By the late 80's, Marvel had new management set on rampant expansion. To increase their market share, more and more new titles were created. Long term, this policy of flooding the market didn't work out so well for them... Cloak & Dagger and Doctor Strange once again went their separate ways, C&D getting a new monthly book, while Doc returned to a bi-monthly. With hindsight this seems an odd decision, especially considering C&D's Mutant Misadventures only lasted 19 issues, while Sorcerer Supreme chalked up an impressive 90 issue run.
Doctor Strange, Sorcerer Supreme #1-2 (1988-1989)
Pencils: Richard Case
Inks: Randy Emberlin
Now settled back into his regular life, Strange is tricked by a reborn Dormammu, who sends Stephen's astral form on a fool's errand, then commandeers his body. It's revealed that Dormammu has been hitching a ride in Doc's mystic eye socket since his ascension between higher dimensions. Ewww. Bodiless, Strange is forced to take over a rat, which provides some comedy value, especially when he's assisted by frog chums of Thor's. Rat Strange eventually confronts Strange Dormammu, in a predictably one sided battle. Only the timely intervention of Clea and Topaz turns the tide in the good guys' favour. Despite the presence of one of Strange's major villains, this is Gillis' lightest Dr S tale, a real change of pace from the often relentless darkness preceding it. Rat shenanigans aside, it's not a particularly memorable two parter.
Doctor Strange, Sorcerer Supreme #3-4 (1989)
Pencils: Richard Case
Inks: Randy Emberlin
It's fitting that Peter Gillis' final full length story for Marvel was the rebirth of the New Defenders, his first regular assignment for them. A content Stephen, now betrothed to Clea, heads to Wales for undisclosed mystical reasons. There he comes across five unlikely strangers compelled to meet in the woods. Four are transformed by his spell into the reborn New Defenders, now known as the Dragon Circle. The other, a literature professor Dafydd, takes on the spirit of King Arthur. The spirits of Arthur and his knights being reborn in ordinary modern day folk to fight an ancient evil is oddly also the premise for Marvel UK's Knights of Pendragon series, which came out a year later.
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| Regional dialects are hard to get right... |
There is the thorny question raised by Stephen whether the hosts are ok with the four heroes co-opting their bodies. Can they switch back and forth between forms? It's all rather unclear.
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| Weirdly, Interloper and Strange act as if they've never met before... |
This was meant to be a three part story, but was truncated to two, leaving a rushed and cramped conclusion in #4. The gang are suddenly in Manchester, which is an unrecognisable burned out shell. Widespread rioting under the influence of the Dragon of the Moon has resulted in martial law being enforced. Like some bleak 1970's sci-fi movie, stereotypical roaming gangs of skinheads and bikers terrorise the populace. It's a very dated view of Britain, especially considering it's set in the late 80's. Although there's no clear evidence, the feel of this issue appears inspired by classic UK sci-fi series Quatermass. The power station with guards under alien control is straight out of 1957's Quatermass II.
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| Quatermass II |
In the final confrontation, the Dragon Circle destroys the pesky Dragon of the Moon once and for all (hopefully). Gillis told Marvel Age he hoped the Dragon Circle might spin off into their own series. However, this was the last we saw of them as a team. Valkyrie eventually crossed back into the Marvel mainstream with short lived Defenders revivals in the 2000's. Andromeda occasionally resurfaced here and there, usually alongside Namor. Manslaughter and Interloper were barely seen again.
The reason this three part story got compressed into two was that the entire creative team (barring letterer and colourist) were abruptly replaced in #5. Editor Carl Potts made way for Gillis' old friend Ralph Macchio. Roy Thomas had returned to Marvel and was offered his old writing assignment back. Richard Case went the other way to DC, beginning a classic run on Grant Morrison's Doom Patrol. Ironically Macchio hired Jackson Guice as new Strange penciller on the strength of the What If issue he drew, written by... Peter Gillis. To add insult to injury, the title also switched to monthly and received plenty of in-house promotion that had previously been lacking.
Specific reasons for Gillis' firing so early after the relaunch are unknown, although he just seemed to have fallen out of favour at Marvel in the post Shooter regime. This pretty much spelt the end of his relationship with Marvel. What remaining plans Gillis had for Sorcerer Supreme remains unclear. When he first took over the good Doctor he stated that he had "ideas for about four dozen issues", including bringing back Jennifer Kale and Dakimh the Enchanter, a leftover idea from New Defenders which never materialised. Late on he'd discussed with Chris Claremont a potential Magik/Strange crossover.
Two later short stories in anthology Marvel Comics Presents bookend PBG's Dr Strange run.
Marvel Comics Presents #20 (1989) - Clea
Pencils: Ron Lim
Inks: Jim Sanders
At The Bottom Of My Garden sees Clea stumble upon a hidden garden in the Dark Dimension. It's guarded by a dragon left there by previous ruler Dormammu to protect its dangerous secret - a flower. Perhaps, muses Clea, such beauty is the one thing Dormammu could not bear. Although he seems like the type just to trample on flowers. Quite a decent little filler.
Marvel Comics Presents #61 (1990) - Doctor Strange
Pencils: Chris Tsuda
Inks: Mike DeCarlo
In The Librarian, Stephen pays a visit to yet another old flame Marjorie, to solve the mystery of her hidden immortality. The pair get a glimpse of her possible future, battling demons in a world where the Sun has gone mad, with the Earth exiled to orbit near Jupiter. It's heady, if slightly nonsensical stuff for an 8 pager. The stiff artwork doesn't do it any favours, treating the action like some 1950's creature feature. A curio.
Thus concludes over 500 pages of Dr Strange stories spanning a decade. Beyond Ditko's originals I've never been a huge Strange aficionado, so I guess a big part of the appeal of Gillis' run for me is that his focus was different from the norm - firmly on the flawed, relatably human soul behind the magic. The black magic saga that spans the majority of his run remains my pick of all Doctor Strange tales.
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