Manic Monday--Reviewing Science Fiction Comics With Booster And Beetle!

It's time for a mature, sophisticated look at the adventures of:

And what kind of spaced-based excitement do we have in store this month?

Oh, come on, Ted, be mature. It's the name of a planet, for heavens sake!

Anyway, there are these viscous space pirates, and...

You too, Booster? Come on, this is a perfectly serious story about crook who just happen to have a base on...well, let the commander say it:

*Snort* OK, "The raiders are operating from Uranus" is pretty funny, guys. But can we tone it down? Think of the kids. Just be mature for a few more panels!

All the excitement is at Uranus?!?!?! Bwahahahahaha

Ahem. You two are getting to me. Look, just one more panel, OK? Can we be grown-ups about this?

Bwahahahahahaha...Task Force Strong takes off for...hahahahahahahahahahaa!!

Look, I know this has all been stunningly immature. But if could have been much worse!! If this captioned change just a little bit...

...to "the bowels of Uranus," well, we never would have gotten them to shut up!

From Tom Corbett, Space Cadet #2 (1955)

Tales From The Quarter Bin--The Lyingest Cover Of All Time

Sometimes the Quarter Bin can introduce you to heroes you've never heard of:

The Human Fly? OK, you know me, I'm always game to read up on obscure mystery men. Let's turn to the first story, which obviously will star the Human Fly!!

Oh, OK, that's Blue Beetle. That's all right...our Human Fly isn't egotistical, and he can give up the lead-off spot to another hero. Let's turn to the next story, which surely features our cover hero:

OK, it's a little 2-page solve-it-yourself mystery feature. No problem. Human Fly is *obviously* next, right?

Nope, it's private detective Earthquake Jones (great name, BTW) and his sidekick Rusty Ringle.

Time is running out, but surely they've been saving the best for last, and saving our titanic title character for the final story:

Bronze Man?!?

So Human Fly #1 (1958) doesn't actually have so much as even a single mention of anyone named Human Fly?

And, upon closer inspection, it turns out that this issue is pretty much a complete reprint of Fox's Blue Beetle #44 (1946)!!

WTF?!?

Well, a closer look at the cover reveals:

Oh, that explains a lot.

I.W. Publications was known for being, well, um, kind of, er...let's just quote the Wikipedia article: "I.W. Publications were notable for publishing unauthorized reprints of other company's properties...Usually these companies were out of business, but not always."

Oh, you bad bad boys.

So Human Fly #1 pretty clearly wins the title of Lyingest Cover Of All Time, for promising a hero who never actually existed to mask the fact that they were involved in a wee bit of intellectual property misappropriation, not to mention selling a reprint comic as new.

Further testament to I.W.'s somewhat fly-by-night practices? Human Fly #1 came out in 1958. The next issue I.W. published was #10 (!!) in 1963!!

And once again, it was completely composed of other people's reprints, this time Blue Beetle #46 (1947). At least the cover was a teensy bit more honest this time...

The Golden Age Of Womanhood

Oh, to be a woman in Fox Comics back in the 1940s!!

So many career opportunities were available!!

For example, you could be a clerk at a pawn shop!

Of course, that just gets you kidnapped by crooks and tortured. Still a little hair-pulling isn't that bad, eh?


OK, that is a downer...but Blue Beetle saved her, so everything's good!

So maybe pawn shop clerk is out. How about spaceship captain? When you're Rex Dexter's girlfriend Cynde, there are plenty of opportunities!

See, boldly standing up for space ship captain equality!! Take that, Janice Lester!!

Of course, in addition to being equal, a female space ship captain gets the unbelievable bonus of posing for futuristic upskirt shots...

...being hijacked by goons because you're a girl...

...and being rescued by your man!!

What's not to love??

Worried about space sickness? OK, how about trying life as a big-city debutante? That's a winning lifestyle!!

Of course, 11 other debs have been murdered and "cut to pieces." So maybe there's a slight drawback...


For the record, this "doctor" is never named, never given any back story, no motivation or explanation whatsoever--he just likes to carve up young women, I guess.

Hey, Green Mask saved her, so really, how could she have been in any real danger?!?

Don't worry, we have plenty of career options left for you gals. How about secretary to a powerful oil executive?

Oh.

Yes, being kidnapped by stereotypical Chinese masterminds who are "carrying on a vendetta against the white race" is part of the job description...as is:

Again, no worries...the handsome white hero saved her!!

Wow, you dames are pretty picky. Oh, one last try. You can be the inventor of a new secret Navy airplane, and a crack pilot!!

...and they still show you in your undies.

Still, if that's the worst that could happen...

Oh, yeah, well, being snatched (while in your unmentionables) by Russkie spies is all part of the job when you're a famous inventor, right? Right...?

Oh, dear...
Not to worry. Because you're so important, Lt. Drake Of The U.S. Naval Intelligence is on the job, and rescues you!



See...a career that leads to personal happiness!!!

All of these panels are from Mystery Men Comics #13 (1940). You've come a long way, baby!

