Wednesday, September 5, 2018

Dial E For Eternity--The Only Good Reporter Is A Dead Reporter!!

It's just another normal day in Anytown, USA...

Well, except for the people being gunned down in the streets!!

This is a job for:

Mercury!! Congratulations, your godliness, this is your 5th summoning, giving you the sole lead (for the time being)!!

Now, Mercury is pretty damn fast...


But he's no Barry Allen!!

Oops.

So the crooks--miraculously unhurt--get away!!

Fortunately for you, dear reader, there's an exposition-spewing reporter to explain what the hell is going on!



It turns out that Joe is not a very good reporter.


But, at a visit to his doctor...

OK, you probably think you know how this is going to go, right? Joe is going to decide that, since he's dying, he has nothing left to live for, so he's going to report the hell outta this story. Then, and only then, he'll find out it was a misdiagnosis, and he's going to live--but he's learned to be a forthright, diligent reporter!

Nope.

If you're slightly more cynical, you figure that Kid Eternity convinced the doctor to tell Joe he was dying--or summoned a doc from Eternity--to motivate Joe to do his damn job. Same result.

Again, no.

Oh, the story does its best to fool us into thinking it's going in that direction:

Well, you could write up the story that you just witnessed a Greek God chasing a car full of gangsters. That's something, right?!?

But Joe gets off his ass to do his actual damned job!


Hmm, Joe kinda sucks at this. Kid, can you help him?!?

Richard Harding Davis!! Welcome to the team!! Let's show Joe how this thing is done!!

See, Joe?

Well, Joe buckles down...but word reaches the Beagle!!

Joe finishes his story...

Uh, Kid...the story's not written yet. Don't leave!!

But Kid and Keeper do skedaddle, and...

Jeebus!! Where the hell are the cops in this town!!


What--a "six-gun"?? You don't mean a "six-shooter," do you? Because "six-gun" is usually a synonym for a revolver...but you've been using a machine gun!!

One good thing about Kid Eternity's job: when you fuck up and get someone killed, you get instant feedback!!


D'oh!!

So whom does Kid call upon to stop the Beagle from wiping out more witnesses?

Cyrano de Bergerac!! This is your second summoning!!

And he doesn't take kindly to gangsters!


So Kid...takes the Beagle to prison??

Well...um...that's five kinds of illegal, Kid.

Meanwhile,, that story won't write itself, so...


Joe Hodges!!

So the dead man does tell the tale...



Wait--wait--WAIT!! It has never worked this way before. The ones you've summoned don't leave a corpse behind when they go back to Eternity!! What the hell?? Are we believe that this one time, Kid just summoned Joe's spirit/soul whatever, and it inhabited his dead body, until it was done writing and he went back to heaven?? THAT'S NOT HOW ANY OF THIS WORKS!!!!!

Anyway, back in Eternity...

Afterlife mechanics aside, this was a pretty good story. Too bad Joe died a year early because Kid was careless...

The was the 54th Kid Eternity story, and our standing are...

