Morgan Edge Is Earth-1's Hugh Hefner?!?!

Morgan Edge is throwing one hell of a shindig!

"Anything goes" parties? People don't want to be "caught" and embarrassed by what they're doing? Everyone wears costumes?!?

By Rao, Morgan Edge holds cosplay orgies at his mansion!

Plus...Spider-Man is there!!!! A trans-multiversal cosplay orgy!!

How could you let this happen, Comics Code?

BONUS: Jimmy Olsen hitting on a chick while wearing his Elastic Lad suit at a cosplay orgy is pretty creepy. Especially when it turns out that she is a distant descendant of his from the future (No, really!! She is!! COMICS!!)

From DC Comics Presents Annual #2 (1983)

Your Tax Dollars At Work--Lucy Lane Joins The Air Force?!?

OK, probably not Lucy Lane...

...but when Kurt Schaffenberger draws an Air Force recruiting comic book, you can't help but see the resemblance to the women of the Superman Family!!

Anyway, The United States Air Force Presents: The Hidden Crew (1964) was a comic detailing all of the great career opportunities besides actually flying that the Air Force provided.

So, as Lucy Lane Jane Trenner drudges away at her tedious civilian job...

Get used to the term WAF--we're going to be using it a
lot!

Now, even though Jane had "finished her schooling" and was presumably an adult, apparently women needed to get their parents' approval for a new job back in those days:

There are rigorous tests to become a WAF!

And your current friends won't approve!

But soon, you'll being doing a whole new kind of menial drudgery!

And that will show your friends!!

It's a WAF life--live it to the fullest!

WAF, won't you?

The Most Frightening Covers You've Ever Seen--Rhubarb!!

I won't lie--I'm a dog person, not a cat person.

But I'm in a state of detente with felines. So please believe me that it's not ill-will that motivates this judgement.

In 1946 H. Allen Smith wrote the novel Rhubarb. He was a feisty stray cat who was adopted by an eccentric millionaire, and when the rich guy dies, he leaves everything to Rhubarb--including the Brooklyn baseball team!!

Silly, yes, but the book was popular enough to get two sequel books, and in 1951, a film adaptation:

Fun fact--a ridiculously young Leonard Nimoy has a teeny uncredited bit as one of the ballplayers. Other fun fact: 14 different cats portrayed Rhubarb in the film. Oh, the days before CGI...

Anyhoo, as happened with anything remotely popular during the era, Dell leapt in with an adaptation of their own in Four Color #423 (1952). But unlike the relatively benign drawing of Rhubarb on the movie poster, the anonymous artist on the comic cover chose to portray the wealthy kitty as a demon from hell:

AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!

Like the novels, Dell dipped twice more into the Rhubarb oeuvre:

AHHHHH still hideous and evil!!!!!

In Four Color #466 (1953), Rhubarb was stepping out at night to hang with his old homey cats, when he is hit in the head and gets...cat amnesia!! An imposter cat takes his place as team owner, hijinks ensue.

And then in Four Color #563 (1954)...

STOP STOP STILL EVIL aahhhhh...

Ahem. Anyway, in this story Rhubarb is kidnapped by a circus and hypnotized to think that he's a dog.

Yes, that sentence is 100% true. Rhubarb is also hypnotized to think he's a seal.

I'm getting distracted here. My main point: unknown artist turns cut comedy cat into hellspawn on Dell covers!! AHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Manic Memorial Day Triple Overtime--If You Have A Spare 98¢...

Good heavens, I need one of these!

Seriously, this would be the greatest damn thing ever!!

I suspect that, while you might be "the center of attention," it might turn out not to be the good type of attention.

Still, I want a hat that lights up whenever I have an idea, can send secret messages, and baffles everyone. Dang, I would be so annoying if I had one of those.

Still what about electricity, or radiation, or what have you?

Well, then, that's good enough for me!!

Ad appeared in Attack On Planet Mars (1951)

Manic Memorial Day Bonus--It's Hard To Be A Mummy In The City!