Cover Me Saturday

#1) Wow...

...Green Arrow really doesn't like Jim Lee's Justice League costume designs, does he...? (that's the solicited cover to Justice League #8)

#2) Daredevil is one of the best mags on the market right now, stem to stern, and it starts with great covers:

And, as local comics shoppe curmudgeon Josh pointed out to me, the conceit works equally well if you turn it upside down:

Marvel kinda missed the boat by not releasing it that way as a variant cover (or even as the cover to the first part of the story, in Amazing Spider-Man...

#3) Lyingest Cover Blurb Of The Week:

Yeah, right...this is DC, where heroes get to commit universal genocide and walk away with a shrug, a grin, and a "my bad."

Manic Monday--The Blue Beetle Seeks No Reward!!

The things you find when you're tooling around in old comic books:

Yes, that's right, Blue Beetle actually had his own radio show back in yon Golden Age!!

It didn't last long--only about 4 months. But thanks to the magic of the infrawebs, here's a site with all of the episodes available for your listening pleasure!

And because Slay Monstrobot is all about the convenience, click on the player below to listen to all of the episodes right here!! Just hit play to start with the first story, or click on the "next chapter" button to get the next story. And remember--the Blue Beetle seeks only justice!!

Differing Definitions

From the latest USA Today article on Flushpoint:

The recent emphasis on diverse characters such as lesbian superheroine Batwoman, Hispanic hero Blue Beetle and African-American adventurer Cyborg (who will be a core member of Johns and Lee's new Justice League) also will continue.

Obviously, DC has a different definition of "emphasis" than most of us do.

Maybe actually publishing a comic book starring Batwoman, Blue Beetle or Cyborg would help, as opposed to perpetually putting off Batwoman, cancelling Blue Beetle, and having Cyborg "star" in a series that is explicitly not in current DC reality.

(Or maybe if USA Today actually, you know, reported, rather than blindly passing along DC press releases as news...squawk, Polly want a cracker!)

I'm just sayin.'

Manic Monday--Blackest Night Roundup

Did I miss anything while I was in 1985?

Oh, yeah...

**Forgive me for being contrarian, but Blackest Night was crippled by a huge flaw: no decent villain.

I mean seriously, can you remember one line of Nekron's? One substantial thing Nekron did, besides stand around and posture?!? Can you even remember what he looked like, without having to go back to the comic to check?

He was completely ineffectual as a presence, a complete black hole in the center of the story. And yes, you can try to defend that with "he was an avatar of death, so of course he wasn't big on personality--he was more a concept than person." Well, I say piffle, and point to Thanos. He tried to wipe out all life in the universe, more than once--and he was never a cipher. He was interesting.

Which is not to suggest that Nekron should have been a Thanos clone. But Geoff Johns didn't even try to make Nekron a character--he was an attempt to impress the readership with with Johns' knowledge of continuity, and because Johns needed a villain who'd fit his...odd...cosmology. But he could have been literally anyone else in the DC Universe, because he wasn't given a scintilla of a scrap of any personality or characterization of his own. Which means, when you compare Blackest Night to Crisis I or any other "event," it has to be ranked farther down, because the quality of your adversary defines you to a large extent--and the adversary in this series had NO qualities whatsoever.

I mean, it's gotta say something when the Anti-Monitor is a more compelling character than your main villain, right? And it has to say something when Johns put FAR more effort into his Black Hand text pieces than in doing anything--anything at all, for heaven's sake--with Nekron.

**Let's whine about dangling plot threads, shall we?

Like, what happened to Sinestro? After Nekron separates him from the White Entity, we don't see him again. Shouldn't we have gotten something? He had been imprisoned by the Guardians, and scheduled to be executed...and the Yellow Corps wanted to free him, and the Red Corps wanted to rough him up themselves...so what happened? He just disappeared from the story. Did someone capture him? Did he escape, twirling his mustache? We don't have room to deal with this?!? Sinestro was a major player, and...poof, gone without even a syllable of explanation???

And what about when "Scar," the Guardian working for Nekron, captured the other Guardians (or killed them...this was very nebulous)?? Are they alive now? Free? Gone back to Oa? Chastened by the mistakes they made that helped all this happened? Arrogant and blaming others? Anything? Hello?

And at the end, Earth was being visited by all these hostile and antagonistic color corps. Did of the the Sinestro Corps just go home, even though Green Lanterns are supposed to detain them, and are authorized to kill them?? Did the Red Corps, supposedly filled with unquenchable rage, just kind of wander off without attacking anyone? Does that seem likely??

Seriously, I know everyone (including Geoff Johns, apparently) was distracted by all the big "surprise" resurrections at the end. But they sort of forgot to actually finish the story they were telling. Even if the Guardians (assuming they're alive--no one bothered to tell us) declared a general amnesty and told everyone to go home (and how likely does that seem, given their depicted attitude to the other corps??), does it seem at all likely that the Reds and Yellows would just meekly go home?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?! What the hell actually happened?

**I can't believe that nobody was harping on this:

Aquaman has his hand back!!

