Issue(s): Howard the Duck annual #1
Cover Date: 1977
Title: "Thief of Bagmom! / Calling all carpets! / The dessert song -- and dance!"
Credits:
Steve Gerber - Writer
Val Mayerik - Penciler
Val Mayerik - Inker

Review/plot:
Val Mayerik is advertised as the artist who first drew Howard back in his first appearance in Man-Thing.

Having been let out of the mental hospital, Howard and Winda move into a one room apartment with Paul Same (the sleepwalker from issue #4) and Bev. Howard's still not doing well, and the others leave him to sleep while they go out shopping. He wakes up feeling abandoned.

They come back with a carpet and a lamp that turn out to be an Arabian flying carpet and genie lap. The lamp takes the ladies to.. *ahem*... Bagmom (and you see the level of 'humor' we're dealing with here)...

...Paul and Howard follow by having the genie lamp arrange for them to get a flight.

They find themselves in the middle of a power struggle between a traditional father and a son who is wrapped up in western ways (he's the one who sold the carpet and lamp in the first place, in order to buy a western style suit) and working for Roxxon Oil. It's not a terrible plot, but the delivery is just terrible, with Gerber's usual wackiness and a lot of Arab stereotypes (although even the stereotypes are a bit tongue-in-cheek).

Quality Rating: C-

Historical Significance Rating: 1

Chronological Placement Considerations: This takes place after Howard getting out of the mental hospital at the end of Howard the Duck #14. Howard the Duck #15 starts with the cast on a cruise boat leaving Bagmom.

References: N/A

Crossover: N/A

Continuity Insert? N

My Reprint: Essential Howard the Duck vol. 1

I think this was the first Howard story I didn't enjoy. Would that it had been the last.

Re: Winda's name- the captions fnord posted name her as Winda, not Linda.