Issue(s): Marvel Fanfare #56, Marvel Fanfare #57 (Toys and Captain Marvel stories only)
Cover Date: Apr-Jun 90

Toys
Title: "Toys night out!"
Credits:
Bill Mantlo - Writer
Don Heck - Penciler
Don Heck - Inker

Captain Marvel
Title: "Power and duty"
Credits:
Bill Mantlo - Script
Roger Stern - Plot
George Freeman - Penciler
Al Milgrom - Inker

Rob Tokar & Sarra Mossoff - Assistant Editor
Al Milgrom - Editor

Review/plot:
My search engine is a little temperamental, and one quirk is that if there isn't at least one Character Appearing in an entry, the entry doesn't show up in certain types of searches. I bring that up because the back-up story in Marvel Fanfare #56 features no actual Marvel characters, so i've lumped it in with the entry for issue #57. It's just a silly feature of no consequence, but i thought i might as well include it.

Actually, i'm really jealous of the kid in this story, because he has a Destroyer action figure. I guess nowadays after the Thor movies that's not a big deal, but it would have been pretty rare for 1991.

Anyway, the boy is told to clean his room before dinner or else his toys will get thrown out. And he tries, but it's too monumental a task. While he's sleeping, his toys come out and fight.

But when they hear the boy's mom coming, the Dr. Strange and Dormammu toys cast a spell to clean up the room.

Silly. But i guess it's nice to see Don Heck draw a bunch of characters.

More interesting are some Mike Vosburg pin-ups.

The back-up in issue #57 is scripted by Bill Mantlo. But he didn't plot it. Per the Editori-Al, "For personal reasons, the writer who plotted this story did not want his name on the credits. I'll just say he's someone close to the character and leave it at that." I assume that was Roger Stern, upset about the situation that got him fired from Avengers. Or maybe he just hated George Freeman's weird stylized art.

Note that Stern, with John Romita, Jr., does get a "created by" credit. Those were still pretty rare at this point.

This is a basic character study. Captain Marvel is living in New Orleans, and she can't sleep. So she flies around, helps the police out with a hostage situation...

...and then talks a drug addict out of committing suicide.

This redeems an earlier situation from when she was still a police officer and failed to stop someone else from committing suicide.

The drug addict is extremely gaunt, but the truth is everyone in this story looks like that.

Some more pin-ups, this time from Norm Breyfogle.

I don't really see USAgent crying about Iran-Contra. I guess it could be Steve Rogers in the costume.

Quality Rating: C-

Historical Significance Rating: 1

Chronological Placement Considerations: Captain Marvel has her original powers. I've dropped this after her story in Solo Avenges #2. Luckily the Hobgoblin had debuted and Wolverine had used the "Patch" nickname at that point, or the toy story would be anachronistic (not that i would have really cared). The main feature in these issues is a multi-part Shanna the She-Devil story that is covered in a separate entry.

References: N/A

Crossover: N/A

Continuity Insert? N

My Reprint: N/A

Fnord, Monica's powers aren't good evidence regarding placement. Monica has her old powers in Operation Galactic Storm. (In fact, I wonder if this backup was one of the reasons the writers of Galactic Storm thought Monica had her old powers back- they might not have realized this was meant to take place in the past. ) But it was probably written around the period you placed it.

a minor point for a minor story (involving action figures which, I presume, have only a basic aspect of the hero's personality) but I notice Wolverine says "never mind my patch"- a reference to the script which Don Heck didn't get, maybe? Since Wolverine is not in his 'patch' persona. Anyway it's a throwaway line in a throwaway story but I noticed that.