Howard the Duck
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Howard the Duck is a comic book fictional character created by Steve Gerber for Marvel Comics and featured in several comic book series of the same name about the misadventures of an ill-tempered humanoid duck trapped in a human dominated world. Howard's adventures are generally parodies of science fiction and fantasy, written in a tongue-in-cheek style and combined with a degree of metafictional awareness of the limitations of the medium, often very experimental for a non-underground comic. There was a film adaptation with the same title in 1986.
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[edit] Publication history
Howard the Duck was created in 1973 by Gerber (with artist Val Mayerik designing Howard's original look) in the comic book Adventure into Fear, as a secondary character in that comic's Man-Thing story, dropped into the Everglades by the Demonic "Thog the Overmaster" of the dread realm Sominus [1]. He graduated to his own backup feature in Giant-Size Man-Thing, confronting such bizarre horror-parody characters as the Hellcow and the Man-Frog, before acquiring his own comic book title with Howard the Duck #1 in 1976.
Gerber wrote 27 issues of the series, illustrated by a variety of artists, with Gene Colan eventually becoming the regular penciller. The series gradually developed a substantial cult following, possibly amplified by Howard's entry into the 1976 U.S. presidential campaign under the auspices of the All-Night Party (an event later immortalized in a brief reference in Stephen King's The Tommyknockers). Marvel attempted a spin-off with a short-lived Howard the Duck newspaper strip from 1977 to 1978, at first written by Gerber and drawn by Colan and Mayerik, later written by Marv Wolfman and drawn by Alan Kupperberg.
Due to Howard the Duck being one of Marvel's few non-superhero titles, and Gerber's status as one of Marvel's better-known and most unusual writers from his earlier work on Man-Thing and The Defenders, Gerber gained a degree of creative autonomy that was unusual for mass-market comics writers of the time, and the stories became increasingly dark and experimental. At one point, unable to meet deadline for his regular script, Gerber substituted an entire issue of text pieces and illustrations satirizing his own difficulties as a writer.
The story of Howard was picaresque and involved him taking odd jobs and defeating minor villains, often through coincidence. After five issues in Cleveland, Ohio, Howard and Beverly take to the road, eventually ending up in New York where Howard is nominated for president by the All-Night Party. A doctored photo scandal leads him to Canada, and the defeat of a supervillain, Le Beaver, who falls to his death. He suffers a nervous breakdown, and after the testimony of recurring foe, S. Blotte the Kidney Lady, is sent to a mental institution, where he meets Winda Wester and is turned briefly into the Son of Satan. Beverly and Paul Same (an artist upstairs for whom Beverly does nude modeling) get them both back to Cleveland, but after several months, Beverly and Winda are kidnapped by a sheik from a Middle Eastern country. Upon escaping to a cruise ship, Howard and Beverly are taken by the latter's former classmate, Lester Verde, now styling himself Doctor Bong, who intends to marry Beverly and perform experiments on Howard, as he has, in Moreau-like fashion, on other animals, including a female duck named Fifi. Verde does indeed marry Beverly, and Howard, transformed into a human by Verde, flees with Fifi, who is killed when they crash land in Central Park. He is restored to his natural form by sleeping with Amy Pope. By odd coincidence, Howard becomes employed as a dishwasher by Beverly's uncle and namesake, who goes by Lee. After more adventures, he greets Winda, Paul, and Paul's new patron, Iris Raritan, as the cruise ship Damned docks. At a party on Long Island, Iris and her guests are robbed by the Circus of Crime who abduct Howard. Ignatz Hubley, a former victim of the circus, tries to shoot the Ringmaster, but hits Paul instead when Iris intervenes. After defeating the Circus, plagued by pessimistic dreams, Howard goes his own way, as alone as he was at the beginning of the series.
In 1978, the writer and publisher clashed over issues of creative control, and Gerber was abruptly removed from the series. This was the first highly publicized "creator's rights" case in comics, and attracted support from major industry figures, some of whom created homage/parody stories with Gerber to dramatize the case; these included Destroyer Duck with Jack Kirby (Kirby himself helped pave the way for creator-owned comics with his series Captain Victory) and Stewart the Rat with Gene Colan.
The series continued for four more issues with stories by Marv Wolfman, Mary Skrenes, Mark Evanier, and Bill Mantlo (Gerber returned briefly to write, though not plot, #29, as part of a contract fulfillment), but fans of the original series did not respond well to the loss of Gerber. Marvel re-launched Howard the Duck in 1979 as a bimonthly magazine — an unusual format for mass-market comics at the time — with scripts by Mantlo, art by Colan as well as Michael Golden, and unrelated backup features by others; this series was canceled after nine issues. Articles in these issues state that Howard was Mayerik's idea, though this is contrary to either Gerber or Mayerik's claim, though it follows Marvel's house art-first style. Mantlo, beginning with Issue #30, returned the series to its former status quo, bringing Beverly back into the picture and having her divorce Doctor Bong, and getting Paul Same out of the hospital. Lee Switzler brings everyone back to Cleveland and employs Howard as a cab driver, while Paul, back to being a somnambulator after his release from the hospital, seems to have become Winda's boyfriend. The second story of issue #9, written by Steven Grant had Howard walk away from Beverly. Grant followed that with a story in Bizarre Adventures #34, in which the suicidal Howard is put through a parody of It's a Wonderful Life. Issue #32, again written by Steven Grant, appeared in early 1986; #33, by Christopher Stager, some nine months later, along with a three-issue adaptation of the movie.