Abu 1
Achilles 4
Adam 1
Antony, Marc 2
Apollo 1
Aramis 1
Arnold, Benedict 1
Arthur, King 2
Astor, John Jacob 1
Athos 1
Atlas 3
Attila The Hun 1
Attucks, Crispin 1
Baker, Lafayette 1
Barry's father 1
Barton, Clara 1
Bernhardt, Sarah 1
Bertillon, Alphonse 1
Blackhawk 1
Bluebeard 1
Bolivar, Simon 1
Boone, Daniel 1
Bowie, Jim 1
Boyd, Belle 1
Brady, Diamond Jim 1
Breitbart, Zishe 1
Bucephalus 2
Bunyan, Paul 3
Byron, George Gordon 2
Caesar, Octavian 1
Cagliostro, Alessandro 1
Calhoun, John C. 1
Canary, Martha “Calamity” 1
Cannon, John W. 1
Capulet, Juliet 1
Carden, Foster 1
Carpenter, Daniel 1
Cherry Sisters 1
Christian, Fletcher 1
Clancy, Patrick 1
Cleopatra 1
Cody, “Buffalo” Bill 2
Colt, Samuel 1
Columbus, Christopher 2
Corbett, Jim 3
Crockett, Davy 1
Cronson, Gerald 1
Crusoe, Robinson 1
Custer, George Armstrong 1
D'artagnan 2
Davis, Richard Harding 1
de Bergerac, Cyrano 2
de Leon, Ponce 1
de Rais, Gilles 1
Decatur, Stephen 1
Discus Thrower 1
Dockstader, Lew 1
Dracula 1
Drake, Sir Francis 1
Dupin, C. Auguste 1
Edison, Thomas 1
Emery 1
Ericson, Leif 2
Frankenstein's Monster 1
Franklin, Ben 1
Galahad 1
Geronimo 2
Goliath 1
Gotch, Frank 1
Gothicus, Claudius 1
Grant, Ulysses S. 1
Greb, Harry 1
Griffiths, Albert 1
Gulliver, Lemuel 1
Hamilton, Alexander 1
Hatfield, John 1
Hauser, Kaspar 1
Henry, Patrick 1
Hercules 2
Hermann, Alexander 1
Hickathrift, Tom 1
Hickok, Wild Bill 1
Hippocrates 1
Hodges, Joe 1
Holmes, Sherlock 3
Hopkins, Matthew 1
Houdini, Harry 3
Houston, Sam 1
Hyde, Edward 1
Hyer, Tom 1
Jackson, Andrew 1
James, Jesse 1
Javert 1
Jeffries, Jim 1
Jones, John Paul 1
Jove 2
Khan, Genghis 2
Kidd, William 1
Lafayette, General 1
Lancelot 1
Laughing Cavalier 1
Leander 3
Lee, Robert E. 1
Legree, Simon 1
Leonidas 1
Light Brigade 1
Lincoln, Abraham 1
Lister, Joseph 2
Marable, Fate 1
Masterson, Bat 1
Mercury 5
Milo Of Croton 2
Minutemen 1
Mix, Tom 1
Montague, Romeo 1
Montezuma 1
Morgan, Henry 1
Mulgrew, Jason 1
Murphy, Charles 1
Napoleon 1
Nation, Carrie 1
Neanderthal 1
Neptune 1
Nightingale, Florence 1
Noah 1
Nobel, Alfred 1
Nobody 1
Nostradamus 2
O'Brien, David 1
Oakley, Annie 1
Og 1
Osceola 1
Paddock, Charley 1
Pasteur, Louis 1
Penelope 1
Perseus 1
Pheidippides 1
Pinkerton, Allan 1
Plastic Man 1
Porthos 2
Post, Wiley 1
Prometheus 1
Quixote, Don 1
Revere, Paul 1
Richard the LionHeart 1
Rin-Tin-Tin 2
Robespierre, Maximilien 1
Robin Hood 3
Roc 1
Rogers' Rangers 1
Russell, Lillian 1
Rustum 1
Ryan, Paddy 1
Samson 2
Sandow, Eugen 1
Sayers, Tom 1
Schleyer, Johann 1
Serra, Junipero 1
Siegfried 1
Silver, Long John 2
Skunk, Jimmy 1
Socrates 1
Solomon 1
Steinmetz, Charles 1
Sullivan, John L. 2
Tecumseh 1
Tell, William 1
Thalfi 1
Thor 2
Thumb, Tom 1
Thurston, Howard 1
Tiglath IV 1
Tuck, Friar 1
Tut-ankh-amen 1
Twain, Mark 1
Ulysses 1
Uncas 1
Vercingetorix 1
Villa, Pancho 1
Villon, Francois 1
Vulcan 1
Washington, George 3
Watson, John H 1
Webster, Daniel 2
Xanthippe 1
Zbyzko, Stanislaus 1

NEXT--What. The. Hell. Is. In. The Briefcase???

From Kid Eternity #9 (1948)

7 comments:

  1. Ah, the 1940s. When you can receive word of a fatal heart condition while smoking in the doctor's office. I mean, I can't say for sure why Joe's heart is in bad shape, but I can make a guess as to some possible causes... :P

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  2. Do you remember sometime in the 70s, Kid Eternity was retconned into being Captain Marvel Jr.'s long-lost brother? Pretty sure the story was written by E. Nelson Bridwell. I liked that. Much better than what happened in the 90s, anyway.

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  3. We'll be getting there sometime next year, James...

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  4. Poor Achilles. Finally beaten out of first place by Mercury

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  5. Jason--don't mourn for Achilles yet. There's a ways to go yet, and trust me, he's in this for the long haul...

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  6. How many times does he get his heel shot or stabbed?

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