Spirit Archives, Volume 7 [Hardcover]

Will Eisner (Author)

Book Description

Series: Spirit Archives | Publication Date: May 1, 2002

As the seventh hardcover edition in the impressive Spirit Archives collection, this masterpiece features the work of some of the pioneers of the comic world. With the war in Europe still waging, the Sunday strips from July 4 - December 26, 1943 had the Spirit focusing his attention to homegrown homefront problems. Returning to his crimefighting roots, the Spirit must help Ellen Dolan when she is framed for a dance marathon murder, prove his own innocence when he becomes the prime suspect for a prominent businessman's death, catch a shipyard saboteur, thwart a kidnapping by a couple of femme fatales, and confront a murderous ex-con living on a construction site.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 228 pages
• Publisher: DC Comics (May 1, 2002)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1563898071
• ISBN-13: 978-1563898075
• Product Dimensions: 6.9 x 0.9 x 10.4 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.6 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 3.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,551,619 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A return to roots for The Spirit, November 12, 2004

By 

Gagewyn (United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Spirit Archives, Volume 7 (Hardcover)

Basically The Spirit is a crime fighting hero who uses ingenuity and physical skill, rather than super powers, to defeat evil. He is witty likeable and politically incorrect. The comic pioneered many layout techniques and so many super heros are modeled after The Spirit. The story lines and comics hold up even now more than 60 years later and I recommend for comic book fans to try out the series.

Volume 7 of The Spirit Archives contains reprints of comics written from July 4 - December 26, 1943. During this time Eisner was still absent (he had been drafted). In Volume 7 The Spirit returns to his roots. Rather than fight Nazis he focuses more on the home front. He must save love-interest Ellen Dolan when when she is framed for a murder. As in the first volume The Spirit is himself framed for a murder and must evade the police as he fights crime. Also in a return to roots The Spirit is up against femme fatale villains in a kidnapping story.

Purists will complain that The Spirit was better with Eisner in charge. These comics still hold up. On the other hand I would recommend this for die hard fans only. If you are new to the series then try out any one of Volume 1-4 or 12 or higher. Will Eisner (after whom the Eisner Award was named) had creative control of those volumes so they are more historically significant. I recommend Volume 7 along with the rest of the series to libraries, because this is a unique opportunity to archive the entire run of a very influential comic.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars The Spirit of WWII, February 21, 2006

By 

Johnny Heering "trivia buff" (Bethel, CT United States) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Spirit Archives, Volume 7 (Hardcover)

This volume of the Spirit Archives covers July to December, 1943. Will Eisner was in the Army at the time, so the comic was written and drawn by other people. It was a decent adventure strip during this time period, but not nearly as good as when Eisner was doing the strip himself.

3.0 out of 5 stars Only one story by Eisner, but an important one., January 24, 2011

By 

J. K. Weston "J.K. Weston" (Baltimore, USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Spirit Archives, Volume 7 (Hardcover)

Will Eisner only wrote one story in volume 7, and he also did layouts for that story, Aug 15, 1943. The finished art is by unknown staff artists at Quality Comics. Lou Fine apparently had nothing to do with it, or for that matter, any other Spirit after August 8 until, just maybe, late December. But this story is unique for its time. It marks the first appearance of Eisner's more cartoony post-war style. In fact, if you threw it into a pile of 1946-1948 Spirit sections, you would find it identical in style of writing and art to several other stories of that later period. The unknown Quality Comics staff artists must have projected Eisner's layouts onto their Strathmore and traced them. It is a unique foreshadowing of what was to come, perhaps worth buying this volume just for the one story. But after this, there is no more Eisner until Dec 23, 1945, in volume 11. Lou Fine's artwork by this time has become more stylized and distant from Eisner's pre-war style of drawing.