After a quick bit of world travelling last week, I returned home to find that several of my favorite Marvel books were on their way into non-existence, including the fantastic Black Panther: The Most Dangerous Man Alive by novelist turned comic scribe David Liss. Liss’ grasp on street level, noir-esque storytelling is very close to unparalleled these days as he weaves classic storytelling tropes into very modern action oriented plots. However, before Black Panther (and the equally fantastic Mystery Men mini-series), Mr. Liss made his comic book debut on a largely overlooked one-shot commemorating Marvel’s 70th anniversary. What I did not know when I first read it was that Liss’ piloting of The Phantom Reporter in this one-shot return of Daring Mystery Comics was very much a declaration of sorts for what was to come from him and given my love of all of his work since, I decided to go back and take a look at this forgotten modern-day classic.
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Better to address this right at the top than let it fester: yes, my borderline unhealthy obsession with The Twelve is what initially lead me to this story, as it stars one of the (more promising) characters JMS and Chris Weston revived in that story, The Phantom Reporter. In fact, this is the only full telling of the character’s origin since his debut in 1940. Given that, Liss decided to stick much closer to the street level crime stories he is comfortable with and that lend themselves to the character with this story. So much so that any and all super hero and/or masked crime fighting elements come off as almost intrusive and, at best, superfluous. And believe it not that is one of the reasons why the issue works.
Another reason it works is due to how explicitly it focuses on the journalistic aspect of the character’s history. In many ways this is a lesson in effective comparison of journalism and detection, and I feel the comparison is not made nearly enough. Sure, the concept of a vigilante hero living a double life as a journalist to mask their evening activities is far more common than most will admit, however Liss actually made the fact that The Phantom Reporter was actually a reporter a source of immense strength for the character and, indeed, drew the character’s unique sense of being from the fact that he was a journalist crime fighter and not a crime fighting journalist.
Liss deliberately highlights the overlap between the extents to which reporters can go to expose the truth and the tactics traditional detectives use to do, essentially, the same thing. In so doing, he is sending a very clear message about what he perceives to be the power of journalism not only in the 1940s but today as well. This character essentially believes in the pure, unadulterated power of the pen over the sword so strongly that he is willing to put a mask on and get shot at in order to expose corruption and murder in New York City. The simplicity of the idea is also the core of it’s strength.
Speaking of simplicity, when you get right down to it, this story is not a boundary breaking, genre bending, nu-comic extravaganza. It’s storytelling modality is very much embedded in the style of storytelling present when the character first debuted in the pre-Marvel Timely Comics’ era. Things progress toward the ending much like you would expect them to, with the traditional parts of story appearing and functioning like they should. Barring a few instances of unforeseen magic usage and a mysteriously unresolved ending, the story feels and functions a lot like a Golden Age comic, which I suspect was much the point in having it appear as a commemoration of that time period.
However, the simplicity of the story can potentially be a turn off to some readers. That combined with the fact that it was, at least somewhat, a tie-in to a 12 part maxi-series that has remained unfinished for four years makes this one a little easy to forget. However, those that do are missing out on a smartly written tale that foreshadows a fantastic career in comics. That alone makes it worth a return read.
