Issue(s): Defenders #97
Cover Date: Jul 81
Title: "Slouching toward Bethlehem"
Credits:
J.M. DeMatteis - Writer
Don Perlin - Penciler
Joe Sinnott - Inker

Review/plot:
The story of the Six Fingered Hand continues. The Devil-Slayer shows up...

...and tells the group that his estranged wife is working on a commune in Israel for what he believes to be an agent of the Six Fingered Hand.

Hellstorm is refreshingly nasty; as the Slayer recounts the story of how he and his wife became separated, Daimon says, "This is all very... fascinating, Payne, But does this chronicle of your personal failures have a point?"

It turns out that the Devil-Slayer's problem's with his wife's idol aren't just projections. He really is an agent of the Hand, although he doesn't know it; he thinks he is a messiah.

As the Defenders show up and battle his 'angels', he becomes fully possessed by the demon Hyppokri.

Perlin's art is generally ok at this point (often very nice)...

...but his depiction of the demons that Hyppokri commands (once the illusion of them being angels is dispelled) are very silly looking.

Despite the revelations, the Slayer's wife elects to remain on the commune even after the false messiah is killed.

The Man-Thing appears in a brief interlude, 'investigating' a dimensional rift.

Quality Rating: C

Historical Significance Rating: 1

Chronological Placement Considerations: This issue starts with the other Defenders waiting for Dr. Strange as he meditates in the home of the musician from Defenders #96. So no Defenders should appear between then and now.

References:

• Strange mystically investigates Hellcat, who has been acting oddly ever since having been possessed in Defenders #94.
  
• The Devil-Slayer previously teamed up with the Defenders in an arc culminating in Defenders #60.

Crossover: N/A

Continuity Insert? N

My Reprint: N/A

I like the idea that Hellstrom is kind of a dick to others. It feels appropriate with his background.

"Slouching Towards Bethlehem" was a collection of essays from 1968 by Joan Didion revealing the darker side of the hippie experience in the infamous Haight-Ashbury neighborhood of San Francisco. When I initially saw the title, my first thought was to the book by the equally-infamous Robert Bork, "Slouching Towards Gomorrah".

But the title of the collection comes from Yeats's poem the Second Coming- which is probably what DeMatteis is thinking of.

Just to add more fun to the conversation, Dan Savage wrote a book called Skipping Towards Gomorrah, in response to Bork. His original title was going to be Skipping Towards Sodom.

I really dig Perlin's art when Sinnott is inking him. It has that classic kind of look. Sinnott himself said in an interview that he was a little bored doing the Defenders, but "Stan wanted him on it" which I thought was odd- Stan's editorial involvement in 1981- but maybe he meant Jim Shooter.