Welcome back to Rotten Ink! I don’t know about you, but I both love and hate Summer time! I am all about the bright skies and the lazy evenings but what I do not like is when it’s way to0 hot and muggy out and it just makes your day miserable! But you know what makes for a great treat and a way to cool down during the heat of the summer sun? You guessed it, a good old fashioned Popsicle, the classic frozen treat that has been a staple of American summers for decades! And today’s quick update is about Popsicles and the Marvel Comic based on them…that’s right, in 2015 Marvel Comics did a promo comic for Popsicles that had a superhero team of them fighting the summer heat. And this of course had to get the Rotten Ink treatment at some point. So sit back, relax and let’s take a fruity frozen treat trip with the Popsicles that saved summer…wait, I wonder if they could stop global warming? We need to call The Flavor Force and find out! Oh and Happy July 4th!!
Popsicle started way back in 1905 when youngster Frank Epperson left a flavored drink with a stir stick still in the liquid outside over night and it froze over into a tasty treat! When Frank grew up he would in 1922 make some of his frozen treats for a fireman’s ball and they were a big hit and this caused him to start selling them at Neptune Beach an amusement park in California and they were called “The Epsicle Ice Pop” back then as Epperson was very proud of his tasty mistake. But after a short while he would name it Popsicle as they were being marketed as frozen drinks on a stick. But in 1925 Frank would find himself at odds with Good Humor a frozen ice cream like products who felt that some of Frank’s tasty snacks were to similar to theirs and this caused him to have to pay them a fee, and later Frank would sell the Popsicle to Joe Lowe Company who by 1989 sold the rights to Good Humor who would in the end be the rulers of Summer Time treats! As once Good Humor took over the classic Popsicle would spin off into such things as Fudgsicle and Creamsicle both that are just as iconic as the treat that spawned them. And Popsicle is still a very popular treat that is a staple item for most Ice Cream Trucks and Carts all over America and Canada. I should also say that in 1939 Popsicle had a mascot with Popsicle Pete who was just a normal kid who loved his Popsicles and made his first appearance on the radio show “Buck Rogers In The 25th Century”.
We have to take a moment to also talk about ice cream and other frozen treats as the small village I grew up in did not see the ice cream trucks very much, and we would have to get our frozen treats from the grocery stores like Big Bear or hit up the Dairy Corner. But when we would go to Kettering, the place my grandparents lived, we would get some ice cream from the trucks and some of my favorites to get was the WWF Superstars ice cream bars that would feature a wrestler on the snack and would also come with a collectible trading card. I would also get the Firecracker Popsicle, the classic Baseball Glove ice cream bar and another favorite was the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles ice cream bar! Also while in town, we would sometimes get some ice cream from UDF (United Dairy Farmers) where I would want Superman Ice Cream and we would get milkshakes from Jet Freeze, one of my favorite ice cream shops that I still go to. But when chatting with my friend Marc Gras, who lives in Spain and is a comic book artist that has worked on such titles for Sparkle and Blood Scream Comics as Final Revenge # 1-2, Black Lion # 0, Don’t Look In The Basement # 1 and Bone Hill Road # 1-2 to name a few, about ice cream and snack food mascots, he brought up that in Spain they have Dracula ice cream….yes ice cream bars that are named and inspired by the vampire Count Dracula that is black ice cream with a red center….this is awesome, and I wish we had this brand of ice cream here in America! Way back when we had a similar ice cream bar called “Vampire’s Deadly Secret” that was made by Good Humor for ice cream trucks, but it was long gone before I was a kid, but ours was more of a cherry flavor while many of the European ones have a more strawberry flavor. Come on Good Humor, bring back the Vampire Secret bars, they would make a perfect treat for the Halloween season!
Man I really do hope that Dracula ice cream or Vampire’s Deadly Secret or whatever you want to call it does make a return to American stores and ice cream trucks as it’s about time we put a little scare into our ice cream again! But let’s get back on topic and talk about Popsicles and the Marvel Comic based around them as superheroes! I want to first say that I love when companies do promo comics and really do think that more fast food restaurants and other food products that have mascots should be doing this! And then I would like to thank Mavericks Cards And Comics who saved me a copy of this comic way back in 2015 and made this update possible. I would also like to remind you all that I grade this book on a standard 1-4 star system and am looking for how well the comic stays to the source material, its entertainment value and its art and story. So with that, let’s grab a Popsicle and sit back and see how The Flavor Force saves the world from a very hot summer.
