Issue(s): Speedball #2
Cover Date: Oct 88
Title: "Stuck on you! / Graffiti Guerrillas?"
Credits:
Roger Stern - Script
Steve Ditko & Tom DeFalco - Plot
Steve Ditko - Penciler
Butch Guice - Inker
Terry Kavanagh - Editor

Review/plot:
It's not quite clear from the credits if Tom DeFalco was involved in the first story. His credit for this is "Navigator" (as opposed to his credit for the second half which is "plotter in chief" Steve Ditko is definitely a minimum of co-plotter for both stories and Roger Stern is only scripting.

The first story has Speedball going up against a guy that has invented "magnetic glue".

The other big news is that the cat, Niels, that we saw in issue #1 turns out to also have been exposed to the energy that turned Robbie Baldwin into Speedball.

Robbie is unable to catch the cat so that Doc Benson can test it for side effects or find a way to reverse it.

Here's an expansion of Speedball's powers.

The second story has Speedball going up against the Graffiti Guerrillas.

Notice that Robbie's referred to as the Masked Marvel, not Speedball.

The topic of graffiti triggers a debate between mom and pop Baldwin about whether or not it is a form of legitimate artistic expression.

Are we sure these aren't the outtakes from Amazing Fantasy #15?

Sometimes i think i can see Roger Stern doing what he can to make this not so generic. But it's not working. Maybe if he had been able to plot the issues...

Quality Rating: D

Historical Significance Rating: 1

Chronological Placement Considerations: N/A

References: N/A

Crossover: N/A

Continuity Insert? N

My Reprint: N/A

The Sticker doesn't die in this story and turns up later in New Warriors 66.
New Warriors 66 retcons all the villains in Speedball's series as having been created by a guy named Clyde, who we'll meet in issue 10. This makes no sense. In the Sticker's case, the implication is that Clyde created the glue formula but the dialogue makes it clear the glue formula was invented by Dr. Haven.
Teri Cooper, David Bealer and Officer Burnatt all have later appearances.

Well, the teenage girls' hair is certainly straight from 1962...

I never read this, or even heard of Speedball until many, many years later, but, on now seeing some scans, this reminds me of nothing more than that middle-aged/elderly guy who still dresses like a teddy boy /hippie/70s rock fan all these years later, despite the changes in the world since. It's just all the worst aspects of the Silver Age all over again (and I write this in recognition of the genius works of that time), with little or no concession to the then present day Marvel Universe. Marvel may as well have set the series in the past, actually...

I remember reading Speedball in real time and feeling like I was reading the punchline to a joke that everybody got but me. It was so obviously out of place, so confusingly anachronistic, that in my mind it had to have been done on purpose. I actually thought the setting of the stories took place in the 1960's.

I've added Teri Cooper, David Bealer and Officer Burnatt as Characters Appearing. Burnatt also appears in issue #1. David Bealer might also as part of the crowd of kids in that issue, but i'm not listing him there. Thanks, Michael.

If this series weren't so disconnected from the rest of the MU, they could have used Paste Pot Pete as a villain for Speedball. Instead they come up with another glue-themed baddie who fits the Scooby Doo style rogues gallery Robbie has.