Creatures on the Loose #16 - Gullivar Jones on Mars.

SATURDAY, 15 MARCH 2014

Creatures on the Loose #16 - Gullivar Jones on Mars.

The Princess of Mars and John Carter the first draft,written that less successful Edgar Rice Burroughs-Edwin Lester Arnold 

It always seemed to me that there was one obvious drawback to getting super-powers.

Which was that, to get them, you first had to actually do something.

For instance, you had to steal a rocket ship and fly it through cosmic rays. Or you had to build a gamma bomb and then let it explode at you. Or you had to attend a science show and let spiders bite you.

If you wanted lots of powers, you had to do all these things and take refuge from aliens, in a cave, whilst banging a stick against a wall.

Reader, you know by now that banging a stick against a wall is beneath the dignity of a man of my quality, no matter how strong it might make me.

You can imagine, therefore, just how impressed I was, as a child, with Gullivar Jones.

After all, he managed to get his super-powers just by walking down the street.

Admittedly, he then got sent to Mars - which is a bit of a downside - and had to fight big red lobster men but he did at least get to snog a princess, so it wasn't all bad news.

Some first came across Gullivar Jones in the pages of Marvel UK's Planet of the Apes, a mag that seems to be getting a zillion and one mentions round here lately.I rediscovered him,by way of bargain basement comic junk sales.

And I was impressed at once.Sort of

Not only did it have the lazy person's guide to getting super-powers but it was drawn by Gil Kane in a genre I always felt suited him best.

But of course, those tales were just reprints. Gullivar Jones made his real Marvel Comics debut in Creatures on the Loose #16 and what happens in that issue is that Jones, having just quit the army, is leaving the officers' club for the last time, when a man -Lu Pov on a flying disc descends from the heavens, declares Jones is going to be a saviour and sends him back through time to Mars to fight evil wherever he finds it.Lu Pov,is Roy Thomas trying to upgrade the material and pay tribute a ERB fan.In the original tale,the character is a nobody,who fall into the street,dropping his magic Martian carget as he drops dead.It's unfortunate,Lu Pov,isn't used as Gullivar Jones Martian Guide,than the old guy,who brings the heroes magic device and then drops dead.

You will of course be aware this is remarkably similar to John Lennon's claim that the Fab Four got their name when a man descended on a flaming pie and told them to call themselves the Beatles. Whether it's the same man in both cases, I'm not at all sure.

To be honest, anyone with any sense, upon arriving against his will on Mars, would promptly burst into tears and be too busy sobbing to do anything.After his hair turns white and clothes gets shredded on his trip backward in time to Mars,Gullivar Jones come across a titanic city,with a vast tent community arround it.

But Gullivar Jones isn't just any man.Jones,unlike novel version,dosen't time jumping across deep space and flying over the Martian lanscape.

He's an interfering busybody.Problem is,he isn't heroic as John Carter.Gullivar Jones,here unlike in the book,cuts right into the action,jumps off his magic carpet and save Martian yellow skinned Princess Hero from her idiot brother and the red skinned Hither Barbarians.

And so, the instant he arrives, he leaps into action to rescue the aforementioned princess from the aforementioned lobster men Hither People and then gets to road-test her tonsils before she's snatched by pterodactyl people and he's left, out cold, on a funeral barge and heading towards his doom.Heru is no Dejah Thoris.Neither novel,comic strip or book version.And certainly,she isn't Lynne Collins,who'd bust a few heads,before getting kidnapped.

This of course all makes Jones sound like a rip-off of John Carter but the magic of Wikipedia tells me he was originally created by Edwin Lester Arnold in 1905 and therefore predates Carter by a good seven years. The fact that Carter's had a string of books and a movie made about him, and Jones hasn't, only goes to show there's no justice in the world.Yeah,right Wikipenishia.Time to step off your blow hard,Sheldon Cooper arrogance,let somebody else sit your favorite seat and move over.

In terms of characterisation, in this issue, we get to learn next to nothing about Jones, and even less about the Princess, so it's all a bit shallow - and, to be honest, feels more DC in that regard than Marvel. But it's beautifully drawn and zips along. And, most of all, with its strange alien world to explore, it holds out the promise of more action, adventure and bizarreness to come in the very next issue.

Does it produce that bizarreness?

Well,no-planetary romances,wthether John Carter or Dune are always fantastic.The only good or bad thing is,in the telling.

We'll have to find out next weekend when I take a look at that very next issue.

And, if Brian Blessed isn't in it as a hawk man, I shall very disappointed with them.While you wait,just imagine this -My Dinner with Brian Blessed and Ronald Long.-Admirel Zarhk of Lost in Space.

Brian-What?FLASH.

Ronald-No,MISTER SKIDNOSE-NOT FLASH

 The fact that Carter's had a string of books and a movie made about him, and Jones hasn't, only goes to show there's no justice in the world.
What?Sorry,ERB might be perfect,by he was way better a writer Edwin Lester.Arnold.The thing flopped,unfortunately.Arnold makes a few dum mistakes and Gullivar Jones is fall guy because of them.I like Gullivar Jones,don't me wrong,but the story does end on a bad note.Suddenly,Jones gets back his previously unmentioned girlfreind.Least,the comic tried to make for allot of dum mistakes.If Burroughs did read this book-the novel,not the comic ofcourse and said he could write,success of John Carter proves right and fanboy pro whats his name wrong