Bad Moon on the Rise!

THE INCREDIBLE HULK — Issue no. 228, July 1978

Book: The Incredible Hulk

Issue No.: 228

Published: July 18, 1978

Title: “Bad Moon on the Rise!”

Cover Price: 35¢

Format: Digital scan

I usually send out Marvel Time Warp on Tuesday mornings. I’m sending this one out on Wednesday because Christmas was Monday, and the holiday threw off my whole understanding of the way days work, and I didn’t have a new Time Warp ready for Tuesday. So happy Wednesday, and I hope you are enjoying this holiday season.

Marvel comic books of this era (the late-1970s) are inconsistent when it comes to crediting the creative team. This issue is credited to: Stern & Gillis (writers), Buscema & McLeod (artists), Patterson (letters), Hall (editor), and Shooter (EIC). The only creator who gets a first name and last name in the credits is Phil Rache, the colorist. If you’d read other Marvel books of this vintage, you’d probably be able to figure out the first names of all of those folks. Though I find the “Buscema” credit particularly frustrating, because Marvel employed two (prominent and talented) Buscemas in those days, John and Sal. Pretty sure Sal is the Buscema in question here (because he’s the regular Incredible Hulk artist at this point). But, again, the credits as listed don’t really work without additional context.

After recently being stuck in his non-Hulk/Bruce Banner mode, Hulk is currently stuck in all-Hulk-all-the-time mode. Which at one point in the story puts him in the unusual (for Hulk) position of trying to sleep. (Usually when Hulk calms down enough to sleep, he turns back into Bruce Banner.)

The apparent villain here is Moonstone, who has a very cool late-1970s costume and can fly and walk through walls. I mean, Hulk can walk through walls, too, but Moonstone can walk through walls without damaging said walls. She shows up at Gamma Base (where Hulk is hanging out) as Dr. Karla Sofen, a psychiatrist allegedly trying to help Hulk ally Doc Samson cure the Hulk. Or, I suppose, at least get him back to occasionally being Bruce Banner.

But Moonstone is really looking to steal the parts for the gammavator for the Corporation. At this point, I’m not sure if the gammavator is something noteworthy or just a MacGuffin. (Also not sure if “gammavator” is a proper noun, so maybe I should be spelling it “Gammavator” with a capital “G.”) I’m pretty sure the Corporation is a sinister group of some sort.

Anyway, Hulk can’t sleep and ends up accidentally foiling Moonstone’s robbery attempt. But Moonstone won’t just walk away from her heist, so she and Hulk end up having a big brawl. And then, when Doc Samson and friends show up, she changes back to her Dr. Sofen disguise at the last minute, so it looks like Hulk has been beating up a mild-mannered psychiatrist. Poor Hulk. That guy can never catch a break.

Next time — I’ll be back in 2024 with a Spider-Man story and my week 29 wrap-up. Happy New Year!