Review by Tony Keen
DC have a long tradition of female counterparts to their male heroes, such as Supergirl, Batgirl, Hawkgirl, etc. Marvel in the 1960s preferred to make their heroines unique, resulting in the Invisible Woman, Black Widow, Wasp, etc. This changed in the late 1970s when, in order to protect copyright, and also out of Stan Lee’s pique at DC suing over Marvel’s Wonder Man, and then introducing Power Girl when Marvel already had had a Power Man, there appeared three female versions of key heroes. It seems slightly odd that Ms. Marvel, appearing in 1977, should be the first, rather than, say, reviving the Miss America name (which Marvel would not do for another thirty years). Jim Starlin’s work with her male equivalent, Captain Marvel, had a cult following, and is much praised now, but didn’t sell well at the time, and Mar-Vell was hardly one of the line’s biggest stars. However, he did carry the company name, and in Carol Danvers, supporting character for Roy Thomas’ run with the Captain, but forgotten by Starlin, there was a pre-existing character who could be Ms. Marvel’s alter ego.
The first two Ms. Marvel stories, written by Gerry Conway have been heavily criticized. Conway himself apologises in the introduction to this volume. And yes, the character we see is a feminist as imagined by a committee of men (Lee, Conway, Thomas, and John Buscema), she has a costume that exposes more flesh than it conceals, and the ‘Ms.’ title doesn’t really make up for that. But Conway had the sense to solicit and credit the input of his wife Carla, which smoothes over some rough edges.
No-one would claim that these are superb comics, but compared to the mediocrity that marred early Spider-Woman, and the drivel that was the first run of She-Hulk, this material is at least okay. The most seemingly preposterous element of the set-up, that a former head of security at a NASA installation (not yet retconned as an Air Force pilot) should end up as editor of a women’s magazine published by the Daily Bugle, is something Conway actually makes work. This also allows him to use some of Spider-Man’s supporting cast and for a brief period Carol and Mary-Jane Watson are BFFs.
In any case, it’s not long before Conway moves on, to be replaced by Chris Claremont (initially over Conway’s plots). Claremont makes several changes, increasing the amount of cloth in Ms. Marvel’s costume, clearing out much of Conway’s supporting cast in favour of his own, transferring Ms. Marvel’s power from her suit to her body, adding an astronaut back story. He also eliminates the division between the Carol Danvers and Ms. Marvel personalities, and drops in the sort of complex narrative threads that were his speciality. It’s not Claremont’s best writing, but improves the quality, and he introduces characters who will become important in his other writing, most notably Deathbird. This collection takes the stories up until early 1978.
Many artists are involved, but the primary penciller is Jim Mooney, whose experience drawing Supergirl stands him in good stead here. Joe Sinnott inks most stories, supplying the standard look of mid-seventies Marvel production (see sample image).
This material can also be found in Ms. Marvel Epic Collection: This Woman, This Warrior and Essential Ms. Marvel, while her first appearance has been much anthologised. The rest of her first run is to be found in Marvel Masterworks: Ms. Marvel Volume 2.
