That about sums it up. The first part of this magazine is a story of old time Asgard, with Thor and Loki teaming up to fight Titans and then team up with Titans to destroy the “Blood Crystal.”
The second is a story of Hercules from Ancient Greece, fighting alongside Argonauts on the island of Medusa. It could have easily been non-Marvel canon, just a generic story about the mythological Hercules, but they specifically call him the Prince of Power.
These stories are not really bad, but they’re not terribly interesting either. The art is much better than the writing.
Len Wein and Jim Starlin (Thor) and Bill Mantlo and Val Mayerik (Hercules)
Yeah, you’re right- when Marvel sets out to produce a “prestige”-format product, the stories therein need to be memorable, not some here-today, forgotten tomorrow bullshit. I like Bill Mantlo, and my heart bleeds for his situation in life, but his writings were always mediocre at best. His “Champions” stuff with John Byrne, and those two issues of “Spectacular Spider-Man” ( issues#17 and 18 ) which concluded the ‘Champions’ saga were pretty good, but that was about it.
He wasn’t ALWAYS mediocre. Micronauts’ first 25 issues or so were great. His work on Hulk and ROM had some really good stories. And the first Cloak Dagger appearances were really good.