Description
Collects Howard the Duck (1976) #17-31, Howard the Duck magazine #1. Howard's greatest enemy, Dr. Bong, has the fuming fowl at his mercy! And Howie's best gal, Beverly, faces an ultimatum: Marry the villain, or the duck's goose is cooked! Bing-Bong, the bells are gonna chime! It gets worse still for our feathered friend when he undergoes a monstrous transformation - into Howard the Human! Maybe he and his old pal, Man-Thing, will find some new hope in an oddly familiar galaxy amid a Star Waaugh! Plus: The never anodyne anatine will have his wings full with the Circus of Crime, the moral guardians of S.O.O.F.I. and the soap suds that walk like a man. But as the Final Bong approaches, he'll find himself strapped in an armor he never made - as the Irascible Iron-Duck!
About the Author
Steve Gerber graduated from the University of Missouri with a degree in communications and took a job in advertising. To keep himself sane, he wrote bizarre short stories such as "Elves Against Hitler," "Conversion in a Terminal Subway," and "...And the Birds Hummed Dirges!" He noticed acquaintanceRoy Thomasworking at Marvel, and Thomas sent him Marvel's standard writing test, dialoguing Daredevil art. He was soon made a regular onDaredevilandSub-Mariner, and the newly createdMan-Thing, the latter of which pegged him as having a strong personal style--intellectual, introspective, and literary. In one issue, he introduced an anthropomorphic duck into a horror fantasy, because he wanted something weird and incongruous, and Thomas made the character, named for Gerber's childhood friend Howard, fall to his apparent death in the following issue. Fans were outraged, and the character was revived in a new and deeply personal series. Gerber said in interview that the joke ofHoward the Duckis that "there is no joke." The series was existential and dealt with the necessities of life, such as finding employment to pay the rent. Such unusual fare for comicbooks also informed his writing onThe Defenders. Other works includedMorbius, the Lving Vampire,The Son of Satan,Tales of the Zombie,The Living Mummy,Marvel Two-in-One,Guardians of the Galaxy,Shanna the She-Devil, andCrazy Magazinefor Marvel, andMister Miracle,Metal Men,The Phantom Zone, andThe Immortal Doctor Fatefor DC. Gerber eventually lost a lawsuit for control of Howard the Duck when he was defending artistGene Colan's claim of delayed paychecks for the series, which was less important to him personally because he had a staff job and Colan did not.He left comics for animation in the early 1980s, working mainly with Ruby-Spears, creating Thundarr the Barbarian withAlex TothandJack Kirbyand episodes of The Puppy's Further Adventures, and Marvel Productions, where he was story editor on multiple Marvel series includingDungeons & Dragons,G.I. Joe, andThe Transformers. He continued to dabble in comics, mainly for Eclipse, including the graphic novel Stewart the Rat, the two-part horror story "Role Model: Caring, Sharing, and Helping Others," and the seven-issue Destroyer Duck with Jack Kirby, which began as a fundraiser for Gerber's lawsuit.In the early 1990s, he returned to Marvel withFoolkiller, a ten-issue limited series featuring a new version of a villain he had used inThe Man-ThingandOmega the Unknown, who communicated with a previous version of the character through internet bulletin boards. An early internet adopter himself, he wrote two chapters ofBBSs for Dummieswith Beth Woods Slick, with whom he also wrote theStar Trek: The Next Generationepisode, "Contagion." During this period, he also wroteThe Sensational She-HulkandCloak and Daggerfor Marvel,CybernaryandWildC.A.T.sfor Image, andSludgeandExilesfor the writer-driven Malibu Ultraverse, andNevadafor DC's mature readers Vertigo line.In 2002, he returned to the Howard the Duck character for Marvel's mature readers MAX line, and for DC createdHard TimewithMary Skrenes, with whom he had co-created the cult hitOmega the Unknownfor Marvel. Their ending forOmega the Unknownremains a secret that Skrenes plans to take to the grave if Marvel refuses to publish it. Suffering from idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis ("idiopathic" meaning of unknown origin despite having been a heavy smoker much of his life), he was on a waiting list for a double lung transplant. His final work was the Doctor Fate story arc, "More Pain Comics," for DC Comics'
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