And we're back for another edition of Comic Book Retro 50 where I look back at what comics a young Dave-El was pulling from the spinner racks lo these 50 years gone!
So what pray tell got my pocket change in September 1976?
Let's kick things off with Justice League of America #137 with a cover by Ernie Chan.
I know I've given Ernie a lot of grief for his covers during this era at DC Comics but this ain't half bad.
Holey Moley! Are we finally getting that much anticipated Captain Marvel vs. Superman match up?
"Crisis in Tomorrow" by E. Nelson Bridwell, Martin Pasko, Dick Dillin & Frank McLaughlin kicks off Part 3 of the annual JLA/JSA crossover, this year including the heroes from world designated as Earth S. ("S" as in Shazam!)
Here we see the Green Lanterns of Earth 1 and Earth 2 teamed up with Ibis the Invicible. (Invincible has long as no one slaps that stick out of his hand.)
Mr. Atom was a long time robotic nemesis of Captain Marvel.
Speaking of robotics, Superman's alien android enemy Brainiac shows up turn Hal Jordan into a skeleton.
For reasons.
Evil reasons.
Reasons of evil.
For reasons.
Evil reasons.
Reasons of evil.
God bless E. Nelson Bridwell who I was always admired as a classic fan boy make good but I wonder if even he understood everything that was going on in this storyline.
Meanwhile, Billy Batson, Mary Batson and Freddy Freeman have been shut off from their magic lightning from the Rock of Eternity. But Johnny Thunder shows up with his Thunderbolt who provides his own magic lightning to transform our intrepid youths into Captain Marvel, Mary Marvel and Captain Marvel Jr.
You can see why Bridwell kept the Marvels off the table until now because they rapidly take out King Kull and his machines in one single epic illustration.
Ooh boy! We're gonna get that epic Supeman vs. Captain Marvel throw down promised on the cover!
Wait! That's it? After all that King Kull did over three issues..
For reasons.
Evil reasons.
Reasons of evil.
We're just gonna fly off and that's that?
If this was not enough about JLA#137, click here for Alan Stewart's more extensive post about this issue.
I remember young Dave-El was a bit disappointed by the anti-climatic ending but to be fair, Cap using his wisdom to defeat a foe rather than his fists was in character for the Big Red Cheese.
Looking back on it now, JLA#135-#137 was a lot of nonsense that barely held together but at the time, other than the anti-climatic and rushed resolution, young Dave-El rather enjoyed this ride.
What else did Dave-El buy in September 1976?
There's Isis#2 with a cover by Mike Vosburg & Jack Abel
"The Creature from Dimension X" by Steve Skeates, Mike Vosburg & Vince Colletta gave us some sci-fi action that the TV show producers could scarely dream about it.
"Lost & Found" by Steve Skeates, Mike Nasser & Frank Giacoia was a more grounded short story in keeping with the tone of the TV series.
Ernie Chan & Bob Oksner provide the cover to Superman#306.
"Backward Battle for the Bizarro World" by Martin Pasko, Curt Swan & Bob Oksner gives us a return of Bizarro but in a different way than he was presented in the 1960's.
While Bizarro had all the powers of Superman, that aspect was rarely explored and stories deferred to Superman having to figure out Bizarro's backward logic and how to convince him to stop being a pest.
Here we see Superman and Bizarro in a direct super powered confrontation.
Superman declares Bizarro has "not even alive" which makes it OK to kill him? Marty Pasko is really channeling some over the top drama here.
Bizarro is all messed up as he mistakenly believes his home planet, the square shaped Earth known as Bizarro world, was destroyed.
The resolution still comes down to Superman figuring out Bizarro's backward logic and using it to resolve the conflict.
There's also a dramatic wrap up on the Toyman plot that continued from last issue.
Marty is trying to bring some Marvel level angst to Superman.
We needs some silver age DC goofiness. Oh, that wacky Steve Lombard, what a schmuck!
On to Green Lantern#92 with a cover by Mike Grell.
"The Legend of the Green Arrow" by Denny O'Neil, Mike Grell & Bob Smith sends Hal, Ollie and Sinestro through a plot device called a "Silver Twist" that deposits our cast into a mash up world of alien tech and a rustic medieval culture.
Conveniently, Hal and Sinestro's rings don't work and given there's a plot afoot parallel to the legend of Robin Hood, Ollie is in his element for a change.
Trying to relive the glory days of the O'Neil/Adams GL/GA run but leaning away from social relevance and towards sci-fi and fantasy, Denny O'Neil was clearly hard pressed to figure out how to make Green Arrow work.
From SPACE to the FUTURE, it's Mike Grell on the cover art again for Superboy#222 and ah geez, it's this guy again?
In "This Legionnaire Is Condemned", writer Cary Bates (with artists Mike Grell & Bob Wiacek) is determined to make us care about Tyroc.
You may recall Tyroc was created to answer the question "Why are there no black people in the Legion of Super Heroes?"
You may also recollect the answer (straight out of Stephen Miller's wet dreams) was that all the black people were living on their own island.
The Legion tells Tyroc that since they have green folk and orange folk and blue folk, black folk are welcome too. And Tyroc decides to give them a chance.
Tyroc's subsequent appearances do seem to be centered around a disturbing recurring theme.
- It's assumed that Tyroc (the ONLY black man on the team) is up to bad shit.
- It turns out Tyroc was just sacrificing his reputation and identity to flush out some kind of threat.
Cary Bates has been writing the Legion since they took over the Superboy title as of issue #197. This issue is his last issue.
This would also be the last we would see of Tyroc for a long time. He would have a cameo for the wedding of Lightning Lad and Saturn Girl in All New Collectors' Edition C-55 and a quick pop in for Superboy & the Legion of Super Heroes#250.
