RetroSPECt: Blind Items for October 16th, 2019

One of the biggest problems with the MeWe platform is that items that I had written about weeks, sometimes months ago, would be pushed down into the ether becoming SPECtres of the past, never to be seen again.  Without giving away too much about the books coming out this Wednesday, October 16th, two items I mentioned nine and six months ago respectively may start to heat up soon..

First up, this week we will see a second member of the Infinity Watch rear her head in a book that has people expecting one thing but will throw a curveball that will intrigue those excited for her to STAR in her own book.

I pulled some of the relevant pages and panels from the Infinity Watch: Infinity special as well as the Wolverine and the Infinity Watch miniseries. What is super interesting here is that we may have a possible tie in to the Incoming series on the way with a reference to the possible celestial entity who gets mentioned.

As I mentioned in the original posting there was only one cover for this issue in which we see death row inmate Hector Batista receive possession  of the time stone.

After the stone embeds itself in Hector Bautista, he finds he has cursory control over time, allowing him to pause time and escape from prison.  We see his story continue in the 5 issue Wolverine & the Infinity Watch.

We follow Wolverine and Loki who have been tasked with protecting Hector by Old Man Wolverinix and King Thor.  We see them in the future tracking the story of the Infinity Watch in the journal of Flowa, the keeper of Asgardian texts.  While Warbringer and Talonar (Robbie Rider) try to capture/kill Hector, he manages to escape with the aid of Logan, Loki and Bats (heating up on his own with that recent Cates shoutout).  By the story’s end he has disappeared with a new costume (courtesy of an armored corpse being dissected by the Fraternity of Raptors) He appears in costume on the cover of issue 5.

Those panels from the future give us a glimpse at what may or may not happen down the line for this new Infinity Watch and we get a hint of what may or may not happen down the line.  Of particular interest is the line that ‘the Infinity Watch managed to hold back Entropy for some time’.

Entropy is the son of Eternity who would show up in the 2002 Captain Marvel series (voice in issue 2; seen fully in issue 4; then named and first full appearance in issue 5.). Entropy would eventually destroy all creation before recreating it and taking on the mantle of Eternity.  While Eternity (first appearance Strange Tales 138) seems to feature heavily in the origin of the new Masked Raider, perhaps Entropy and the Infinity Watch will play a key role in the upcoming Incoming book from Marvel.

A much simpler one to untangle is the return of a character that was created to jettison the surplus of predominantly C list villains in the Marvel Universe.  Back in August, the Cap solicit for issue 16 caught my eye for that tagline resembling, ‘Justice is served.’

I’d grab up a couple of that on point AH! cover just in case there’s a new vigilante under the mask.

VIDEO UPDATE: The Comic DeSPECtive

https://youtu.be/fw7NmxyNcnY

Tales of the UnexSPECted: Rise of the Midnight Sons Preview

Preview books tend to fall into two categories in terms of collectors.  They are curios for some but with no real value attached but for others they are significant keys worthy of spots in their collections.

Marvel Age 16 which predates
New Mutants 18

First Warlock??

I tend to fall somewhere in between both camps as I am a proponent of first appearances in 'marketing books', such as Marvel Age but I don't believe that solicits in Previews, or that previews inserted in ALL books that came out a certain week should be qualified as first appearances.  

One particular book that I think squarely falls into the category of a truly collector worthy preview is the Rise of the Midnight Sons preview which came out in January of 1992.

Here is a little more about the book courtesy of the online antique store Endless Treasures:

Published by Marvel Comics in 1992, this is a black and white uncorrected proof of the mini-series with series 'Rise of the Midnight Sons'. It is an 8 1/2" by 11", magazine size, square bound format with one sided pages... This is one of a series of advance previews that Marvel Comics sent out to their distributors and larger retailers as a promotional item to encourage higher orders on select issues. These are quite rare as only about 500 of each were printed and most were tossed out by those who received them not realizing their collectible potential. It has an introductory page describing the storyline, and all of the contributors, followed by a sampling of the comics printed in black and white on white mando paper. Some of these printed the entire comic, and others left out the final few pages so as to not spoil a surprise ending before the actual release date. There are pin ups & trading card illustrations in the back. This is all in black & white.

I was able to grab one of these a few years back as I feel that this particular corner of the Marvel universe has been greatly untapped  in other forms of media.  Even the cancellation of Hulu's Ghost Rider is probably a beneficial thing as Marvel can now develop the original Ghost Rider Johnny Blaze and his successor Danny Ketch. From the Spirits of Vengeance to the Nightstalkers to the Book of the Darkhold, Marvel has a wealth of properties upon which to build.

I have included some additional shots from the book below.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

There isn't a lot of historic sales data on this book and it seems to have disappeared from any of the online retailers.  At the very least, if you are a fan of that particular supernatural segment of the Marvel Universe, it's an essential bit of history to be on the lookout for!