Scene least likely to be seen in the upcoming The Mummy film:

See, if you dropped somebody from, say, 1890 into present day, their head would probably explode. So you'd think that if you did the same with someone from, say, 2000 B.C., they would at least demonstrate some confusion--or even curiosity--about the brave new world they find themselves in, like N'Kantu does above.

But I can pretty much guarantee that the movie's mummy/goddess won't show the slightest pause at waking up in a far-flung future world, and will be completely nonplussed by technologies that should be indistinguishable from magic to her.Nope, she'll just yawn and start immediately conquering as if she had slept for 2 days, and not 4 thousand years.

Blah blah "it's only a two hour movie, so no time for such trivia" blah blah "so powerful and self-obsessed she can ignore stuff" blah blah. I don't want to hear it. Have millennia-old characters show some shock and awe at the alien modern world they find themselves in, or let me write the damn movies. [Editor's note--international treaties used to prevent snell from writing movies, but the current administration has declared such treaties obsolete.]

Then again, watch me turn out to be completely wrong about this...

From Supernatural Thrillers #7 (1974)

Manic Memorial Day--What's In A Name?

Another menace is threatening Metropolis--but never fear, Superman is on the job!! Let's watch:

 Wait...who?

OK, that may be the best villain name ever.

Kal-El does not agree.

The entirely too self-aware onlookers have plenty of meta-commentary on the issue:

You know, I'm not sure whether to blame plotter Stuart Immomen or "dialoguist" Mark Millar, but if that's the point/joke you're oh-so-subtly trying to make, maybe you should have given the guy the name Joe Smith or Eric Jones. That would have worked much better. Instead, you named him the certainly-sounds-like-a-super-villain-name of Gabriel Van Daniken, which isn't as funny and sort of undercuts your oh so clever commentary.

Just sayin'.

From Adventures Of Superman #574 (2000)

Bold Fashion Choices--How Captain Atom Is Like A Stolen Car!

A couple of months ago we discussed the best version of Captain Atom's costume.

But how did that costume come about?

Nathaniel Adam had been burdened with this monstrosity:

A necessary evil, as the accident that gave him his power had him emitting radiation like a mobile Chernobyl, and that suit was the only thing that could contain those energies.

But a new option has presented itself...

"Liquid metal"?!?! Ahhhh--he's a terminator!!!

Yup...it's all about the image, Captain!

And how do apply this liquid metal?!?

Spray paint him like a stolen car!!

They do the primer coat first...

...and then the trim...

And good gravy:

They actually use a stencil to put on his Spirograph design!!

The result?

Dead. Sexy.

And functional, too!

And thus was born Captain Atom's best costume ever, before DC got their hands on him and turned him into a silver-covered boring dude (costume-wise, at least), and then they made him into a universal-level genocidal maniac, and then they turned him into an ersatz Dr. Manhattan because they can't stop their Watchmen fixation, and... Sigh...

From Captain Atom #84 (1967)

The Wonder Woman Movie, In Three Acts!!

I haven't seen it yet, of course, but I imagine that the film will go a little something like this...

 Love that third cover's costume. Can we get Wonder Woman to wear that for a week or two?

Most people forget that Harlequin had a science fiction line. They published the first three of John  Russell Fearn's long-running Golden Amazon series.

The second title above, The Deathless Amazon, was an alternate title for The Golden Amazon Returns. The first two covers are by Paul Anna Soik, the third by Norm Eastman.

There's No Satisfying The People Of Earth-4!!

A rogue group has stolen classified atomic secrets! Captain Atom tried to rustle them up! He lost his powers and got his butt kicked!!

And so everyone's favorite shows are interrupted!

Hahaha...the Mets winning. Now we know this is fiction!!

But, ti turns out that Clark Kent's glasses aren't the lamest disguise ever--it turns out that people don't recognize Nathaniel Adam as Captain Atom because...

...his hair is white!!

OK, then.

The public, it turns out, is not terribly sympathetic:

Vox populi!!

Well, Captain Atom regains his powers, gets a new costume, kicks the bad guys' butts, and recovers the ransom!! He's a hero again!!

Ah, but the polls show a more mixed result:

People--never, ever satisfied!! Especially that Washington upper class!!

From Captain Atom #84 (1967)