Art by John Romita Jr.
Alison Blaire is looking to further her music career and avoid thugs at night. Fortunately for Alison, she is also known as the mutant called Dazzler. Dazzler posesses the ability to use sound and turn it into colorful and sometimes blinding lights. The power comes in handy keep bad guys busy while you hope for Spider-Man or the X-Men to show up.
I was inside of a used book/music store perusing the comic books when I came across this book from 1981. I think it peaked my curiosity as, one year at Phoenix ComiCon, I went over to Mark Bagley who was at his table drawing. I was looking to get a couple of comic books autographed and he asked if I wouldn't mind waiting until he was done laying out his art work. It's Mark Bagley for crying out loud, of course I don't mind watching this artist at work. It was at this point he told me it was his first time drawing Dazzler. I thought it was pretty awesome to watch him sketching out a character he had not drawn previously.
The store put a price tag of $2.00 on Dazzler #1 so I thought, "why not?" I'm sure in 1981 people thought the same thing with an original cover price of $.50. I'm no inflation expert but I'm sure that's not equivalent to the $4.99 comics I'm seeing nowadays. I enjoyed going through the yellowing pages of Dazzler, reading the descriptive boxes that make for commentary on what is happening in each panel. I also enjoyed the advertisements. "Fun Factory" had all the mail order gags and novelty items. "Mile High Comics" had a list of comic books with prices that you could order by mail. Yep, mail. This was before the internet kiddos.
So anyway, back to Dazzler. This book was filled with guest stars which is probably a good thing. She would have made more sense as someone in a group. I guess Dazzler could still work as a comic book. I feel like you would have to really explore the personal side of Alison Blaire. While it was explored, there were points of action that just included rudimentary thugs. For some reason, thugs decide to bust up a school dance forcing Dazzler to use her blinding power.
Apparently this light show is something however. The Enchantress comes down from Asgard to get a singing gig at a club, but Alison's voice and lights won over the club owner enough to get over. The Enchantress wasn't too happy about that and she's going to make them pay, presumably in the next issue.
It's unlikely that I'll get to issue two of Dazzler but it was fun to read through this book. I hope you all enjoyed this review of a 30+ year old comic book.
Are you a fan of Dazzler? What other comic books would you like to see reviewed? Please leave your comments below.
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