Okay so Lois is pretty sick in the head:
But check out what turns Superman on:
Not that there's anything wrong with that.
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But check out what turns Superman on:
Not that there's anything wrong with that.
Star Spangled War Stories #84
Người đăng: lecuongle on Thứ Ba, 16 tháng 11, 2010
This is another example of the women who began to pop up in the DC magazine line during the late 1950s and early 1960s; I still don't quite understand the sociological reasons for this although I suppose it could be just as simple as the publishers realizing that there was a huge untapped market.
Mademoiselle Marie became a mildly significant character in the DC Universe. In the early 1980s it was disclosed that she had been a lover of Alfred Pennyworth, Bruce Wayne's butler, and had borne him a daughter, named Julia Remarque. Julia had a continuing presence in the Batman line and became a brief romance interest for Bruce. Of course, this illustrates once again the problems with tying continuing characters to historical events. Back then it would have put Alfred at (say) 60 years old and established a girlfriend for Bruce of about 35 years old. Now it would mean that Alfred is pushing 90 and Julia would be eligible for Social Security.
But all that was far in the future as this August 1959 story was published. A paratrooper is about to land in occupied France. He expresses frustration here:
Eventually the lights appear briefly, but his parachute gets tangled in some trees and it looks like he's going to be snuffed out by a Nazi patrol, until:
She quickly impresses him with her competence and fighting ability. And when he destroys a tank that is about to kill her, he gets a little taste of her softer side:
But then she chastises him for disobeying her order to escape. Later, they attempt to blow up a bridge, but she delays pressing the plunger:
He wants her to come back to England with him, but she knows where she belongs:
Marie was featured in SSWS for the next year, before being bumped for the War that Time Forgot (aka Dinosaur Island) series. She made irregular appearances in several of the DC war comics features of the Silver Age, including Sgt. Rock, the Haunted Tank, and Johnny Cloud. In Detective Comics #501-502, it was revealed that she was shot and killed by a Nazi collaborator shortly before the end of WWII.
There are two backup stories. The first is a Mort Drucker treat called Blind Bomber. As the title implies, a Korean War bomber pilot is blinded by flak, but he still manages to deliver his "eggs" to market:
The final story is No Flag for a Sand Flea. A squad of US infantry is dying of thirst in the desert of North Africa, when they come upon an oasis. But you can probably guess the problem:
The flag has six stars on it, indicating that the Nazis are a crack outfit, having defeated six Allied units. Determined not to be the seventh, the infantry squad manages to take the flag and the oasis. Afterwards they come up with their own flag:
Frew 1315 - The Search For El Dorado (Part 2)
Người đăng: lecuongle on Thứ Sáu, 12 tháng 11, 2010
Download Part2
Scanned by Rockloud
Edited by Micho
All credits go to both friends.
P.S. Part 1 is available HERE.
Maybe Karen Deserved It?
Người đăng: lecuongle
After all, how much more thoughtless can you be than to have a picture of yourself framed with the inscription, "All my love, Karen," and give it to a blind man?
The Short Life of Mike Murdock
Người đăng: lecuongle on Thứ Tư, 10 tháng 11, 2010
One of the more bizarre sagas from Marvel in the 1960s concerned Matt (Daredevil) Murdock's "twin brother", Mike. As I have discussed in the past, most superheroes are also only children, and as it happens, Matt is no exception to that trend.
The story begins in Daredevil #16. DD's enemy, the Masked Marauder, comes up with a novel idea on how to tie up two superheroes at once. He creates an army of Daredevil knockoffs and instructs them to attack Spiderman, who recently foiled one of his schemes. After the initial attack, they are to fade away, leaving the wall-crawler angry and frustrated.
The plan works to perfection. When Spidey encounters the real Daredevil, he lashes out angrily. While they are battling, the Masked Marauder pulls of a spectacular robbery. This convinces each hero that the other was in cahoots with the MM. By a bit of coincidence, Spiderman happens to be swinging by the law offices of Nelson and Murdock awhile later, and his spider-sense alerts him to the presence of Daredevil. He makes the obvious deduction that DD cannot be a blind man, and thus accuses Foggy:
Matt and Karen eventually convince Peter of the error he's made. In the following issue, DD and Spidey team up to defeat the Masked Marauder. A few issues later, Peter sends a letter to Matt Murdock, revealing that he knows that Matt is really Daredevil, but not to worry, he won't disclose the secret to anyone. Unfortunately, Matt disappears shortly afterward and Karen remembers a special delivery letter and:
This sets the stage. In DD #25, Karen and Foggy confront Matt with the letter:
Of course, Foggy points out the obvious: that he roomed with Matt at college and never heard anything about a twin brother. So Matt prevaricates some more and Karen says what does it matter now that Matt's back, but Foggy still wants to meet this mysterious sibling and so:
And for the next year and a half, Mike became a regular character in the DD universe. It's an insane plot twist but Stan manages to pull it off with some credibility because a) he acknowledges that it's crazy and b) Daredevil's abilities mean that he's able to pass Mike off as a sighted person despite being blind.