In 2001, with Marvel under new management and launching its MAX imprint of "mature readers" comics, Gerber returned to his former publisher to write a six-issue Howard the Duck miniseries, illustrated by Phil Winslade and Glenn Fabry. Featuring several familiar Howard the Duck characters, it, like the original series, parodied a wide range of other comics and pop culture figures, but with considerably stronger language and sexual content than would have been allowable 25 years earlier. The series as Doctor Bong causing Howard to go through multiple changes of form, principally into a rat, and entering a scenario parodying Neil Gaiman's The Sandman. (It should be noted that Gaiman and Gerber have mutual admiration for each other's work.)
He had cameo appearances in She-Hulk (1st series) #3 (Feb. 2005) and (2nd series), # 3/100 (Feb. 2006, the 100th issue of all the various She-Hulk series). He was also featured in Ghost Rider Volume 2 issue #81, cover dated January 1997 with a cameo appearance.
In the one-shot multi-character omnibus Civil War: Choosing Sides (Feb. 2006), Howard attempts to register under the Superhero Registration Act, but learns his socially disruptive life has created so many bureaucratic headaches that the government's policy is that Howard does not exist. This lack of government oversight delights him: "No more parking tickets, no taxes, no jury duty." In this story, as well, Howard says he was pressured to give up cigars.
[edit] Characters
Howard the Duck, as his name suggests, is a three-foot-tall anthropomorphic duck. He generally wears a tie and shirt, and is almost always found smoking a cigar. Originally, like many cartoon ducks, he wore no pants; Disney threatened legal action due to Howard's resemblance to Donald Duck, and Marvel redesigned that aspect of character.
Howard has an irritable and cynical attitude to the often bizarre events around him; he feels there is nothing special about him except that he is a duck, and though has no goals but comfort and to be left alone, he is often dragged into dangerous adventures simply because he is visibly unusual. His series' tagline, "Trapped in a world he never made", played off the genre trappings of 1950s science fiction. A common reaction to meeting Howard the first time is a startled, "You...you're a DUCK!"
His near-constant companion and occasional lover is former art model and Cleveland native Beverly Switzler. Like Howard, Beverly wants an ordinary life but is frequently singled out for her appearance, though she is a beautiful woman rather than a duck. Their only other friends are Paul Same (a painter who briefly became a sleepwalking crime-fighter) and Winda Wester (a lisping ingenue with psychic powers).
Howard found himself on Earth due to a shift in "the Cosmic Axis". In the black-and-white Howard the Duck magazine series, writer Bill Mantlo theorized that Howard came from an extra-dimensional planet called Duckworld, a planet similar to Earth where ducks, not apes, had evolved to become the dominant species. In 2001, Gerber dismissed this idea, calling it "very pedestrian" and "'comic-booky' — in the worst sense of the term." He believes Howard came from an alternate Earth populated by a variety of cartoon animals.[2]
His antagonists, who usually appeared in a single story each, are often parodies of science fiction, fantasy, and horror characters, and sometimes political figures, but also include ordinary people simply making life difficult for Howard. The chief recurring villain, Lester Verde, also known as Doctor Bong — modeled on Doctor Doom and writers Bob Greene and Lester Bangs — is a former tabloid reporter who has the power to "reorder reality" by smashing himself on his bell-shaped helmet; his main goal is to marry Beverly. After several issues, she agrees to marry him to save Howard from Bong's evil experimentation, and remains married to him for some time. Doctor Bong would reappear in issues of She-Hulk and Deadpool in the mid-1990s. The other recurring villains were included the Kidney Lady (S. Blotte), who had been convinced by her former lover that the soul is in the kidneys and attacks anything she see as a threat to them, and Reverend Jun Moon Yuc and his Yuccies, a parody of Reverend Sun Myung Moon and the Unification Church (Moonies). Another important villain was the Sinister S.O.O.F.I. (Save Our Offspring from Indecency) organization, whose leader was implicitly Anita Bryant, though she looked like old, fat Elvis Presley with a smiley face/orange on her head.
Other Marvel Comics characters occasionally appeared, including Spider-Man, Daimon Hellstrom, and the Ringmaster.
Seemingly an autodidact, Howard at various times references Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, the Brontë sisters, and other figures of philosophical and political significance. In a parody of the Marvel comic character Shang-Chi, he was trained in the art of Quak-Fu. In the 2001 miniseries, he was turned into various animals, primarily a mouse.
