‘Mars Attacks KISS’ One-Shot (IDW Publishing)
Written by Gaz E
Sunday, 03 March 2013 03:00
You’d expect a nerd like me to have pretty much everything comic-book related to KISS….and you would expect correctly.
From the band’s first appearances in the pages of Marvel’s Howard The Duck, through the iconic pair of Marvel Comics Super Special issues (#1 in 1977, #5 in ’78), the first of which famously claimed to have band member blood in the ink, the brief return to the same legendary comic powerhouse in 1996, the Image Comics/McFarlane ‘Psycho Circus’ years, the Dark Horse dalliance, the ill-fated Kiss Comics Group proving to be as essential to publishing as Gene Simmons’ Tongue magazine, right up to the current deal with IDW, I have stuck by the Starchild, Demon, Spaceman and Cat through the pencilled years and, honestly, it hasn’t been worth it. Not even close.
The Howard The Duck appearances (in issues 12 and 13 of the classic Marvel character’s monthly book back in 1977) hold a kind of reverence over this particular geek, and the two Super Specials will always have a magical hold over me given they were once held in the same regard as the Holy Grail or Lost Ark of the Covenant. After that though, jeez, KISS in the comic world has generally been as thrilling as having ‘Hot In The Shade’ on repeat.
The KISSnation book that Marvel put out in 1996 when the reunion with Ace and Peter (*proper KISS) was Hotter Than Hell was part magazine and part comic-book, the latter section a feeble attempt at introducing the KISS characters to the world of the X-Men, thereby making the band’s return to the company to which it had given blood stand on the precipice of Rock Bottom. That destination, sadly, was to be hit with the band’s next inked moves.
Tart the whole ‘Psycho Circus’ strain up as much as you like, the fact remains that everything connected offered way more than it delivered. Album, computer game, action figures and comics all arrived with the kind of propaganda expected of a corrupt, money-hungry corporation, the product actually very poor value for money. Comic-wise, some idiot suggested a load of old celestial bollocks be chosen to tell new KISS stories in an old fashioned medium and, seriously, it was a shocking decision. For a band with lyrics and themes that barely scratch at the surface let alone ever threaten to be deep, the idea of the Four-Who-Are-One, basically sub-Silver Surfer cosmos-related balderdash, and a constant stream of insipid storylines for which nobody cared meant that KISS comics have died embarrassing deaths at whichever publishing company Gene $immons has convinced to put out the bland nonsense, the Elders looking for a new home more often than your average workshy family of eighteen.
And so it has continued, from Image Comics to Dark Horse, through the 4K non-event that saw the KISS Comics Group hang around for even less time than Mark St. John, right up to the newest deal with IDW that launched in the summer of last year, the cosmic snores have continued to ring out. I’ve still bought them, shame on me, kept the band in wigs, but stopped reading them long ago, that completist OCD gene meaning that I can’t cease to purchase and hoard. A four issue jaunt in 2011 – Archie Meets KISS – was the first time in what seemed like 100,000 years that a hint of fun was allowed to be uttered in the same breath as the words ‘KISS’ and ‘comics’. Until now…
Finally, a little of that KISS bombast has found its way into comic-book form…and all because of some Martians who talk exactly like a certain spaceman from Jendell: “Ack!”
To celebrate the 50th anniversary of the infamous trading card series Mars Attacks IDW Publishing, already publishing a monthly comic dedicated to the vicious extra terrestrials with a bloodlust bigger than their exposed brains, decided upon a weekly comic book event that would see the Martians, famous for burning cattle and destroying dogs, crossover into the worlds of other pop culture icons and comic-book licences. Over a five week period at the turn of the year Mars would attack Popeye, The Real Ghostbusters, Zombies Vs Robots, the Transformers and, of course, KISS. Retailer incentive covers would see the zap-happy ETs troubling the likes of Judge Dredd, Cerebus, ROG-2000, Spike and Madman, but it is the first KISS comic in years that I actually read at a canter that holds court here.
With its front and back cover paying homage to the legendary Mars Attacks trading cards – #40: Flaming Youth – this one-shot (written by Chris Ryall, with art by Alan Robinson) offers the kind of grin-inducing, throwaway thrills that pretty much sum up the whole KISS experience, with added old school KISS comic nerd bait thrown in for shits and giggles.
Page one finds the action, worryingly, acted out in the cosmos (again). The Elder, a cosmic deity who speaks in KISS logo font, tells SHE, enigmatic emissary of said Elder (fucking told you, eh?!), a load of old codswallop about the KISS avatars (power-giving symbols ever so similar to the character talismans in KISS Meets The Phantom Of The Park) but, before I file this comic away with the other KISS non-reads, the green shit hits the fan because, back on Earth, the Martians, it would appear, are attacking!
Four of the Martians are attacking an aged hippy named Dizzy The Hun (in a wonderful tip of the hat to Steve Gerber, writer of the original KISS Marvel Super Special) who, upon seeing a quartet of struggling musicians – guess who?! – throws a mysterious box in their direction. “Heads up, Flaming Youth! Hither cometh thy destiny!”
The box, though, is zapped by Martian ray gun and falls to the floor, its contents spilling out onto the sidewalk. Its contents? The KISS avatars!
The four Martians pick up an avatar each and BOOM! (in another Marvel homage, this time to the John Buscema/Tony DeZuniga artwork from 1977) the butt-ugly green alien mofos are suddenly transformed into butt-ugly green alien mofos….with KISS make-up and special powers!
The Demon Martian breathes fire when a human Gene Simmons-thrown house brick smashes his space helmet, the Catman turns a cuddly poodle into a monster dog that eats its BBW owner, the Spaceman pulls a cool hole in space and time move on a human that results in the latter getting his face shrakked off, while the Starchild shoots down fighter jets with his one good eye. And looks bloody gorgeous doing it.
For continuity reasons the Four-Who-Are One make an appearance, fighting the illegal aliens from a different plain which, as well as being pretty funny, offers our human Knights In Satan’s Service the chance to finish off the job in the here and now. But wait, a legion of flying saucers are descending on the Earth – if only The Elder could intervene with one big clap of his otherworldly hands!
With the planet appearing to be saved a certain Paul Frehley stops the culling of an injured Martian, an idea forming in his mind. “What if I told you we would all wear some kind of crazy makeup too, so we look as weird as he does?”
An all-new KISS origin story told to the backdrop of a celebration of half a century of Mars Attacks? Finally, finally, a KISS comic-book that hasn’t tried to rock but, instead, rolled over and died.