It's safe to say that most adult readers today find the storyline unbelievable and a low point. However, I remember reading these issues as a young teen and enjoying the heck out of them. Mike was the opposite of Matt in every way; confident where Matt was tentative, arrogant instead of sensitive and relishing letting Foggy and Karen know he was Daredevil. He flirts outrageously with Karen and teases Foggy abut his weight. What teenaged boy wouldn't want to try being a new person, confident and breezy, especially with the understanding that he could always go back to being the meek and mild-mannered guy if things didn't work out?
Again this is not to deny how ridiculous the stories are. Because Matt and Mike couldn't appear together, Matt was forced to rely on a series of increasingly implausible ruses to keep the imposture going:
And he apparently enjoyed being Mike so much that he began to get some decidedly weird ideas:
For a lawyer, Matt doesn't think things through very carefully.
In Daredevil #41, Mike (as Daredevil) is "killed" while destroying a machine that moves people into another time dimension. Is this the end of the superhero as well? Umm, no, as Matt tells the Jester (plus Foggy and Karen) in the next issue:
Blog into Mystery covers one of the early Mike Murdock stories here. There were two oddities that I noticed while reading the stories in this run:
1. The villain from last month's issue is frequently rescued by this month's villain. This happens to the Gladiator (rescued by the Masked Marauder in DD #19), the Leap-Frog (attempted rescue by the Stilt-Man in DD #26) and the Stilt-Man (rescued by the Masked Marauder at the end of DD #26).
2. The villains often attempted to blind (temporarily or otherwise) DD. The Masked Marauder hits him with an "Opti-Ray" blast that had briefly blinded Spiderman. The Gladiator threw sand in Daredevil's face in #23. The alien invaders in #28 use a "sight-stealing ray". The Cobra and Mr Hyde actually succeed in eliminating DD's extra senses with a potion intended to blind him in #30-32. And Dr. Doom's hynoticon in #37 fails precisely because ol' Horn-Head is sightless (just as the Ringmaster's hat was unable to hypnotize him in Amazing Spiderman #16).
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The story begins in Daredevil #16. DD's enemy, the Masked Marauder, comes up with a novel idea on how to tie up two superheroes at once. He creates an army of Daredevil knockoffs and instructs them to attack Spiderman, who recently foiled one of his schemes. After the initial attack, they are to fade away, leaving the wall-crawler angry and frustrated.
The plan works to perfection. When Spidey encounters the real Daredevil, he lashes out angrily. While they are battling, the Masked Marauder pulls of a spectacular robbery. This convinces each hero that the other was in cahoots with the MM. By a bit of coincidence, Spiderman happens to be swinging by the law offices of Nelson and Murdock awhile later, and his spider-sense alerts him to the presence of Daredevil. He makes the obvious deduction that DD cannot be a blind man, and thus accuses Foggy:
Matt and Karen eventually convince Peter of the error he's made. In the following issue, DD and Spidey team up to defeat the Masked Marauder. A few issues later, Peter sends a letter to Matt Murdock, revealing that he knows that Matt is really Daredevil, but not to worry, he won't disclose the secret to anyone. Unfortunately, Matt disappears shortly afterward and Karen remembers a special delivery letter and:
This sets the stage. In DD #25, Karen and Foggy confront Matt with the letter:
Of course, Foggy points out the obvious: that he roomed with Matt at college and never heard anything about a twin brother. So Matt prevaricates some more and Karen says what does it matter now that Matt's back, but Foggy still wants to meet this mysterious sibling and so:
And for the next year and a half, Mike became a regular character in the DD universe. It's an insane plot twist but Stan manages to pull it off with some credibility because a) he acknowledges that it's crazy and b) Daredevil's abilities mean that he's able to pass Mike off as a sighted person despite being blind.
It's safe to say that most adult readers today find the storyline unbelievable and a low point. However, I remember reading these issues as a young teen and enjoying the heck out of them. Mike was the opposite of Matt in every way; confident where Matt was tentative, arrogant instead of sensitive and relishing letting Foggy and Karen know he was Daredevil. He flirts outrageously with Karen and teases Foggy abut his weight. What teenaged boy wouldn't want to try being a new person, confident and breezy, especially with the understanding that he could always go back to being the meek and mild-mannered guy if things didn't work out?