[edit] Other media
- In 1986, Lucasfilm and Universal Pictures produced the movie Howard the Duck, starring Lea Thompson, Jeffrey Jones, Tim Robbins, and Chip Zien as the voice of Howard. In the film, Howard was brought to Cleveland by a laser experiment gone awry, which also summoned an evil alien spirit called a Dark Overlord of the Universe intent on destroying the Earth. Besides Howard (who was portrayed by an assortment of stunt actors in a duck suit) and the Dark Overlord of the Universe (presumably based on Thog the Overmaster of Sominus, but bearing no resemblance to the character), the only character borrowed from the Marvel Comics mythos was Beverly Switzler, though in this version she became a rock singer. The film was widely panned and was a box office bomb, but it renewed enough attention on the character for Marvel Comics to keep using the character on occasion. Many people consider Howard the Duck as one of the top 100 worst films ever made.[citation needed] The character of Beverly was originally offered to then-unknown singer Tori Amos, but the offer was retracted when Thompson expressed interest. At the time, Amos was the lead singer of the rock band Y Kant Tori Read.[citation needed]
- Gower Goose, an ally of Megaton Man, is a satire of Howard the Duck
- In Amalgam Comics, Howard was fused with Lobo to form Lobo the Duck
- Strangest of all, during a tacitly-approved cross-over between Marvel's "Spider-Man Team-Up" Vol. 1 # 5 and Image Comics' "Savage Dragon/Destroyer Duck" #1 (both Nov. 1996), Gerber claims that Howard and Beverly Switzler changed their names to Leonard the Duck and Rhonda Martini, remained in the Image Universe and "were last sighted in Chicago boarding the Amtrak for Buffalo" while the duck who returned to Marvel is "only an empty trademark, a clone whose soul departed him at the corner of Floss and Regret." [3].
- The only Howard the Duck action figure ever released was as a "freebie" companion packed in with the Marvel Legends Series 5 Silver Surfer action figure by ToyBiz.
[edit] Appearances in Popular Culture
- In Philip K. Dick's book The Transmigration of Timothy Archer, published in 1982, one of the characters (Angel Archer) reads a current issue of Howard the Duck.
- In Stephen King's novel The Stand, a character reads a Howard the Duck comic and is bewildered by the concept. In the 1990 reissue of the book, the comic was changed to Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles.
- On the rock band The Pretenders' first album, 1980s Pretenders, the song "Precious" contains a brief reference. Songwriter Chrissie Hynde, a native of Northeastern Ohio, uses Cleveland as the backdrop for the song, which includes the lines:
And Howard the Duck and Mr. Stress [a long-time local bar band] both stayed
Trapped in a world that they never made
But not me, baby, I'm too precious.
[edit] Trivia
- In Italy, Howard the Duck was translated as "Orestolo il Papero", which means "Orestolo the Gosling".
[edit] Bibliography
[edit] Comics series and starring features
- Giant-Size Man-Thing #4-5 (April-Aug. 1975)
- Marvel Treasury Edition #12 (1976)
- Howard the Duck (1976 series) #1-31 (Jan. 1976 - May 1979
- Howard the Duck Annual #1 (May 1977)
- Howard the Duck (black-and-white magazine) #1-9 (Oct. 1979 - March 1981)
- What If? #34: (Aug. 1982)
- Bizarre Adventures (color, comic-size last issue of black-and-white magazine) #34 (Feb. 1983)
- Howard the Duck #32 & 33 (Jan. & Sept. 1986)
- Marvel Comics Super Special (magazine movie adaptation) #41 (Nov. 1986)
- reprinted in part as Howard the Duck: The Movie #1-3 (Dec. 1986 - Feb. 1987)
- Howard the Duck Holiday Special #1 (Feb. 1997)
- Daydreamers #1-3 (Aug.-Oct. 1997)
- Howard the Duck (Marvel MAX) #1-6 (March-Aug. 2002)
- Civil War: Choosing Sides (Marvel Civil War Tie-in) One-shot (September 2006)
[edit] Collections
- Essential Howard the Duck, Vol. 1 (ISBN 0-7851-0831-9)
- Howard the Duck (Marvel MAX series; Marvel, 2002; ISBN 0-7851-0931-5)
[edit] Official published references to Howard and cast
- The Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe (first series) #5 (May 1983) (Howard; ½ page)
- reprinted in The Essential Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe, Vol. 1 (2006; ISBN 0-7851-1933-7)
- The Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe (second series) #5 (Apr. 1986) (Howard; 1 page)
- reprinted in The Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe Volume Three: Galactus to Kang (1986; ISBN 0-87135-210-0)
- reprinted in The Essential Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe – Deluxe Edition Vol. 1 (2006; ISBN 0-7851-1934-5)
- The Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe (third series) #2 (Aug. 1989) (Doctor Bong; 2 pages)
- reprinted in The Essential Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe – Update 89 Vol. 1 (2006; ISBN 0-7851-1937-X)
- The Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe (fourth series) #2 (Jan. 1991) (Howard; 1 looseleaf sheet; Masters Edition)
- Marvel Encyclopedia Vol. 4: Spider-Man (2003; ISBN 0-7851-1304-5) (Howard; 1/3 page)
- Marvel Legacy: The 1970s Handbook (May 2006) (Hellcow; ½ page)
- The All-New Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe #5 (May 2006) (Howard; 3 pages)
