{"id":3446,"date":"2020-03-12T00:00:19","date_gmt":"2020-03-12T04:00:19","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/comicsfromspace.com\/spiderman\/?p=3446"},"modified":"2019-08-02T20:55:48","modified_gmt":"2019-08-03T00:55:48","slug":"fanfare-6","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/comicsfromspace.com\/spiderman\/2020\/03\/12\/fanfare-6\/","title":{"rendered":"Marvel Fanfare 6"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Marvel Fanfare! A place where creators could do short stories outside the main line of books. Often a showcase for great talents too busy, too slow or just not interested enough to do a monthly book. Lookit that gorgeous P. Craig Russell cover. That\u2019s worth a stunning 90 cents all by itself. Thanks, McKays! Spidey appeared in seven issues of Fanfare, and as of this writing, I have 4 of those. This one in particular features a Spidey\/Scarlet Witch team-up by writer Mike W. Barr, penciler Sandy Plunkett and inker P. Craig Russell, b\/w a Dr. Strange story by writer Roger Stern and the always delightful Charles Vess. All this on highly-unusual-for-its-time glossy paper, bookended by editorial pages by editor Al Milgrom and Editor-in-Chief Jim Shooter. Quite the package! Let\u2019s get to it.
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We open on a mysterious wizard-y guy spying on Spider-Man with a crystal ball, so you know this is gonna be as weird as the cover promised.
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Suddenly: cheesecake. Not what I was expecting on that page turn. \u201cMiss Frank\u201d there is The Scarlet Witch, who I apparently don\u2019t know enough about, because I thought she always went by Wanda Maximoff, so shows what I know. She fights back with some magic of her own, but is overpowered, enveloped in some kind of force field, and vanishes. Not long after, a very Ditko-looking Spider-Man is swinging around town at night, when he spots The Scarlet Witch hanging out on a roof. He stops to chat, but she has no pupils in her eyes, and tosses a magic bolt at him that makes him fall into a very Ditko-looking magical realm.
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The lady running up claims to be Wanda, but Spidey knows what she looks like, and this ain\u2019t her. However, she seems pretty convinced, so he takes her to a nearby pool of water so she can see herself.
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Well, ok. Here\u2019s a villain I definitely thought I\u2019d never see again. It\u2019s Xandu, who\u2019s menaced Spidey & Dr. Strange at least twice before, both times trying to restore his beloved wife to life, most recently way back in MTU 21<\/a>. More than 100 issues later, he\u2019s still up to the usual, I guess, but he\u2019s got a new angle. After explaining that he scoured his mystic realm until he found the Wand of Watoomb again, he goes on to say he was able to use it to restore Melinda\u2019s body to life, but not her spirit. So he stole a new spirit, and has pronounced his bride back to normal. This is\u2026 not a terribly sane person, I think.
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He summons up a gang of demons to chase Spidey around. Spidey swears he\u2019ll be back for Wanda. Xandu is super pleased about this, and says he\u2019ll get Dr. Strange next, while a mysterious orb watches the scene before vanishing. Magical. A weird pattern is forming here:
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Plunkett keeps drawing the same Spidey head twice per page. Spidey is \u201csaved\u201d by Wanda\u2019s real body, still piloted by Xandu, as he\u2019s decided to take care of Spider-Man personally. Sort of. Spidey tries to web up her hands to keep her from casting spells, but that doesn\u2019t work.
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I begin to get the feeling that, if you really wanted to, you could source almost every Spider-Man in this comic to an old Ditko panel. Not traced, but certainly copied. Wanda\u2019s body knocks out Spider-Man and brings him back to Xandu\u2019s fortress. But while he\u2019s plotting how best to kill his enemy, the glowing orb returns, and quitely puts Wanda\u2019s mind back in her own body. You can guess who it is, I bet.
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Right-o. Spidey knocks out Xandu while he\u2019s distracted, and Melinda, now driving her own body again, says they have to escape this realm before his rage destroys it. She wants all 4 of them to go back to Earth, but Xandu says he\u2019s nothing there and a god here, so they just leave him, Melinda putting the heroes in a bubble and zipping them out as Xandu\u2019s castle explodes.
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Well, that was a wacky one. Not the best showing for poor Wanda. The Dr. Strange story dealt with a random guy named \u201cIan McNee\u201d trying to challenge Strange for the title of Sorcerer Supreme. Guess what? Totally out of his depth. A pretty unusual diversion! Next post, back to normal with more Team-Up.
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