The Day of The Defenders

The Day of The Defenders

The Seventies must have been mad… Not the most astute observation by a child of 1992, but I don’t think it can be overstated. The colours, the mind set, the politics, the music, it all feels like the world was drunk on a manic, angry cocktail. Marvel never misses a beat to grapple with current events and the comics really reflect the bitterness of the time.

Marvel’s Bronze age is a mish-mash stew of big ideas, big debuts, big emotions and enormous amounts of cheese. There is something gloriously silly and sad about seventies comics. Its funny to think that some of the characters created as disposable ideas have become household names: Thanos being an Iron-Man villain of the week back in 1973, spouted from the pencil and mind of Jim Starlin, is now up there as one of the best cinematic bad guys. 

What am I Reading? The Defenders Epic Collection: The Day of The Defenders. Collecting Doctor Strange #183, Incredible Hulk #126, Sub-Mariner #22/#34-35, Marvel Feature #1-3, Defenders #1-11, Avengers #116-118.

What’s it about? I mean… it's The Defenders… it’s The Avengers with more notice. It is a bit of a playlist of classic (but new back then) villains. Dormammu, Enchantress, The Nameless One, various Kirby monsters and the traditional punch on with the Avengers. Most notably for me, Xemnu, who I adored in Immortal Hulk. 

What’s good about it? The art is so brutalistic. Pages are stuffed full of bold simple designs lavishly drenched in bizarre linework effects, block colours (mainly due to technical limitations) give a blunt vividness like a torch shone in your face. Motion feels outrageously energetic through the pasting of effects. It's great! I wish Marvel had kept this up.

Did I mention the cheese? It’s all so cheesy. It kicks the inner child in the teeth and then hands them a lolly pop. I had a goofy grin for the majority of this. The deeper themes of mistrust for the authorities, misinformation, and war fatigue is all there, it's just beneath the cheese. 

What did I struggle with? I think current  mainline Marvel rarely lives up to the art of the earlier decades, but god damn the visual storytelling has come leaps and bounds. I can’t get past being told the same thing three different ways per page. People announce their powers, perform their powers, then comment on how well their powers worked… I know these are for children, but 70’s kids must have been thick as bricks to need this level of explanation. 

For 480 pages I don’t really have a lot to say about this. It’s just classic comic fodder. Enjoyable, digestible, but a bit forgettable. Besides the fact this was the formation of the Defenders (something I’ve now seen about four times since), there isn’t a great deal to talk about. 

Would I recommend it? For the completionist, yes. For those that want to dip their toes in the back catalogue, probably not. I think there are better 70s titles that show the progression of the medium. I’d recommend Master of Kung-Fu hand over fist instead of this. That shows the foibles of old comics tackling the mind-set and politics of the time and evolving into deep character study with insane action.