Slay, Monstrobot of the Deep!!: Sherlock Holmes

Showing posts with label Sherlock Holmes. Show all posts

Saturday, June 7, 2014

Apparently I Have Too Much Time On My Hands

The debut of my new Sherlock Holmes blog. Try not to be too disappointed.

Monday, February 3, 2014

Manic Monday--A Scandal In Riverdale?

For those who might have missed last night's episode of Sherlock while watching some football game...

...it probably wasn't as good as you were expecting.

[OK, obviously joking. I haven't seen His Last Vow yet as this is being written. I'm sure it was pretty good. Still, Archie as Sherlock was irresistible.]

From Life With Archie #158 (1975)

Wednesday, December 26, 2012

The British Post-War Crime Wave!!

From the True Crime files of Headline Comics #50 (1951):

A) Well, that's pushes Jack The Ripper out of the #1 spot, eh?

B) Damn you, European socialist governments, for your oppression of itinerant peddlers!! Your regulation is throttling the growth of the itinerant peddler industry!!

C) This would make a pretty good Sherlock Holmes story--The Adventure of The Extra Ounces. Much to the chagrin of Miss Almathea Winthrop's fiancee--a promising young clerk in the War Office--a spy from Balkania has stolen a sample of a new explosive. She hires Holmes to find it before her husband-to-be is cashiered. Holmes, of course, correctly deduces that the spy is disguised as an itinerant peddler, trying to smuggle it to confederates by use of a scale allowing him to give out an extra ounce and a half! Holmes foils him when he disguises himself as a itinerant peddler inspector, and England is saved!

Yes, I'm an idiot.

Friday, November 4, 2011

Friday Night Fights--Baritsu Style!!

For this, the final Prize Fight round of this session of Friday Night Fights, Spacebooger has commanded that we feature a fight between two arch enemies.

Well, why not go back to the very beginning, eh? Batman and the Joker? Pshaw--50 years too late. Lex and Superman? Amateurs.

No, we're going back to the very debut of the concept of arch enemies in Western literature. (Don't qubble--it's Friday Night Fights, not Friday Night Algonquin Round Table...)

Yes, I'm talking Holmes and Moriarty.

We're in Switzerland, at Reichenbach Falls. And after Holmes has smashed Moriarty's criminal empire, the Napoleon Of Crime shows up, seeking revenge:

Well, that's it for Holmes, right?

Nope. Because Sherlock Holmes was a master of Street Fighter!!

Sherlock wins--no shit!!

Spacebooger bet all his rent money on Moriarty winning that fight, too...

Western literature's very first retcon was brought to us by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, as adapted by "Mr. Dennis J. O'Neil & E.R. Cruz, Esquires" in DC's Sherlock Holmes #1 (1975).

Look, there's money on this, and there's stuff I want to buy on Amazon. Therefore, it's only logical that you vote for me, no? So vote!!

Tuesday, February 22, 2011

The. Greatest. Comic. Book. Ever--The Insane Conclusion

Well, Deadman and Sgt. Rock have secured the Batman statue...but it's still been a heckuva day for Batman.

He's had his leg frakked up:

He's had his hands severely burned:

He's almost drowned:

We saw previously he was shot at by a crazed dance hall girl and fell out of a second story window onto his head.

The result...he's in the hospital, wrecked, depressed, and no closer to catching the mad bomber.

But wait, Batman has a secret ally:

Damn, now Alfred will never know how The Sign Of Four finishes! Thanks for ruining his book, ghost of Sherlock Holmes!!

Anyway, this finally leads to Batman's final confrontation with the mad bomber:

So, Lucifer's plan has failed! And boy, is he ticked at his minions (who, it turns out, did absolutely nothing the entire issue after their big roll call scene, they weren't even in a single panel again until the end--that's right, Bob Haney wasted the ghosts of Hitler, Jack The Ripper, etc!):

Ah, but Lucifer gets his now, as Rama Kushna shows up to settle his hash!!

