What’s Inside:

As Goliath laments the previous month’s adventure, Detective Elisa Maza is in turmoil. Turns out a serial killer has appeared in the alleys of New York using the same M.O. as the killer that Elisa took down in the grand year of 1992, the very same bust that landed Elisa her detective’s badge and launched her career. The man she arrested at the time pleaded his innocence, but was found guilty. Did she arrest the wrong man? Is her career based on a lie?

Determined to find out, Elisa takes to the alleys to lure the current killer, hoping he is just a copycat. By issue’s end, she is confronted by the killer, a “shaggy” man, and will need to fight to survive.

Meanwhile, the trio of Brooklyn, Broadway, and Lexington has lost Bronx in the subway tunnels! To be continued, and Make Mine Disney, and stuff!

Writer: Mort Todd

Artist: Amanda Conner

Colorist: Anthony Tollin

Publisher: Marvel

Why I Kept This Issue:

Well, I’ve already explained just how much Gargoyles means to me, so I won’t go into it again. I picked this issue up at a Kroger newsstand when I was a kid, and kept it safe and sound at my grandmother’s ever since.

This comic is way darker than the show was allowed to be. In this issue, we are exposed to a serial killer, two corpses, a (possible) wrongful conviction, and hookers. Yes, hookers.

Attached Memory:

Amanda Conner and her husband Jimmy Palmiotti are two of the greatest people I have ever met at a comic convention. And from what I hear from my friend in the industry, they are two of the most loved and pleasant people to work with.

At C2E2 last year, I brought this and a whole stack of other comics for Amanda and Jimmy to sign. They had a huge line, like, huge, one of the biggest lines of the entire weekend. I actually split up my pile and got in line four different times, so I wouldn’t hold anybody up.

 I probably should not have worried about that though. I noticed my first time through just how slow the line was going. Good lord, I thought, what is the delay here? Turns out the delay was the fact that Amanda and Jimmy are incredibly nice people who give one-on-one attention to their fans, and I was no exception.

When I finally made it up to their table, Ms. Conner took one look at this comic and beamed enthusiastically. “Oh my god!” she exclaimed. “Oh, this is from so long ago, I haven’t seen this in so ages!”

She then told me an interesting story about the comic; it was from early in her career, and she had drawn this cover with the intention of giving the criminal in the background bloody hands. She explained that when Disney (who was working with Marvel for this comic at the time, and now they own Marvel, which little-kid-me would have thought was nuts) saw the cover, they objected to the violence. So, the blood on the hands was colored blue to make the hands just…wet…I guess. I had always thought that was strange when I was a kid, and sort of figured that some form of censorship had taken place. (What I find interesting, however, is that Disney objected to the outside of the comic but not the inside since, like I said above, there are totally corpses and hookers).

“Do you want me to fix it?” Ms. Conner asked.

“Sure!” I agreed.

She then spent minutes of her time coloring in the blue ink, turning it back into the blood. And, yes, this held the line up a great deal, but I could tell that she was willing to do this for every one of her fans. And then Mr. Palmiotti, naturally, offered to sign it and conversed with me as well.

Experiences like that, where a creator really shows appreciation for their audience, can transform someone from a casual fan into a die hard one. I hope I get to see them again at C2E2 this year.

Condition of My Copy: This is (as far as I know) the one and only (I hope) bloody variant of Gargoyles #10 in existence!