Murdock and Marvel: 1983

Comics Over Time

Episode 21 - Murdock and Marvel: 1983

This year things really start to accelerate in the comics world, as the direct market kicks into high gear. Marvel leads the way again, with a truly astounding number of new books. Welcome to the crazy years, folks. Its time to talk 1983.

Convergence Con: https://www.convergence-con.org/

The Year in Comics

Notable and Newsworthy

Industry Trends

Eagle Awards

Dan's Favorite

The Year in Marvel

Events & Happenings

New Titles

New Characters

Series Ending

Who's in the Bullpen

• ROOKIE OF THE YEAR: Paul Neary

Dan's Favorite

The Year in Daredevil

Appearances: Daredevil #190-201, Incredible Hulk #279, Marvel Two-in-One #96, Marvel Fanfare #7, Iron Man #169 and Fantastic Four #255

Writing credits: Frank Miller (190-91), Alan Brennert (192), Larry Hama (193), Denny O’Neil (194-201)

Pencilers: Klaus Janson (190, 192-96), Frank Miller (191), Larry Hama and William Johnson (197), William Johnson (198-201)

Inks: Klaus Janson (190, 192-96), Terry Austin (191), Larry Hama and Klaus Janson (197), Danny Bulanadi (198-201)

• The year starts with another Double Issue as DD, Widow and Stone race to keep the Hand from resurrecting Elektra; Unbeknownst to DD, Stone finishes the job the Hand started, and Elektra lives again.
• Daredevil visits Bullseye telling him a story about a recent client and how’s he’s questioning what he’s doing. This amazing story is our spotlight story this week.
• Next, we have a story about kingpin trying to get Ben Urich under his thumb by using his wife's desire for a new house to turn Urich dirty; ultimately Ben must decide how best to be a good reporter, a good husband and a good man.
• DD is on the trail of some stolen missiles, and they lead him to a cruise ship and a traveling magician who doesn't know the gun she stole from a guard she killed at the heist doesn't work.
• Tarkington Brown, who works for the mayor, finds that he only has a few weeks to live, so he recruits some cops to form a criminal killing murder squad as his way of making a final contribution before he dies; While she is drunk at a party, Heather tells Tark that Matt is DD, and Tarkington sends his squad to take down the Man Without Fear.
• The incapacitated Bullseye is kidnapped from his hospital by mysterious Asian agents. In the process, they shoot a visiting Wolverine, who tries to intervene. When Daredevil investigates, a recuperated Wolverine insists that the two team up and work on the case which sends Daredevil to Honshu Japan (the largest island).
• There he meets up with Dark Wind’s daughter, Yuriko, who offers to help Daredevil find Bullseye if he’s able to help her save her love interest from the power sway of her father. We learn Dark wind took Bullseye to repair his paralyzed body with adamantium so he can kill a Japanese delegate he doesn’t agree with. Now healed, Bullseye betrays Dark Wind and makes his way back to the States; while Yuriko kills her father to save DD's life.
• The 5-book story arc ends with Bullseye back in New York who is looking to get back on Kingpin’s payroll as a hit man. Black Widow comes checking in on Daredevil and a climactic battle in an old arena Jack Murdock once wrestled in to try to make ends meet. After a lengthy battle, Daredevil looks to finish Bullseye once and for all but is stopped by an image of his father that reminds him who he is (which is not a killer).
• The year ends with someone takes a shot at Foggy, and a wounded Daredevil enlists the Black Widow's aid in trying to find out who is trying to kill his partner. Issue 201 cover is by John Byrne.

New Powers, Toys or Places

New Supporting Characters

New Villains

This Week's Spotlight: Daredevil #191 February 1983 “Roulette”

Recap

Why We Picked This Story

The Takeaway

The start of superstar creators.

Questions or comments

We'd love to hear from you! Email us at [e-mail] or find us on Twitter @comicsoftime.

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THANKS TO THE FOLLOWING CREATORS AND RESOURCES

Music: Our theme music is by the very talented Lesfm. You can find more about them and their music at https://pixabay.com/users/lesfm-22579021/.

The Grand Comics Database: Dan uses custom queries against a downloadable copy of the GCD to construct his publisher, title and creator charts.

Comichron: Our source for comic book sales data.

Man Without Fear: Kuljit Mithra’s Daredevil site contains a staggering collection of resources about our hero, including news, interviews and comic details.

The American Comic Book Chronicles: Published by TwoMorrows, these volumes provide an excellent analysis of American comics through the years. Because these volumes break down comic history by year and decade they are a great place to get a basic orientation on what is happening across the comic industry at a particular point in time.

Joshua and Jamie Do Daredevil: A fantastic podcast that does a deep-dive into Daredevil comics. This ran from 2018-2020, and covered most of the first volume of Daredevil, and was a fun way to get an in-depth look at each issue of Daredevil from 1-377.

My Marvelous Year: This is a reading-club style podcast where Dave Buesing and friends chose important or interesting books from a particular year to read and discuss. This helped me remember some fun and crazy stories, and would be a great companion piece to Murdock and Marvel for those who want more comic-story-specific coverage.

BOOKLIST

The following books have been frequently used as reference while preparing summaries of the comic history segments of our show. Each and every one comes recommended by Dan for fans wanting to read more about it!

Licari, Fabio and Marco Rizzo. Marvel: The First 80 Years: The True Story of a Pop-Culture Phenomenon. London: Titan Books, 2020. This book is sort of a mess, as the print quality is terrible, and Titan doesn’t even credit the authors unless you check the fine print. It’s like this was published by Marvel in the early 60s! But the information is good, and it is presented in an entertaining fashion. So its decent, but I would recommend you see if you can just borrow it from the library instead of purchasing.

Wells, John. American Comic Book Chronicles: 1960-1964. Raleigh: Two Morrows, 2015. Not cheap, but a fantastic series that is informative and fun to read.

Wright, Bradford. Comic Book Nation: The Transformation of Youth Culture in America. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2001. This is the revised edition.

Marvel Year By Year: A Visual History. New York: DK Publishing, 2022. The academic in my rails at using information from any work that doesn’t have an author credit, but this is a decent (if very surface) look at each year in the history of Timely / Marvel from 1939 to 2021.

Cowsill, Alan et al. DC Comics Year by Year: A Visual History. New York: DK Publishing, 2010. Because its nice to occasionally take a peek at what the Distinguished Competition is up to.

Dauber, Jeremy. American Comics: A History. New York, W.W. Norton & Company, 2022. An excellent, relatively compact history of the domestic comic industry from its 19th century origins through to recent 21st century developments. An excellent successor to Bradford Wright’s Comic Book Nation.