Marvel Preview #4 (January 1976)

Guardians of the Galaxy is on the fast track to being the biggest box office hit of the summer, if it wasn't already. It was a pleasant surprise to me, as many of the characters in the film are hardly well-known outside of comic book readers, the members of the Guardians themselves first appearing in Marvel titles from the 1960s and the 1970s.

In fact, in honor of the film, I decided to do a review of one of the first appearances of one of the central characters of the film: Peter Jason Quill, aka the Star-Lord.

They messed with my Walkman. They shouldn't have messed with my Walkman...

Star-Lord in the comics is surprisingly different, yet similar to his film origin in many ways. He's also an older character than one might think. His first appearance was in Marvel Preview #4 (January, 1976). Marvel Preview was a black-and-white magazine that lasted from 1975 to 1983 and had 34 issues released (issues 25 to 34 were released under the name Bizarre Adventures). Interestingly, Star-Lord's fellow Guardian, Rocket Raccoon, also debuted in issue seven of Marvel Preview.

Here I come to save the galaxyyyyyy...

Co-created by writer Steve Englehart and artist Steve Gan, Englehart's inspiration behind the character by the interest Englehart had in astrology at the time (it was the 1970s). The issue has an introduction by the man on how Star-Lord came to be. It's...trippy. Again, it was the 1970s. The story, being in magazine-format, is quite a long one.

In this original story, Star-Lord comes off as well...a jerk obsessed with revenge. As a boy, he witnessed his mother murdered by aliens, and he swore revenge on them. He made it his lifelong goal to go to space and get his vengeance. As a result, he spent his youth hitting the books and eventually becoming an astronaut at NASA. However, he struggles with interacting with others, as his obsession with space and revenge prevents him from forming friendships and romances.

Despite his angry and solitary nature, a spark of heroism does exist in Quill, as he leaps to save the life of a fellow astronaut from a centrifuge accident. However, his jerk nature comes back to bite him in the butt when he is not picked to go on a space mission, as being in space for long periods of time will require people to get along with each other, and Quill has not exactly been making friends. After a night of drinking, he gets melancholy about not being able to get into space.

The kicking off seems to have had an effect, as later, he is given a chance to work in a space station, Quill's commander noting that ol' Petey seems to have gotten better in his behavior and attitude. Over the next couple months, Quill finds peace on board the station. One day, a spaceman appears and tells the inhabitants that during the next lunar eclipse, one human shall be recruited to become the Star-Lord. Quill suggests that someone volunteer to be the next Star-Lord, meaning himself.

The head council of the station agrees to the idea, but tells them they want someone more experienced in space operations. Quill. FLIPS. OUT. I mean, he flips out. He goes tossing-a-chair-at-the-screen nuts. Bananas, cuckoo, crazy, wacky, shama-lama-ding-dong. The astronaut they chose is Greg Harrelson, the astronaut that Quill once saved from the centrifuge. Enraged, Quill rampages through Cape Canaveral, attacking people and stealing a rocket. Yup, this is our hero, the man who will become a film star and source of hilarity and awesomeness about forty years later.

He makes it to the space station, where he continues his rampage and attacks Harrelson, hell-bent on becoming the Star-Lord. Luck is on Quill's side as the eclipse hits...and he is taken.

Quill finds himself on an alien world where he meets a bearded man and is given a uniform and a gun. Quill discovers that the suit allows him to fly and the gun is an Element Gun, able to shoot fire, water, wind, and earth. I think the Element Gun is pretty cool. Shame he didn't have that in the film, because the Element Gun is awesome. The old man asks him what Star-Lord will use his new power for...and Quill admits he is unsure. The old man reminds him of his desire for revenge against the aliens who killed his mother, and Quill finds himself out in space...and he encounters the aliens. Quill leaps into action and gets his vengeance.

He finds himself back on the old man's planet, where he realizes it was an illusion. The old man explains that he did this to get Quill's desire for revenge out of his system. The comic ends with the statement that the Star-Lord's adventures have just begun.

The comic is not a BAD story, per se. However, there are a couple big flaws. Mainly, the character of Peter Quill himself. He is a major jerkwad in this story. However, this was intentional on the part of Englehart. You see, his intention was for the character to grow over his adventures to become more of a heroic and cosmic character. Unfortunately, Englehart left Marvel before this evolution could unfold (This comic is the only Star-Lord story he'd write), so Star-Lord was left as a major-league jerk here.

The other major flaw I have is, I never really got any idea of what Star-Lord is from the story itself. Star-Lord was actually supposed to be an intergalactic policeman, but I didn't quite pick that up from the story. And being your typical 1970s Marvel cosmic story, there's a lot of flowery narration, making the story a bit hard to get through at times.

On the other hand, I loved Steve Gan's artwork. It's detailed, and plain gorgeous to look at. I wonder if he did any other work for comics. His work here makes me think of John Byrne a little bit.

All in all, Star-Lord's debut is a flawed story, but it's still a fun read with beautiful art.