The premise of the sidebar by Norman Spinrad is that The Black Hole and Star Trek: The Motion Picture are both terrible stories that are more or less vehicles for expensive special effects. Leaving aside the question of whether he is correct in his analysis (he is), the irony of making a “they may have been beautiful and impressive but they made no sense” argument in the pages of Heavy Metal magazine seems to be lost on him. After all, the publication history of Heavy Metal to this point has been centered on the presentation of beautiful artwork in the context of stories that make little to no sense. It’s a good argument, but there was probably a better forum to present it in.

(Heavy Metal issue #37, April 1980 – Page 6 Trekking Down the Black Hole by Spinrad)