Quite a detailed cover by Buckler and Milgrom. Not a swiped Spidey this time, to my knowledge. Been some time since Ghost Rider appeared in MTU (#58, to be exact), but he’s back. Inside, we got Steven Grant continuing his brief tenure as writer, with the revolving door of artists bringing up Pat Broderick & Bruce Patterson this month. As we begin, Glory Grant has talked Peter Parker into rolling out to Connecticut to visit a carnival, and they’re having a good time.
This is some very detailed art! Is this a date? It would be quite random if it was a date. They’re described as friends on page one, but that body language in panel 3 has a different vibe. Strangely not the first time Peter’s seen Man-Thing in a side show, only it was the real thing last time (MTU 68 is coming up way too often to have not been put up on the blog yet). The Amazing Six-Armed Spider-Man is pretty funny. Also fun, The Blazing Skull was a Golden Age Marvel hero.
It seems weird that Peter would yell “Hey, that’s Ghost Rider!” How would he know? How well-known is Ghost Rider, anyway, to the general public? I always wonder about stuff like that. If regular people know Ghost Rider and Morbius and Werewolf By Night and whatnot are on the loose, how are they not just terrified 24/7? Hang on a sec, look at this:
I don’t know if Steven Grant thinks this was a date, but Pat Broderick sure does. The detail in this is really something. I’m surprised Broderick wasn’t on the level of Michael Golden or Art Adams in terms of popularity in this period. Well, I guess it’s a few years before Art, but you know. Not many people putting down this many lines in 1980, and the ones who did tended to get noticed. but the figures are also more cartoony than the usual superhero fare, another quality shared with Golden (and later Adams). Hm. Anyway, as soon as he hits the ground, Spidey is attacked by a pack of guard dogs. He manages to put them down with his webbing, but then the whole carnie crew is behind him, led by the creepy guy from earlier. He almost seems to have been expecting Spider-Man, and despite our hero not knowing who he is, he’s got a grudge. The leader tells his minions to attack, but the only one who does is the spider-man. Spidey easily dispatches him, but then a fireball whizzes by his head.
Spidey chooses to flee, and soon finds himself on top of the rollercoaster, like on the cover, carnies coming up in a coaster car on one side, the mind controlled Ghost Rider zooming up the other. He tries to flip over GR’s motorcycle, but a well-timed wheelie catches him.
Spidey wakes up chained inside one of the wagons, which is much bigger on the inside. The leader appears to taunt him, and some magic hand-waving reveals his true face: He’s Moondark The Magician. Whaaaat? Yes, Moondark, the very silly villain of Marvel Team-Up #12! It’s been a little while, dude! Spidey is not impressed, calling him “Another cornball third-rate wizard.” Then Moony reveals he has Johnny Blaze’s soul trapped in his ring before getting into the requisite “what have I been up to for 80 months” flashback.
Haha, “you are my greatest foe!” How sad for Moondark. After all that, as he begins to absorb Spider-Man’s soul into his orb (Allegedly), Spidey just casually rips the chains down off the wall. He makes the call to try to free Blaze instead of run from the orb’s smoky tendrils, with a pretty impressive web shot grabbing the ring off Moondark’s finger and smashing it to the ground. Seconds later, Spidey is being taken down by the mysterious power of the orb. But…
GR’s hellfire does nothing to a dude with no soul to burn, tho, so Moondark just laughs it off, hits our heroes with a magic whammy, and begins summoning “his dark masters” to come take Spidey and GR into… whatever realm they live in. As a big demon begins to manifest, Moony offers to trade the heroes’ souls for his own, but then Ghost Rider zaps the soul orb.
Poor Spidey never has a good time with a Ghost Rider. Pretty fun little issue tho. and certainly a great looking one.