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Ampersand
Jammy/Fehnmy. /979
This Duck Gets Down
by Kent Murphy
A couple of years ago a new comic book»ha racier introduced himself in the otherwise undistinguished pages
of a “creature” comic called .1Itu-Thtng: a duck. Howard by name, the feathered kind with a rumpled,
ill-fitting sport coat that didn’t quite cover his protruding tail. He carried a cigar and a jaunty air of
confidence while, deep in the ' verglades, light years from home, he was about to face a gang of gohlins
summoned by a master villain. Howard, in the manner of all great heroes, attracts trouble like a lightning
rod.
The Duck wears his dockworker philosophy on his sleeve, a self-reliant
figure in an execrable world populated by, as he puts it, “talking,
hairless apes." Howard escaped his first encounter with Farth only to
misstep on a celestial pathway home. He fell tumbling through the
void, this time into a vacant lot in Cleveland. Depressed by his poor
sense of direction, Howard resolved to dive from a height toward the
smelly Cuyahoga River, w hich once in real life caught fire. Bui near
the top of a slender tower on the river’s edge, the Duck
stumbled once again. This time a voluptuous redhrad
barely dressed in golden chains sobbed her despair
and Howard made his move. Thus began his rela
tionship with the delightful Beverly, a kind of love
one who doesn't know Howard cannot hope to
fathom.
Maybe four feet tall with wide flat flip
pers, the comic kingdom's newest hero
htoks no more the part than Bogey did
But Beverly Switzler, who could be
Lauren Bacall’s lush baby sister, fell
hard for the tough little bird who came
to her aid in what turned out to be a mad
accountant's castle.
The celebrated fiist issue o(Howard thr Duck
ends on a wan and |>cssimistic note. Two themes
appear on its final page that follow through all his
adventures. With Beverly at his side and not a dime
in his pocket he listens to her ask "Where will you go
now? What will you do?” The existential anguish
comes to comics, voiced by a delicious babe dedicated
to a duck. Howard’s reply would have pleased
Camus. “I dunno . . . but I could sure use a good
cigar.'”
At times we all wonder about a parallel
universe, some wheeling cosmos spin
ning next to ours separated by only an
eyelash and a few Jaws of physics
Howard comes from one of those nearby
worlds, flung into our own when the starry nexus
rippled for a moment and he was caught in the crack.
His must have been a world much like our own, full of
wisecracking, acerbic macho types who posture to cover up a
soft core that melts for happy dogs and dizzy blondes. Howard
makes his way through our world with aplomb, startled only by the
occasional observation, such as Spiderman's “Hey ! You’re a talking duck!"
But Howard is not one to let these things pass without comment. “You’re not
exactly Mr. Normal, either, y'know,’’ he retorts to the webslinger.
Howard is most recently involved with a wasted trio of weakly bred socialites, one
of whom is a Barbara Wallers sound-alike incapable of articulating an “L. n The duck is
appalled by the immaturity he finds among them. After a horrific misadventure in which
writers and artists to Howard.' While he
talked he handled the pages as one might
examine a fragile medieval manu
script. “It’s the kind of hook that
people who care aliout comics
would do. You get the feeling as
you read it that the people who
put it together really like *hai
/ they’re doing." A clerk at Fantasy
Land Books in Chamhlre, Georgia,
believed that Howard was appealing
because “It has more realistic dialogue
than other comics.”
But not all collectors are so thought
ful. “I'm keeping it because thr price is
going up,” announced one. A
grandmother said that she had liought the
entire series for her grandson, now four. “So
that he would have something for college ”
Shr updates the investment each month at a
neighliorhood grocery.
Overstreet's authoritative f.'omu Hook Hncr
(•uidr, published annually, pegs mint quality copies
at S.7.*> for most numbers, excluding of course thr
very early ones. Yet that’s more than twice the cover
price for comic liooks only a year or two old. Few stix kv
or lionris have appreciated so much.