Why didn't she just step in earlier, and fix the whole mess before it happened? DON'T QUESTION BOB HANEY!!

And so our story ends. The Queen is thrilled with her gift...

...and Alfred helps the weary Caped Crusader home, as Haney quotes the Beatles:

So endeth the crazy, crazy, Brave And The Bold Special (a.k.a DC Special Series #8) (1978), where Batman was never even on the same continent as his team-up partners; where the devil has his minions blow up ghetto thee-ay-ters; where the only way to get Sgt. Rock to follow obvious clues is to have his buddy talk like a "limey;" where Batman fails 7 or 8 times, but it's OK, because it was all because of a magic voodoo statue that was stolen from the Queen of England by Satan-worshiping Scottish nationalists; where the ghost of Sherlock Holmes re-writes portions of the Doyle novels to send secret messages to butlers.

It was The. Greatest. Comic. Ever.

OK, no it wasn't. But it was damn sure worth the quarter I paid for it...

The. Greatest. Comic. Ever--Bring On The Bad Guys

So, our good guys are Batman, Deadman, Sgt. Rock, and Sherlock Holmes. Who could possibly be evil enough to stand against them??

How about the ghosts of Guy Fawkes, Nero, Benedict Arnold, Bluebeard, Jack The Ripper, and Hitler?!?

And who could be frightening enough, evil enough, to be master of these sinister shades???

Yep, Lucifer, the fallen Angel himself (and, it must be said, he's rocking that Grell-tastic outfit!! Well played, Ric Estrada and Dick Giordano!)!!

So what is the well-dressed Lucifer's heinous plot? How does all of this tie together? To be continued...

From The Brave And The Bold Special (a.k.a. DC Specials Series #8) (1978)

The. Greatest. Comic. Ever--Enter Deadman And The Detective

Meanwhile, in Niagara Falls:

So, Deadman is possessing people just to make them perform stunts--not to save anybody, but for showmanship? And then ditching them, and hoping they hit the safety nets? Not terribly heroic, Boston Brand...

Anyway, Vashnu sends Deadman to England to receive an important message (why not just give him the message yourself? Haney, that's why!):

Who was that mysterious figure? How could he see Deadman in his spirit form??

When Boston returns later for some follow-up advice:

Lay it on thick, Bob.

Obviously, either Haney just enjoyed being mondo mysterioso, or some rights hold-up was preventing them from mentioning Sherlock Holmes (he's not named anywhere in the story).

So, now the heroes are all on the board...but what about--the villains???

To be continued...

From The Brave And The Bold Special (a.k.a. DC Special Series #8) (1978)

Thursday, August 27, 2009

A Study In Scarlet?

When you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however goofy, must be the truth.

From Antarctic Press' November solicitations, in the latest Previews:

Wait...again?

Yes, ladies and gentleman, the stupidest (and yet coolest) idea ever:

Man, you just know this is going to suck. And you also know I'm going to have to buy it, you incredible bastards.

Can I at least hope Watson is a samurai as well as a doctor...??

Wednesday, April 29, 2009

A Literary Gift

From a back cover blurb on Dynamite's Sherlock Holmes #1:

Why, yes, Jeph Loeb, Sherlock Holmes is a "brand new wrapper" for a Victorian mystery story. Because Batman inspired Sherlock Holmes, obviously. And any good Holmes story is just a gussied-up Batman story.

If he wrote a blurb for a Tarzan book, it would probably read "It's a Ka-Zar story with a brand new wrapper!"

Yeah, I'm being overly harsh and picky, but Loeb is (supposedly) a professional writer, so if he can't express his ideas better, well, he deserves the scorn. And then there's Heroes...

In the interest of fairness, here's the full blurb:

P.S. It was a pretty good issue, although I don't buy the characterization of someone that we're shown at the end. Although it's certain to be "all is not as it seems," so judgment is officially withheld.