Not that it matters to me that much, but you think more people would have mentioned it...

**Pot calling kettle black department: From the Brightest Day panel at Wondercon:

Was Blackest Night meant to be a commentary on the nature of death in comics? "Characters get killed all the time in comics," Johns said. "We wanted to do away with that tool for a while—when a character dies, they're dead. Try to give death a meaning in the DC Universe again."

This from the guy who did more than anyone else--much, much more than anyone else--to take away the meaning of death in the DC Universe in the first place. It's kind of like Bendis and Quesada complaining about how Marvel had mysteriously become less heroic under their tenure, and then expecting us to applaud the Heroic Age.

[James]Robinson: "Can I just say that there are characters that I wish came back that didn't, but Ted Kord died a true hero's death," saying that bringing him back might diminish that.

Yeah, because Barry Allen didn't die "a true hero's death." I guess he just tripped and fell down the stairs or something...or maybe he was just killed to prove that Maxwell Lord was a villain now. Now that's heroism. Anyway, bringing Barry back in no way diminished his sacrifice, right? Right? Hello?

**Why do so many of these rings involve vomiting?

Seriously, Geoff, that's kinda sick (and odd)...

Cleaning Off My Desk

Bullet-point Sunday.

• Hey, Edgar Rice Burroughs estate--how come we don't have any Tarzan or John Carter of Mars comics going right now? Fix this now!! Hell, I'll settle for Carson of Venus!!
  
  

• Why is it that in movies and TV, "hidden" video surveillance cameras ALWAYS have a flashing red light on to show that they're working (and conveniently alert the hero to their presence)? Hollywood hacks, do you know how annoying that is? Do you really believe that super spy agencies are so stupid as to put a flashing light to attract attention to that which is supposed to be hidden?!? Stop this now.

• Re: DC's "Wednesday Comics," the weekly broadsheet presenting 16 weekly strips presented "newspaper format." First, be suspicious that DC has yet to announce a price for this beast. Secondly, I liked it better when it was called Action Comics Weekly. But the odds are that it will be much less affordable than ACW was...P.S. Could you come up with a lamer, more boring name for it? At least call it Wednesday Funnies...sheesh.
  

• Re: DC's new back-up series. I'm not sure I understand the reasoning here. Yes, I'm glad that DC is giving us something extra to go along with the price increase, and not just a bunch of lame "director's cut" crap and rejected sketches and such. And since I like most of the characters involved, great, But I'm not sure I understand it from a business sense. Blue Beetle can't support itself as a regular book, but we expect continued exposure in the not-exactly-setting-the-world-on-fire Booster Gold to make him more popular? We're going to rehabilitate evil-destroyer-of-universes Captain Atom in the pages of a mag that doesn't even star Superman anymore? Manhunter can't draw, so we're going to give her less space in a more expensive mag and see how that does? I'm glad to see some of the back-ups, I'm happy DC at least cares enough to give us actual extra content for the money...I'm just not sure I understand the thinking involved...

• Speaking of mags that don't even star Superman anymore, what's up with that? Is there some reason the Superman World of New Krypton story couldn't have taken place within the confines of the regular Superman title? That the forthcoming Secret Origin of Superman couldn't have been told in Action Comics, instead of a separate spin-off series? Did we really need a flipping year of the latest incarnation of Nightwing and Flamebird? Doesn't Mon-El belong in the thirty-first century? Other than a lame attempt to strip money from my aching wallet, what's the point of moving Superman stories into other mags and running less interesting stories about less interesting characters in his mags? Anyone?

• Lest it appear that I'm going too easy on Marvel today, I've got to ask a similar question: The Search For The New Sorcerer Supreme is taking place in...New Avengers? Really? Because for most of the past year the New Avengers haven't even starred in their own mag (it became Bendis Flashback Theater). And now they're reduced to guest stars again? Has Bendis run out of ideas/justifications for this mag? Then again, when I think solutions to magical crises, I do think Wolverine and Cage...

• Dear all Marvel writers: Can we please stop seeing Dr. Doom kicked around just as a way for you to impress us how tough your new monster is? Morgan Le Fay kicks Doom around, just so we can be impressed how tough she is when the Dark Avengers take her on. Millar suddenly has him subservient to the "Master of Doom," just so we can quiver over how tough this forthcoming baddie is. Stop this now. This is Doctor Freaking Doom, and he will eviscerate you if you keep this up. Thank you.
  

Friday Night Fights--Squisssshh Style!!

So what do you do, when the nefarious Mr. Mind...

...is nestled in your evil dad's brain, and threatening to take over the multiverse??

First, you zap the hell out of him...

...then you accidently blow off your dad's ear (oops)...

...then when Wormy tries to make his escape...

...you have your dead best friend put his foot down!!


Oh, don't woory, kiddies...Mr. Mind just tranferred his intellect into one of his thousands of "children"...probably.

Bahlactus eats punks like Mr. Mind for breakfast every morning...Mmm, mmm squisssshhy!!

Bug-killin' from Booster Gold #10.