Again this is not to deny how ridiculous the stories are. Because Matt and Mike couldn't appear together, Matt was forced to rely on a series of increasingly implausible ruses to keep the imposture going:
And he apparently enjoyed being Mike so much that he began to get some decidedly weird ideas:
For a lawyer, Matt doesn't think things through very carefully.
In Daredevil #41, Mike (as Daredevil) is "killed" while destroying a machine that moves people into another time dimension. Is this the end of the superhero as well? Umm, no, as Matt tells the Jester (plus Foggy and Karen) in the next issue:
Blog into Mystery covers one of the early Mike Murdock stories here. There were two oddities that I noticed while reading the stories in this run:
1. The villain from last month's issue is frequently rescued by this month's villain. This happens to the Gladiator (rescued by the Masked Marauder in DD #19), the Leap-Frog (attempted rescue by the Stilt-Man in DD #26) and the Stilt-Man (rescued by the Masked Marauder at the end of DD #26).
2. The villains often attempted to blind (temporarily or otherwise) DD. The Masked Marauder hits him with an "Opti-Ray" blast that had briefly blinded Spiderman. The Gladiator threw sand in Daredevil's face in #23. The alien invaders in #28 use a "sight-stealing ray". The Cobra and Mr Hyde actually succeed in eliminating DD's extra senses with a potion intended to blind him in #30-32. And Dr. Doom's hynoticon in #37 fails precisely because ol' Horn-Head is sightless (just as the Ringmaster's hat was unable to hypnotize him in Amazing Spiderman #16).
Quick Bits
Người đăng: lecuongle on Thứ Hai, 8 tháng 11, 2010
That wish could be interpreted in more than one way:
How strong is the Hulk?
Strong enough to defy gravity.
More about →
How strong is the Hulk?
Strong enough to defy gravity.
Secret Six #1
Người đăng: lecuongle on Thứ Năm, 4 tháng 11, 2010
As the 1960s drew to a close, DC began to experiment more. Whereas previous titles had almost always required a tryout issue or two in Showcase, Secret Six debuted in their own magazine. The only earlier Silver Age title I can think of given that treatment was Captain Storm.
The first part of the story is tied up with introducing our six characters. King is a Hollywood stuntman, Crimson is a top model, Carlo is an escape artist, August Durant is a physicist, Lili is a cosmetologist and Tiger is a former pro boxer. We learn that a mysterious person called Mockingbird has a hold over them, and wants them to defeat criminals that the law cannot touch.
The hold he has over them is somewhat like blackmail, although in each case it does not appear to be something the Secret Six member did wrong:
With the arguable exception of King. I point this out because while the idea of the "anti-hero" was very popular at the time, DC was not quite ready to present their readers with characters that were more than a teensy bit flawed, although that would soon change.
To add an element of suspense, it is indicated that one of the members of the Secret Six is probably Mockingbird operating incognito. He (or she) uses his control of the group to force them to attack criminals who are outside the reach of the law. Their initial misson:
Crimson seduces and drugs one of the financiers. Lili then makes up Tiger to look like the drugged moneyman. Carlo uses his escaping abilities in reverse to find a way into the evil genius' hideout.
They succeed in rather undramatic fashion; in the end the criminal dies by his own gadget as is cliche in these stories.
Overall the story (by E. Nelson Bridwell) is entertaining but nothing special. The art by Frank Robbins (Correction: Frank Springer, as pointed out in the comments by Dan) shows some promise; if I recall correctly, this is an early work of his for DC. The series is obviously inspired by the very popular Mission Impossible show on TV at the time.
Update: I read through the next several issues in this series and I have to say that the whole is greater than the sum of its parts. Although the individual stories are not all that strong or unique, I like the way the series develops. As time goes by we learn more about the background of the Secret Six and the people responsible for the problems that Mockingbird exploits to force them to do his bidding--the crooks that wanted Tiger to throw a boxing match, the charmer that conned Crimson out of the family fortune, the torturer who forced King to reveal army secrets, etc.
Update II: Commander Benson's take on the Secret Six series is here. Commander Benson discusses the logic process that led to his deduction of the identity of Mockingbird here. I should mention that in my reading of the series, I noticed that while there were six issues after the first, and that each issue revealed more about the backgrounds of the characters, the only character whom we did not learn more about was the one that Commander Benson identified.
