4 out of 5

So this is the lil’ or big sister to the Savage Dragon / Destroyer Duck x-over Gerber scripted, and it’s an odd little booger… According to the editorial in SD / DD, Spider-Man Team-Up was scripted first and then tweaked to match the joke that Steve would deliver the punchline to over at Image, and yet the books couldn’t feel more tonally different, despite being two halves of one coin.  Maybe it’s that this started with an idea whereas the sequel was written after the fact, or maybe it’s that Marvel kept things a little more grounded (although the mass vomiting in the Image book is pretty funny…), but S-Man Team-Up is infinitely more successful.  It’s funnier, it’s more sensible (in that zany Gerber way), and it feels more true to the Duck.  To be fair, in that same editorial Steve did report he was happy with the Marvel half, but he seemed pretty giggly about getting some jabs in at his HTD history over at Erik Larsen’s joint.  Alas and alack, if you’re not in on the joke it’s not generally that funny, and that’s where the Image book flops.  But here Steve manages to swing so many elements from Howard’s history into just a few pages – plus giving us just enough about that damned Defenders elf to make him relevant and funny – that, overall, this works much more effectively as a wink to the audience and fans.  James Fry’s art is also so totes Gene Colan-esque that it just sweeps you into happy land, versus the muscle-bound Image-ness of the Savage Dragon book.

So – somehow it just works.  It is a little hinky toward the end, and frankly only serves to make you want more of this style of Steve (the ‘just having fun’ Steve), but it was a welcome return and a fun read that felt at home with the 70s run… even if the attempt at leaving a lasting mark on the duck (read the wiki or comicbookdb blurb) doesn’t really translate.

Nothing to say about Darick Robertson’s half of the book – a written and penciled Gamit / S-Man thing.  Or something to say: that Robertson, sorry, can’t write that well.  Sure, I narrate my memories to myself all the time.  His half of the book is rather a slog to get through.