I took a trip home last month and pulled my Avengers collection out of storage, and I just finished re-reading the entirety of Roger Stern's run on the title, which was even better than I remembered it. Thanks for 60 issues' worth of great stories, Unca Rog.

The first issue I bought off of the newsstands (#286) was actually one of your final issues, which you plotted but didn't script. I've got a few questions about this era, and I'm sure that some will be much easier than others to answer. Anyway...

1. You wrapped up your run about a year prior to Avengers #300. Can you tell us anything about your plans for the title if you'd stayed on for that particular anniversary issue?

2. How much of the Super-Adaptoid/Fixer/Heavy Metal story was based on your ideas and concepts, and how much of it was left for Ralph Macchio and Mark Gruenwald to fill in?

3. Did you have anything to do with this subplot, pictured below? To the best of my knowledge, no one ever followed up on this guy, and for me, this is one of the most memorable scenes in Avengers history, since it's from the second issue I'd ever read, and 20 years later, it's still a mystery why he got so worked up over Marrina. I'm tempted to pitch a Dan Smallwood one-shot to Marvel, just so I can get some sense of closure.



Thanks!

I was still working that out, but I'd hoped to engineer a big cosmic dust-up with Loki. Oh, and Power Man was going to join the team.



I really don't recall. And unless I someday unearth my old notes on those issues, I may never be able to say. All I can tell you is that I plotted those first two issues before I was fired, and never really read what was done with them. Didn't read the Avengers again until Br'er Byrne's brief run as writer...and after that, not until Kurt Busiek took over. (I did later acquire most of the issues in between while researching Avengers Forever.)

But "Heavy Metal" was not my title for the storyline.



Oh, I'd forgotten all about that scene. Dan Smallwood was the grandson of the old couple who literally raised Marrina from the egg. Growing up alongside Marrina, Dan had a sort of unrequited love for her -- despite what the copy says, they were not childhood sweethearts. I was going to -- eventually -- have Dan show up on the Avengers' doorstep, and there was going to be some friction between Dan and Namor.

But of course, no one who followed me on the book had any interest in that. And with the way things turned out, it was probably just as well.

-- Uncle Rog

How painful was it to read The Crossing when researching Avengers Forever?

THANK YOU!!! Once Marrina left the scene in Walt Simonson's run, the realization set in that I'd probably never find out what the deal with Dan Smallwood was. I suppose he read about Marrina's death in the newspapers a couple of weeks later, may or may not have contacted the Avengers, and probably got a nice hand-written note from Captain America for his troubles.

What a relief...

And Power Man in the Avengers? Are you crazy? That would never work...

Thanks again for answering our questions!

Well, first they were going to clear him in the death of Iron Fist.



Just doing my best,
-- Uncle Rog

And right after Power Man, Wolverine could join the team. Then Spider-Man. Then...

Ah, what could have been. John Buscema's Power Man would've been fun, and that could've opened the door for Iron Fist coming back and joining the team.

As much as I enjoyed the Walt Simonson-written issues at the time, I don't think Captain Marvel II ever really recovered from the late 1980s "Avengers Disassembled" story. It's almost as if there weren't room in the Marvel Universe for a powerful character with no psychological problems, a stable family life, and who really had her act together.

I loved those Avengers issues! Thanks for a great run!

The Crossing started off very interresting....that's about all the good things to say about it. Except that it was better than Heroes Reborn and Disassembled...put together.

I used to put every issue of the Stern/Buscema/Palmer Avengers up as the best comic of the week when I worked a Heroe's World back in the 80s.

Thanks, Marcus.

-- Uncle Rog

I've been rereading Uncle Rog's Avengers run for the last few weeks. Definitely ranks up there as one of my favorite comic runs in general, and Avengers run, of all time. It had the classic look and feel but at the same time really created a new team dynamic. It was great to see the Wasp grow as a leader throughout the years. It was my start to reading the Avengers. That and the Englehart/Milgrom West Coast Avengers were what cemented my love of the great Assemblers.

Classic comics to be sure.

Here's a question: We know that "Kree-Skrull War" was a tagline given to that 1970s plotline by fans, well after it had started. Was it the same with "Mansion Siege" or was that a name given by editorial at some point?

Marcus, I also worked in a store called Heroes World. Mine was owned by the company that MArvel ended up buyin out and blowing up.

That's it! Same company. I worked in the Galleria Mall in White Plains, NY but they were a NJ based co.

HA!
I worked in the Woodbridge store, and the small warehouse they opened in Matawan NJ until a couple months before they sold out. Funny thing, I found out a couple years later Gordon ended up as a store manager for Stables somewhere. I hear he is still a tool.

I worked there around '86-88. I think that is the same Gordon. Was he Asian?

Gordon was Ivan's (the owner) cousin that ran all of the stores for him, loke an overall general manager. He had a patch over one ear all of the time. I worked there from about 90-93.

Small world huh.

It sure is! Mark was the GM when I was there. There was no whiff of the marvel fiasco.