Sea serpents, bullets, and gimmicks!

It's the first of the month, which means a a clean slate of fresh challenges that await us. It's also a Wednesday, which means a clean slate of new books to read. Before we get lost in the ongoing adventures of comic book day, let's take a trip back into the past to see exactly what the kids were reading in Comic Book Days of Wednesdays Past!

We've reset the Randomizer to pick a year from 1938 to 2009, so where's our first stop?

1954!

If you were growing up in the early 50's and took your dime to the general store, there's a chance you may have walked out with Out Of The Night #17.

At first, I was worried for Peter Parker on that cover. To begin with, I think he's been slacking on his mythological studies as I don't ever recall Minotaurs ever being drawn as sea serpents.

Secondly, it's a freaking sea serpent! Run!

Third, it's breathing fire! Oops, my bad...that minotaur serpent isn't breathing fire, but being hit by some sort of exploding projectile thrown by our hero.

In that case, I think he gets what he deserves. Anyone walking around an underground labyrinth with flaming projectiles is just itching for a fight, in my opinion.

Let's leave him to his fate and see what year we're off to next.

1942!

Yes, when political correctness was just a gleam in society's eye, we had Bulletman #9 on the stands. And really, who better to take on a pack of wild dogs than two heroes modeling themselves after bullets. As outraged as PETA is right about now, I'm sure you could take any cover of Bulletman from this time and make it seem vaguely inappropriate.

It's not as bad as it first looks however, as what I originally mistook for a hail of gunfire surrounding the canine bank robbing gang is just jewels falling from their ill-gotten gain.

Nothing to worry about here after all. Although it does remind me that it's been far too long since I've caught The Doberman Gang on cable t.v. Do they even replay that anymore?

So let's use the power of the Randomizer for good, and pick the next random book from my collection to review. Take it away Randomizer...

...and that book is Fantastic Four #347 from December 1990, published by Marvel Comics!

Hey, it's our old friends the Fantastic Four! Remember them? They were the star of our very first review here at the Random Longbox, and they've been surprisingly absent in the intervening fifteen months.

Come to think of it, it wasn't even the "real" Fantastic Four as the book that we reviewed fell smack dab into the Heroes Reborn Jim Lee reboot. It's a good thing we get another crack at the FF, with the 616 version of them--

Wait a minute...is that Ghost Rider on the cover? And Gray Hulk?

Yes, it's the goofiest line up of the FF ever with Ghost Rider, Hulk, Spider-Man and Wolverine taking over for a couple of issues.

I could feign outrage at Spider-Man and Wolverine being part of the team too, but that argument's getting a little stale. Besides, if I remember correctly this storyline was a parody of sorts of cash-grabbing guest stars that were all the rage at this time, so their inclusion here actually makes sense.

See you in a day or two for the review.