Monday, October 6, 2014

Manic Monday Triple Overtime--Where's Yarnek When You Need Him?!?

When I saw this spread in the front Action Comics #399 (1971)...

I was sooo hopeful that we were getting a Silver Age DC remake of The Savage Curtain!

For the non-Star Trek familiar, The Savage Curtain was a third season episode of the original Star Trek series. In the story, an alien being brings Abraham Lincoln and Surak of Vulcan forward in time (or more likely just recreates them--the story is vague on the final answer) to team up with Kirk and Spock...

 ...to fight Genghis Khan, Colonel Green, Zora and Kahless of Klingon to the death...

...so the aliens can watch and determine whether good or evil is the stronger philosophy.

Yeah, it's a pretty stupid experiment.

So, anyway, when I see a time-tossed Superman suddenly teamed with George Washington, Abraham Lincoln, and General Custer (!), well, I got my hopes up that we might see them teamed up against, say, Benedict Arnold, Hitler, the Joker, and Tharok. Or maybe Vandal Savage, Luthor, Sinestro, and Mordru. Or maybe...

[This is the point where you get to construct your own team of "evil"--4 people, some real and from the past, some fictional, some from a hypothetical future. Go wild.]

Anyway, sadly, that wasn't the premise of the story. Instead, it was future professors who used a time displacement device to snatch history's greatest heroes from a moment before their deaths for the benefit of their "Advanced History" class.

And it turned out not to be actually the moment before Kal-El's death, because they were actually from a parallel world that accidentally pulled our Superman to the future instead of theirs. It happens.

So, boo, Action Comics #399, for getting my Trek-nerd hopes up.

But it did have a really great cover...


4 comments:

SallyP said...

Firstly, I'd put Custer in the Villains category, because seriously, I can't stand him.

Secondly, I am so happy that they got his title correct. He was a General during the Civil War, but afterwards, was only a Lt. Colonel.

Haw!

George Chambers said...

Swap out Custer for Teddy Roosevelt and you have a team for the ages!

Siskoid said...

Teddy is so badass, he would quickly spin off into his own series.

Cabin said...

Don't you just LOVE how Mork from Ork wore Colonel Green's uniform, with one slight changes, 15 years later?