Modesty Blaise

MODESTY BLAISE remains one of the greatest adventure comic strips to have ever graced a newspaper, or comic book, as far as I'm concerned.

Adventurer, spy, smuggler, racketeer and all-round bad girl is the usual description people give for this gracious and deadly beauty who has been blessed with many talented artists, and a singular creator, Mr Peter O'Donnell.

Modesty Blaise has been adapted into some generally well-regarded books and some pretty forgetful films, but the comic strips remain at the pinnacle of the form.

For any potential writer of the comics business, and any artist who wants to know how to choreograph a story properly for that matter, they should study O'Donnell's work - He is at turns concise, informative, intriguing and plot-progressive in his work.

Modesty Blaise debuted in the pages of The Evening Standard back in 1963, and UK publisher Titan has brought out a number of truly worthy collections. Reviews of a few of those follow, and for further information you may wish to visit: www.cs.umu.se/~kenth/modesty.html

Modesty Blaise: The Black Pearl
By Peter O'Donnell & Jim Holdaway
(Titan)

The Black Pearl story takes Modesty and partner Willie Gavin out to Tibet to make good on a promise the lady made in her youth, thus filling in some of her origin. The Black Pearl turns out to be a bear that will know and acknowledge a reincarnated yogi/monk. We get a guerrilla war among the mountains that's quite gritty in a thriller vein. Compared to this The Magnified Man story comes off rather woefully like a James Bond movie although there are nice action scenes.

The Jericho Caper is a wonderful take on vintage westerns, with a bit of spaghetti thrown in for good measure, and The Killing Ground is a rarity that ran in The Glasgow Evening Citizen while there was a strike in England and The Evening Standard was off the newsstands so the regular Modesty strip was on hiatus, this is rather shorter in length and relies more on quick gimmicks than characterisation. Altogether it's a great collection though.

Modesty is the femme fatale par excellence, wonderfully drawn by the late Jim Holdaway - if you think there's too much photorealism at work look to his backgrounds, admire his choreography in the fight scenes, that's a master at work.

Likewise, Peter O'Donnell's concise text, natural ear for dialogue - corny, cute, hi-tech and as political as the needs arise within the tale or even all at once - these things make me want to stand back and applaud. Loudly. He is one of comics' greatest writers and not enough people know that.

Ironically one of the articles included is on romance adventure novels he ghosted under the penname of Madeline Brent, his American editor never knew!

An octogenarian, O'Donnell is still with us and contributes short intros for the serials enclosed. A downside? The serials contained are not strictly chronological, or have sagas missing, so are being cherry picked. Also, some of the art is less than crisp in this edition - after all this time one cannot be surprised I suppose. Wonderful stuff nonetheless. All would be writers of the comics medium start here not with Alan Moore. Learn to walk before you run, and then walk with a swagger in style!

Modesty Blaise: Top Traitor
By Peter O'Donnell & Jim Holdaway
(Titan Books)

The lead feature in this trio of top quality adventures corresponds to those latter-day British cold war days when double agents were being out-ed and fleeing to the USSR. In Top Traitor the searchlight goes out for Sir Gerald Tarrant who's believed to have defected and taken the top secret Acorn Files with him.

Modesty Blaise and Willie Garvin go searching for their friend, knowing he could never betray his queen and country and also demonstrating they do so out of a deep friendship, and love, not because they're league with the government. In fact if further emphasis that Modesty Blaise is not and never could be a female James Bond this it.

It moves from espionage detecting to exciting thriller with lots of creative cameo parts along the way as they head off to the Alps to rescue Tarrant, who's being held cative as Graf Von Schuyler and his men ransom off the files. It's a top rated story that's epic in feel.

The Vikings is the next story and it relates how an old member of Blaise's old Network gang has signed up to pillage on the modern northern seas. It has its moments of datedness, not helped by the quality printing for this middle saga, as the Viking leader Magnus sounds off about the old Viking ways but then when you consider all the Black Metal murders of recent years in Scandinavia and the recent official status of Pagan worship again, maybe it's not so inappropriate.

The Head Girls is a neat little piece that comes on as if it's straight out of a period TV series yet hangs together better than The Vikings. It features the return of arch-nemesis Gabriel, plus some new quirky villains, very conservative British with it - rather a brisk trot than fast paced, over too soon it leaves you wanting more.

Supplementary features include rare Al Wiliamson try-outs and an interview with O'Donnell where it's mentioned Neil Gaiman's interested in producing a film script. Gaiman's skill as a writer, and him being a bit of a mover and shaker on the movie front these days cannot be underestimated, there are many things he could pull off - the mature emotional interchanges between the lead characters yes. However, one questions if he could pulls off the action, and sheer suspense in the drama that would be required, after all those are stylistic matters are noticeably absent in his published work thus far. That is of course if there ever was another film adaptation.

Modesty Blaise: Bad Suki
By Peter O'Donnell & Jim Holdaway
(Titan)

The next book in the run has Bad Suki as lead story. This ran as backup in the previous old Titan collection. A swinging 60s drugs fable that despite protestations by various isn't that dated so much as kookie in nature at times. If there's a fault it's the cliche of the old lady, Gertrude Porter, being the real Bad Suki who supplies the smuggled drugs to London town.

Actually this is a seafaring collection. From the smuggling boats on the coast of Cornwall in Bad Suki we dive off a luxury yacht to meet with an ancient Roman trireme being used in a Hollywood movie that gets taken over by crooks who used to be friends of Modesty's, and they're carrying a stolen atomic bomb and the actors are forced to row it in The Galley Slaves. Then we have peaceful serenity of the canals of Venice getting disrupted and gondolas displaced as murder takes places in the final tale that is The Red Gryphon.

The stories get better, the art more dynamic. We are also presented with a couple of Holdaway nude paintings of Miss Blaise that fit in with the water theme if you care to view them, the Masdeline Brent article concludes, O'Donnell continues to reminisce and comment anecdotally, and American creator Walt Simonson pays tribute to Holdaway as an influence right from his Manhunter days on and you kick yourself for never having noticed before.