is doing the stunt without any difficulty (aside the almost impossible task he is performing). Children want to listen to the transistor and enjoy the broadcasting of the stunt (remember, they can hear). Radio signals cuts the control of the drone leaving it free.

The Fly grabs the wire and gazes at the sigh of the two kids in the gondola and the radio in their hands explains to him why the dirigible is on the loose. The static must have jammed the signal to the drone. They can not hear him.

Blaze adds an extra tension to the highwire and moves apart from the drone in a desperate attempt to cut it into two and set the Human Fly free to go to the drone and take control of the situation.

The problem now seems to be the skyscrapers. The Human Fly must elude them while climbing into the gondola. They are headed for the Empire State Building and Blaze runs to help them while fighting against the radio interference that overruns the drone. The Kids listen to the radio and understands that it is the radio signal that is producing the static that cuts the radio controls. The transistor goes under the panel and they can not reach it to shut it off.

The Human Fly them notices the antenna on top of the building. The tower is a radio transmitter. Blaze can boost her signal via the tower’s transmissions. The incredible reduction of speed makes the Fly loose the wire. He uses his baton to get back to the gondola.

Speaking to the kids is futile. The Fly notices that they use the hand alphabet. He learned the language back at the hospital. The Human Fly speaks (because they are not hearing-impaired) to them an reads the hand motions. The drone is now in control, but the Fly has never pilot one of these things in his life.

The dirigible lands smoothly and the Human Fly comes out of it with both children in front of the reporters. The City of New York has agreed to send them to their aunt in Los Angeles. Aside the good news, the Human Fly learns a lesson. He must check out a stunt an extra time for unforeseen occurrences.

No Fly papers in this issue.

HUMAN FLY #15.
COVER TITLE. War in the Washington Monument!
INSIDE TITLE. War in the Washington Monument!
COVER DATE. November 1978
COVER PRICE. 35¢
COVER ARTIST. Bob Lubbers & McLeod
NUMBER OF PAGES. 15
WRITER. Bill Mantlo
PENCILLER. Lee Elias
INKER. R. Villamonte
LETTERER. C. Robins
COLORIST. Michele W.
EDITOR. Bob Hall
EDITOR-IN-CHIEF. Jim Shooter

This is the shortest of the stories of the Human Fly, but we must race, because in this issue Marvel started a contest to give ideas for the comic book and there is a photo-show of the real Human Fly.

Ted brings the Fly and company to Washington D.C. to visit his old army colleagues at the Potomac Hospital (V.A. Hospital) and the issue begins with a great mêlée. The guards go crazy the minute Ted asked for Slick Gordon. The Fly hates violence and wants it to stop, but Ted is a little less sorry for the fight. Blaze is being hold hostage and they must surrender to the hospital security guards.

Everyone of them are herded down the hospital’s empty corridors and forced into a disused operating theatre that is soundproof. The door is shut and locked while they run off with the records.

The Human Fly suspects that they may be misusing the veterans’ benefits. They must get out of the facility. Ted shows us the content of his prosthetic arms. Special tools that were unnoticed by the guards would help them to exit the room by using the Fly’s cape as a trampoline. The Human Fly gets out and reduces a guard, recovering his baton, and freeing his crew. He listens to the radio and learns that there is two veterans armed in the Washington Monument protesting for the inhuman conditions in the hospital. They had forced tourist and guards out at gunpoint. They have threatened that they will destroy the monument if their demands remain unanswered. And they want the President to be informed in person.

When they are safely free outside the hospital, the Human Fly calls the police before the administrators of the hospital make off with the records. While the police handle the hospital, they are headed for the Washington Monument.

The Fly and his crew are not allowed to come into the Monument. Everything is wired to explode if anyone comes into and tries to go up. But the Human Fly will come into using the elevator shaft. Meanwhile, Ted Locke tries to send a message to Slick Gordon but to no effect. Larry, the companion of Slick will not be dissuaded so easily. He considers that doctors are getting rich off their disability checks.

The Human Fly has reached the elevator and is making a way out through its floor. Then he goes through the roof and Larry starts firing at him. The elevator goes down and the Fly grabs the wire that goes up and reaches the same room were Larry and Slick are. Larry is point the gun and takes the baton off the hands of the Human Fly.

Now for a silly ending. Larry tries to push the detonator with the baton and it fires so uncontrollable that bounds him. The End… Come on, man, this ending stinks.

The human Fly visits the Marvel Bullpen! With a commentary by Bill Mantlo and photos by D. Jon Zimmerman.

This is so unreal that I must post it in its integrity. Stan Lee, Archie Goodwin, John Romita, Jim Shooter and Bill Mantlo are showcased with the real Human Fly and his sidekick? Mercury in this set of pictures. All to announce the Human Fly Stunt Contest. Readers are to design a stunt and how the Human Fly can do it and survive. Ideas should be send to Marvel Headquartets in 575 Madison Avenue, NY. by October 31, 1978 (a time machine will be OK now)

The problem was that the magazine was not to survive itself. Winners would had seen his story published and receive a page of original artwork signed by the Fly. It was a good idea, but in a long forgotten contest.

