Newsarama has a nice story on the return of Frank Miller and Dave Gibbons’ Martha Washington, who makes a comeback next month in Martha Washington Dies.
I read a couple of the older Martha Washington stories, and it’s pretty interesting stuff: The character work is fairly restrained for Miller, and even the political angle is toned down, or at least presented more playfully than one expects from Miller. It is, I suspect, where Miller took all his idealistic and fun superhero ideas; it certainly predates his raving loony period, and managed to escape his current “Hard Core Noir!” period. And Dave Gibbons has done some great work with the character, a soldier in a war of technology that doesn’t always work. Of course, it’s been ages since the creators worked on the character, so who knows exactly what we’ll get?
The Martha Washington books are surprisingly obscure and underappreciated considering their creative pedigree. I’d say you should check them out, but they’re mostly out of print (Dark Horse has this sort of problem.) I don’t know exactly what the back issues are fetching, but they’re worth looking into. Perhaps the best is the Happy Birthday, Martha Washington one-shot, a wonderful tribute to the recently-deceased Jack Kirby.
There is light at the end of the reprint tunnel, according to editor Diana Schutz:
In 2008, we are doing The Life and Times of Martha Washington in the Twenty-First Century. It’s an oversized hardcover, slipcased edition, collecting all the Martha-related stories, along with some significant additional material, like preliminary sketches and designs.
Granted, a giant hardcover omnibus may be a bit pricey for a relatively obscure book. But I think it’s a great idea, anyway, and hopefully Marth Washington Dies resurrects some interest in the character.