Despite H-uiard thr Duck's high flying collector's reputa
tion. the Duck fell flat on his l»eak as a daily comic page figure
When Howard displaced Steve Canyon last year, in the Ma
con, Georgia, Irlr^raph, the readers howled. They pro
tested so much that the editor had to respond with a piece
defending his decision. “’Hie comics page must keep up,
he said in essence. The noble exper
iment was tried at almost the same
time in Columbus, Georgia, as well
The Columbus Isdgrr made room for
Howard and promptly felt heal from
its Traders. Howard endured for two
months in Columbus, aliout three in
Macon. A 'telegraph stafler told the
story of Howard's end. “We ran a
survey to rank the comics by order of
preference. Howard the Duck came in last.” Not only was Howard last, he was a distant last
“Folks just weren’t ready for him here," sighed a newsman.
The college cniwd that reads Howard is a varied one. 'Ib keep up with the Duck, it has to l*r
“Weirded out," complained a pre-med sophomorr who had once read HID. “I’ll try again in a
year or so. See what he’s up to." < )n the other hand, a .veent graduate in Political Science felt
empathy “I’m over-educated and can’t find a job. So is Howard. He makes me laugh about
it."
A self-educated polymath, Howard's a walking diatribe on social ills, but a commentator
without a forum, an orator with no soapbox. His on-again-off-again affair with Ms. Switzler is
an analogue lor the mid-Seventies uncertain view of affection. It hurts Howard when he
thinks himself weak so he periodically shuns the attentions of those who love him and declares
for rugger! individualism But he can’t operate for long alone, he is by nature gregarious and
he appears 4s a circus comedian, the duck delivers himself of a typically stem lecture. “Listen concerned. These traits show up in his readers, the elements mixed in them in many ways,
close Iris, cause here’s a lesson obviously never taught you: Actions have consequences. All “People buy this one who don’t read any other comics,” says one bookseller. “They seem to lie
you hairless apes seem so self-possessed. I’m not surprised it never occurred to you, but mess mostly college types."
with people’s lives—and fate eventually messes back! You’ll get yours. Iris.” As an anti-hero Howard has the appeal of one treated unjustly by life, a fiesty soul down on
Stev e Gerber, a Marv el Comics writer, created Howard the Dud half a decade ago in his his luck but determined to make his own comeback. And the women like him Girls love him.
Brooklyn apartment. He was 26 and lull of creative fruitrations after working as an want to mother him, want to make it with a duck. Because regardless of his intelligent bearing
advertising writer and then a spinner of “sword and sorcery" genre comic book tales. Gerber and smart mouth, Howard remains a duck. He never steps out of character. Once he was
eventually got together with Frank Brunner, an artist, who also wanted to do comics that asked, “You rally a duck? I.cmme hear you quack.” Howard takes the abuse in stride, the way
appealed to the mind as well as the mindless. They teamed up for a pair of Howard adventures we all learn to live with large noses or naturally curly hair.
based incongruously in Cleveland, and Stan Lee, Marvd's publisher, knew he had a winner. Rumors drifting through th** comic book underworld have it that Howard the Duck is
Howard thr Duck Number One hit the presses with much fanfare and once on the streets dying, that it’s a successful cult venture hut a commercial failure. These rumors, in turn, spui
promptly disap|>eared. speculative buying and Howard sales inch upward another month. The managers at Marvel
Among comic collectors Howard thr Duck is already legend. Although on the market for Comics Group, Inc., in New York, Howard’s publishers, are playing it dose to the vest. Jim
barely two years, issue Number One, featuring the first animal super-hero since Mighty Shooter, consulting editor on Howard the Duik, said, “I know of no plans to end it,” when asked
Mouse, commands a mint-condition price of $15 (if you can find a willing seller). In the South about the rumors But Gerber, Howard's creator, is gone and the new editor is Bill Mantlo In
and on the West Coast the price may ease Mime, but supplies are lower in those places. One the near future Houatd thr Duck will become a bi-monthly black and white publication, largei
archive near Atlanta would say only that Howard the Duck hack numbers were in stock. They and more mature, they say.
most certainly were not for sale. Another dealer said, “Yeah, I got Mime. But they’re buried. Just mi he sticks around for awhile longer. «slk
They’re going to stay buried." One enthusiast tried to explain the comic’s intrinsic appeal as An* Murphy oj Atlanta mm a+uadtwrnanatoupmdmratl aaaUahlrtapurafa mrm.duck cornu hook lull*fat*'
he displayed a rare issue. “The drawing and lettering are high quality. They assign their best hr mall take tadk immtly