Popsicle # 1 **1/2
Released in 2015 Cover Price FREE Marvel # 1 of 1
The issue starts with a brief history of Frank Epperson and how he created the first Popsicle in 1905, and the three Popsicle Heroes pay him respect! Next Cherry Popsicle is out hanging with some kids when Lord Weather Vane, the leader of the Anti-Flavor Foundation, strikes and is causing massive heat that melts Cherry! But thanks to his electric super powers he is able to freeze up again and cause all the air conditioners to work hard and help keep people cool and this angers Lord Vane! Some time later Lord Vane is in his hideout and is plotting more ways to try and ruin summer but his plot is over heard by Orange Popsicle who is super smart, and when he thinks he has frozen her, Orange makes a ice statue of herself and escape the hideout to alert her friends and it’s only sometime later that Vane figures out he has been tricked. We then join The Flavor Force on top of a building were Orange and Cherry ask Grape how he got his super powers and the purple hero mumbles about heat, humidity, and Lord Weather Vane and then coughs when he says what his power is as they others just go along with it as they fly around the city trying to save people from the summer heat. Lord Weather Vane meets The Flavor Force in the park with his own group of frozen treats that he calls The Freezer Burns that include Grass, Sea Water and Turkey Gravy and they are looking for a fight! And a fight they get when Cherry uses his electric powers to melt them and as they are puddles they thank them for saving them as they know that they were gross flavors! Lord Weather Vane then decides that he will attack a cruise ship next and this is quickly stopped when Grape knocks him over board and into the cold water below. Mad cause he keeps getting beat, Lord Weather Vane decides to make his robots build him a space ship so he can ruin summer in space, but Cherry stops him this time and throws a disco rave for the bots who stop working to party! The Flavor Force then travel to space as it appears Lord Weather Vane has made the sun even hotter trying to ruin summer, and Orange is able to use a cooling beam on their ship to make it cooler and saving summer for the time being. But Grape is finally the one who stops Lord Weather Vane as he asks him why he hates summer and is able to talk him down and leave summer alone! And then Grape showcases his power is laser eyes!
This is a very silly and basic kids promo comic that is used to promote a food product that most kids eat all the time for a treat during those hot summer days, and teaming with Marvel Comics to give away for free at Comic Shops was a very wise move to help spread the word even more that Popsicles are where it’s at! This comic’s plot is about three super powered Popsicles who are trying to save summer from blistering heat that is being created by Lord Weather Vane, a bitter man who can control weather who wants to ruin the summer fun for everyone! And of course by the end of this comic, our frozen pop heroes end up talking the baddies down and learn that he is doing this because his feelings were hurt by people who complain about the weather. The heroes of this comic go by The Flavor Forcem and while they do have names I just call them by their flavoring as I did not catch what the name of Cherry Popsicle was but he does have the power of electricity, while the female Orange Popsicle who is super smart is named Mandy and the Grape Popsicle who has laser beam eyes is named Pete. They all got their powers when facing Lord Vane and each use their powers to try and stop him and for good deeds. I think my favorite hero is Pete the Grape Popsicle as he is kind of a strange dude who does not share his powers nor how he got them with his friends until the end of the issue…and he is the one who really ends the summer heat as he just talks with their nemesis and learns to understand his sadness. The main villain is Lord Weather Vane, an older guy who can control the weather and seems to hate the happiness of others, he also clearly likes making things as hot as Hell and can even create his own beings that he tries to get to help him in his quest to ruin summer. But while he starts out evil it’s clear he is not a bad guy, just a sad one who feels people do not respect him and what he does. The Freezer Burns are a trio of gross flavored Popsicles that Lord Van created in order to fight The Flavor Force and also ruin the tastebuds of those who eat them! As who wants a frozen treat that taste like Turkey Gravy, Sea Water and Grass! But they are no match and our heroes take them down with ease. The action aka fights are more done with words with some time action as there is some melting going on and the jokes are as corny as you would think they world be, but I have to say I did really enjoy this as it made me think back to when I was a kid and read comics based on the Quik Bunny, Cap’n Crunch and Sugar Bear and brought some fun stories to the junk food I was eating. The cover for this comic is very eye catching and looks like a true kids comic that you would have found on your local comic shop shelves, and the interior art was done by Tom Grummet and is really good stuff and looks like a classic kids comic from the early 90’s. Speaking of classic kids comics, I wish that Marvel would have brought back the Star Comics brand to do this comic and would have continued making promo comics based on food mascots as well as cartoons to give away at shops and events…in other words bring back Star Comics! Over all this was a fun silly read and did it’s job as after reading it I wanted a Popsicle! Check out the artwork below to see the art style of Grummet used in this kids promo comic by Marvel.
While Popsicle the comic book was not Earth shattering stuff, it was a fun and quick entertaining read that did a great job of promoting the frozen treat and brought some life to a product that has been around for many decades and as well gave the company new mascots for a while as poor Popsicle Pete, the human version, had been in the mascot retirement home for many years…and you have to give them some credit as naming the Grape Popsicle Pete clearly was in honor of their first mascot. I would really like to see Marvel Comics do more promo comics like this in the future as items like this do help younger readers find their way to comic books and lord knows that the comic industry needs to draw in younger readers again. But now that we have cooled off and have had a Popsicle or two I think its time that I tell you readers about our next update that will take us away from The Flavor Force and back into the world of Horror as we will be taking a look at the 1896 Silent Horror Film “House Of The Devil” that is said to be the first horror film made as well as the first Vampire film! So until next time, have a great July 4th, read a comic or three, watch a movie or two and as always support your local Horror Host. See you next update for a spooky silent good time!