He will get a 3 issue arc in Legion of Super Heroes#263-#265 (1980) which ends with that island for only black people shifting to another dimension and Tyroc leaves the Legion.
Back to September 1976, the back up is a short story written by Jim Shooter with art by Mike Nasser & Bob Layton. Since I began reading the Legion (Superboy#205, August 1974), this is the first NEW story I've seen not drawn by Mike Grell.
"Death of a Legend" is about a super hero who is more celebrity than hero but has to rise up to face a dangerous challenge.
For more teen team action with Teen Titans#45, sporting an Ernie Chan/Vince Colletta cover.
"You Can't Say No to the Angel of Death" is written by Bob Rozakis with art by Irv Novick & Vince Colletta.
Taking over from Joe Orlando is Julius Schwartz as editor.
Let's do a quick flashback to Teen Titans#44 when Mal Duncan cobbles together some different elements from other stories and characters to create a super hero identity to help him rescue the Teen Titans.
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| Art by Pablo Marcos & Bob Smith |
Julius Schartz did not like that. He wanted Mal to have his own original identity that was not assembled from spare parts.
So with issue #45, Speedy starts to rag on Mal about his borrowed super hero persona.
This is a bit much from a kid sidekick whose whole schtick is a borrowed identity from his mentor, Green Arrow. Who calls himself "Speedy"?
Mal leaves Titans HQ with a full mad on at this jackass.
Mal goes up against a Gotham street gang called the Wreckers who set off a bomb explosion. Caught in the blast, it appears Mal Duncan's number is up as Azrael, the Angel of Death, has come to claim him.
Mal challenges Azrael to a fight. The angel Gabriel is summoned to referee and the fight is on.
Mal wins which pisses off Azrael.
OK, are you guys following all this?
So Mal puts the horn to use to summon the Titans to help finish off the Wreckers.
So this was the solution to Julie Schwartz's mandate for Mal to have an original skill set? OK, points for "original" maybe but it's also muddled and absurd.
While the Guardian identity may have been a borrowed one, Mal was able use that identity to take direct action and save his friends.
This new concept just means all Mal can do is holler for help and teleport his friends into danger.
Side note: Issue #45 marks the the first appearance of Karen Beecher who will become the costumed hero Bumblebee.
After a couple of months of not picking up an issue, I returned to the fold with Action Comics#466, sporting a weird but dynamic cover by Neal Adams of grown up Lex Luthor beating up baby Superman?
"You Can Take the Man Out of the Super, But You Can't Take the Super Out of the Boy" is the actual title for this adventure by Cary Bates, Curt Swan & Tex Blaisdell.
The bit is that Lex has figured out a way to de-age both physically and mentally his hated foe, working from the premise that an older, wiser Lex can easily defeat a young, less experience Superman.
He tries this trick out on Batman and Flash before zapping Superman with his de-aginator thingy.
It's another Ernie Chan/Vince Colletta cover for Detective Comics#466.
I'm not sure where this Len Wein tale came from. Len had left DC about 2 years back to set up shop at Marvel and would not return to DC on the regular until 1978.
This story is a bit of an odd duck. Signalman was a Z-list bad guy from the 1950's and should've given Batman little trouble.
Instead, Batman gets knocked out and tied up inside the Bat-Signal turned death trap.
Gotta admit Batman bursting out of the Bat-Signal like that is pretty impressive.
The back up sees the Calculator taking his schtick up against Green Arrow this time in "Take Me Out of the Ballgame".
Bob Rozakis's script is illustrated by Marshall Rogers & Terry Austin. IIRC, this is Rogers' debut work as a professional comics artist.
Rogers will go on to acclaim as the artist for Steve Engelhart's run on Batman in Detective Comics. (But let's save something for next years' posts on Comic Book Retro 50.)
OK, one last book for September 1976 and we're not done with baseball.
DC Super Stars#10 with a cover by Ernie Chan is branded as "Strange Sports Stories".
Strange Sports Stories was an anthology comic that ran for 6 issues from 1973 to 1974. It featured (do try to keep up) Stories about Sports that were (this is the key element) Strange.
This special leads off with an ALL NEW 18 page tale called "The Great Super-Star Game" by Bob Rozakis and JLA artists Dick Dillin & Frank McLaughlin. (As if Dick and Frank weren't stressed enough with the annual JLA/JSA crossover.)
It's heroes vs. villains!
Uncle Sam from Freedom Fighters is the umpire.
For the good guys, we've got Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman, Green Arrow, Black Canary, Plastic Man, Robin and Kid Flash.
For the bad guys, up on deck are Sportsmaster and Huntress (hopping the dimensional divide from Earth 2), Lex Luthor, the Joker, Chronos, Doctor Polaris, Felix Faust, Matter Master, Tattooed Man, Weather Wizard and Amazo.
Why pray tell is this game happening?
The Huntress and Sportsmaster set up a baseball game between heroes and villains.
Villains win? Huntress will remain a villain.
Heroes win? Huntress will become a hero.
Really!
Here's a page of the game play for this thing that actually happened!
Of course the villains cheat but the heroes win and here's the last page for all of that.
Rounding out the contents are some reprints.
From Strange Adventures#59, it's "The Super-Athletes from Outer Space" and from Green Lantern#39, Hal Jordan has to compete in the "The Fight for the Championship of the Universe"
Both stories pencilled by Gil Kane.
And that is that for what a young Dave-El bought in September 1976.
Next week's comic book post is a Comic Book Retro Spotlight. Before the events of JLA#135-#137, we'll take a look at a prior crossover between Earth 1 and Earth S from 1974.
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