Issue(s): Hulk #194
Cover Date: Dec 7
Title: "The day of the Locust!"
Credits:
Len Wein - Writer
Sal Buscema - Penciler
Joe Staton - Inker

Review/plot:
This issue begins Sal Buscema's run on Hulk, which will rival Herb Trimpe's in length. Sal is probably my favorite Hulk artist, but his style develops over time.

The Hulk is wandering the woods, stealing beans from hobos.

After a nap, Hulk transforms into Banner, who hitchhikes a ride from a couple that is on the run from someone. It turns out that the woman is the daughter of the Locust, and he doesn't like her choice of husband, so he's been chasing after them with an army of bugs.

So basically the Hulk fights a bunch of giant bugs until the father and daughter work out their differences.

Meanwhile, the clean-up of the Hulkbuster base continues, and in the process they discover the Abomination buried under the a field. Apparently he's been down in there since he crashed into the Rhino in his last appearance. Whoops! They just left him there?

Anyway, they revive him but plant a bomb in his forehead to put him under their control.

Len Wein didn't have a compelling reason to revive this third-rate villain. He's obviously no match for the Hulk and the story doesn't connect with the character in any way. It's just a completely random villain of the month story. It's fine for what it is, but still.

Quality Rating: C

Historical Significance Rating: 1

Chronological Placement Considerations: The Hulk is roaming free at the beginning and end of this issue. I have this between Defenders #30 and #31. The Hulk is with the Defenders at the end of #30 but is shown to be on his own again in #31, so this seems to fit ok. (I am way out of sync with the MCP on the Hulk's appearances in Defenders, for reasons i have yet to discover.)

References:

• The Locust last appeared in Uncanny X-Men #24.
  
• The Abomination has been buried under the Hulkbuster base since crashing into the Rhino in Hulk #171 (is the Rhino down there too?).

Crossover: N/A

Continuity Insert? N

My Reprint: N/A

Maybe Wein brought Locust back as part of the X-Men relaunch? Getting the old rogues' gallery into circulation again. It just happens to be an excruciatingly lame rogues gallery, for the most part.

Am I the only one who has ever wondered why the Abomination- a Russian spy named Emil Blonsky- after his initial appearances, speaks like a Brooklyn cab driver in appearances up until the late 1980s when Peter David remembers this fact? While I have fond memories of the character during Bill Mantlo's period (hey, I was a little kid), and found the Tyrannus connection in Hulk Annual #15 very cool, this has never been touched on or discussed, as far as I know. Granted, being a spy, Blonsky was fluent in English dialects, but even so. Why does he continue to talk like a Yancy Street resident?

I've wondered about this too (The Abomination's speech patterns). It seems like most villains who are cast as muscle or bruiser roles, regardless of their background, ended up adopting such speech patterns in a lot of the 70s or early 80s Marvel comics (The Rhino, despite also being Russian, talks this way, although no one at the time knew he was Russian). But even guys like Whiplash, who is supposed to have some science knowledge, talks like a petty thug a lot.