Don Collins considered the irony of issue ten (the one with the miners) being released at the same time a one hundred-plus coal strike. He also points the likeliness of Dukas’ face to that of Tony Stark (a.k.a. Iron Man). Bob Hall announces that Frank Robbins is off on a vacation and that Lee Elias will be working in Power Man. A new artist, Bob Lubbers, whose work could be seen in the covers of the magazine, will be the next penciller and Frank Springer as his inker. But, in fact, the inker will be Ricardo Villamonte.

Peter Borli presents several logical mistakes about issue ten, but minor ones. Bob Hall defends the logic of the issue as a good attorney. Dan Caillier tells us that he always plays the roll of the Human Fly when he plays superheroes with his friend (a young reader that now could be about forty years old).

Commander Quotey comes back. He considers that if issue ten where published in the fifties, Marvel would had problems with the FBI. He mentions the documentary “Harlan County, USA”, that could be seen by Bill Mantlo as an inspiration. C. Quotey criticizes the quick ending of the comic as a bad one. The end of the letter denounces the unsafe mining conditions.

This last two letters represents what I consider the effect a comic book has in his reader. First we read about a child who loves and enjoys his comics and then an intelligent commentary by an adult that gives an insightful point of view. In the end they are both enjoying their reading. To me that’s reason enough to be a comic book fan.

Oh! And in the Bullpen Bulletins an announcement: Bill Mantlo is working with Mike Golden in a new project called Micronauts… Stay tunned to Tonnerre de Brest!

HUMAN FLY #16.
COVER TITLE. Niagara Nightmare!
INSIDE TITLE. Niagara Nightmare!
COVER DATE. December 1978
COVER PRICE. 35¢
COVER ARTIST. Un-credited
NUMBER OF PAGES. 17
WRITER. Bill Mantlo
PENCILLER. Bob Lubbers
INKER. Ricardo Villamonte
LETTERER. Novak
COLORIST. D. Martin
EDITOR. Bob Hall
EDITOR-IN-CHIEF. Jim Shooter

The first of the two issues pencilled by Bob Lubbers. I think they look great, putting aside some anatomic imperfections and a little reduction of detail in the Fly’s outfit. Oh! and Blaze turns to be a really gorgeous woman. The finishing touches works really smooth. Lubbers could had become the regular penciller of the series, but it turn to be a guest penciller.

This is the Blaze issue. The Fly and Blaze are making a recognition flight over the Niagara’s horseshoe falls because the next stunt will be to waterski over the Niagara’s Falls! He will be in the water skiing and being pulled along by the sea-plane’s tow line from the Canadian part of the fall to the American part, where the sea-plane takes off. Then the Human Fly will be on his own.

There is a mysterious house at the edge of the falls…

The money raised will go directly to the funds of the Candus Hospital. Arnie talks to Dr. Kaity, a young paediatrician in charge of the handicapped boys and girls section. We get to know that the hospital will be fore-close if they don’t satisfies its mortgage payments. Meanwhile, Blaze, who is transporting the toys donated by Canadian and American businessmen, is being intercepted by a pickup van. She is being kidnapped!

The Fly, who is giving toys to the kids, wonders where Blaze is. A phone call threaten him not to perform his stunt or Blaze will be killed. She gives him hint of where she is. She is “on the edge of death”. The Mysterious house will be investigated.

With the stunt postponed, Arnie, riding an ambulance, infiltrates as a member of the Candus Hospital into the doors of the mansion to divert the guards. Inside, Blaze fights to free herself and the owners watch a slide-show where they present their plans of turning the hospital into a Honeymoon Haven Resort. It will cover other activities.

For the first time, Ted pilots a plane. The Fly waterskiis and uses a hang-glider that directs him towards a skylight on top of the house. The surprise takes the captors umbalanced and the Fly reduces them without effort. He uses gas to put them (including Blaze) to sleep. The RCMP is ready to proceed with caution into the house.

Just outside, Blaze recovers consciousness in the arms of the Fly (how manly of him). That is a seventies comic, and the rol played by women in this adventures where really to be revised.

So the story ends, but it is too short. And it is so weak that we don’t get to know the villain and his reasons. Mantlo adds a second part that has nothing to do with the kidnappers. Let’s start anew.

The stunt goes nicely but a camera cable gets stuck with a wheel-chair wheel and child is carried towards the guardrail and the boy falls into the river.

The Human Fly ignites his rocket-pack (an idea from Ted, of course) and flies toward the kid. The device is not enough to carry all the weight but the Fly fires the baton bola-line directed to a support beam bellow the spectators’ stand.

The strain is so great that he must go over with the waterfall. He uses the momentum of the fall itself to turn on again the rocket-pack and shoot them downwards out of the torrent, past the rocks bellow and skim them safety in the calm waters beyond.

No Fly Papers in this issue.