Let's Monkee Around With Batman

From June 1970, Batman#222 featured an odd little story titled "Dead... Till Proven Alive!" by Frank Robbins, Irv Novick and Dick Giordano.

The story was a riff on an urban myth going around about the Beatles, specifically the myth that Paul McCartney was dead. 

Among the alleged clues to this secret that Paul McCartney was dead was the cover of the Beatles "Abbey Road" where the four Beatles are crossing the road (presumably to get to the other side) and Paul is the only one not wearing shoes. 

The "Paul is dead" myth serves as the impetus for the lead story in Batman#222 when the Twists, analogues of the Beatles, visit Gotham City.

Frank Robbins has a clever take on the whole "Paul is dead" thing with an ending that reveals there is a conspiracy to cover up death within the Twists but it's not the member you expect.  

Here is the cover to that issue by Neal Adams. 

Batman's first word balloon "Here they come..." puts me in mind of a real life group of Beatle wannabes, the Monkees. The Monkees were assembled to star in a TV series about a group of Beatlesque musicians having zany adventures. 

The Monkees theme song went like this: 

"Here we come!
Walking down the street! 
We get the funniest looks from everyone we meet! 
Hey, hey! We're the Monkees!" 

So here is my badly modified version of the cover to Batman#222. 

And that is what I have for today.

Tomorrow is Songs For Saturday which includes theme songs from some of the TV shows I write about on the Tuesday TV Touchbase.

Cinema Sunday follows on Sunday (duh!) with a look at a documentary about Fred Rogers of Mr. Rogers' Neighborhood.

Thanks for reading and until next time, remember to be good to one another, even if you get the funniest looks from everyone you meet.