Back when I was a young and inquisitive teenbo I wasn't allowed to watch them James Bond moom pitchers that were being broadcast on nationwide tee-vee at the time. They were just too durty or something like that especially for an up-and-sprouting suburban slob such as I, so even the thought of asking permission to watch GOLDFINGER or ON HER MAJESTY'S SECRET SERVICE with the hotcha Diana Rigg was out of the question.
However sometimes I would click the dial onto the station where these off-limits mooms were being shown and hope that perhaps I would get to see something rather nefarious, like a wild bloody fight scene with entrails a' drippin' or better yet some high quality bellybutton and bullseye action on the part of one of the Bond Girls. Alas, I didn't get to see anything as exciting as that when I did tune in, though perhaps I was just catching the moom at the wrong time. Oh well, there was always some NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC special on the other channel to contend with I'm sure.
There's very little bullseye action in THE GOLDEN GHOST...in fact there's only one to be espied via a distant photo of a gal en delegant flagrette or whatever the French call it, but that doesn't mean this book's a no go for us slo' mo's. The idea of there even being a JAMES BOND comic strip inna first place was pretty wild in itself, and judging from this book the likes of Jim Lawrence and artist Yaroslav Horak were able to pull such a task off rather smooth like what with such great scripts and hard-edged art that ain't as goop-ish as one might imagine.
Gotta say that I enjoy these BOND 'toons even more than some of the old continuing saga serious strips this was patterned after like say...RIP KIRBY which I never could follow despite the fine artwork because it was so upper crust or somethin'. Transposing the BOND theme to comics might have seemed impossible to some, but Lawrence and Horak did a splendid job of attuning the strip for daily consumption without sacrificing much of the over-the-top sex 'n bloodshed to be found in the flicks. The occasional use of mild expletives might startle those of you who are not attuned to seeing such language used in the dailies, but after a few "damns" 'n all I think you'll get used to 'em.
Four stories here...the first deals with the launching of a new dirigible whose flight is heavily rumored to be sabotaged by a seer whose previous predictions have come true (a goodie even if the fate of said seer and her involvement in it all never is revealed), the second has Bond coming into contact with a former MI-6 spy (and main squeeze as they used to say) supposedly gone rogue and some weird robot men killers on the prowl, the third a weird case of some exact doubles causing trouble for the real deal people who eventually end up dead with Bond naturally falling for a Palestinian activist involved in the saga, and the last a weird plan where fireballs from the sky seek out and kill various folk sorta like those drones you read about today. In all some great comic strip reading that'll make you wanna seek out more, if you have the time and moolah that is!
As for me these BOND strips were fine and dandy, but what I really would like to see is the English comic strip take on the old GUNSMOKE series entitled GUN LAW. From what I have seen there's plenty of bullseyes and bellybuttons in that one!
You, sir, were a suburban slob! A self-loathing subhumanoid! Sheesh!
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