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Post by Hoosier X on Jun 2, 2023 21:49:02 GMT -5
The Brave and the Bold #199
Batman and the Spectre
“The Body-Napping of Jim Corrigan!”
Writer: Mike W. Barr
Penciller: Ross Andru
Inker: Rick Hoberg
I like this one a lot! Ross Andru does a bang-up job on the art! And the story is a bit of a change of pace for a Spectre/Batman team-up. Somebody has stolen the Spectre’s host body Jim Corrigan and has magically covered his tracks very well. The Spectre goes to Batman for help because he needs a detective.
(Yes, Jim Corrigan is a detective. But the Spectre isn’t!)
It starts with Jim Corrigan on a train going to Gateway City. But the bridge is out! Corrigan leans back in his seat and assured his fellow passengers that everything is going to be OK.
And you turn the page and there’s a double-page spread of the Spectre grown to a gigantic size as he holds the bridge as the train passes safely by.
It’s pretty cool.
He tries to get back on the train and re-enter Corrigan’s body ... but it’s not there! Somebody has stolen it!
After several panels of fruitless searching, he glides away to seek help in Gotham City. Surely the Batman, the Dark Knight Detective, will be help the Spectre find his host body before times runs out and he dissipates into the ether.
And Batman does indeed take charge of the investigation immediately, and with the help of the Spectre’s mystical powers, they find the thieves, a couple of powerful occultists who have been trying to negate a sorcerer’s curse for 200 years!
It’s pretty cool.
I would have brought back Zor or Oom the Mighty. But it’s still pretty cool. I like seeing the Spectre in a vulnerable position. And seeking Batman for his specials skills when his own great power had proven ineffective.
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Post by codystarbuck on Jun 2, 2023 23:02:08 GMT -5
Well, he couldn't call on his brothers......
Wrong Way Corrigan......
and Crash Corrigan......
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Post by Hoosier X on Jun 8, 2023 7:44:44 GMT -5
I got another batch of issues of The Brave and the Bold.
The Brave and the Bold #108
Batman and Sgt. Rock
“The Night Batman Sold His Soul!”
Writer: Bob Haney
Artist: Jim Aparo
This is the one where Batman accidentally sells his soul to Adolf Hitler to get out of a well.
And the only one who can save him is Sgt. Rock. It’s the Haneyverse Sgt. Rock. He’s not quite right.
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Post by Hoosier X on Jun 10, 2023 11:28:50 GMT -5
The Brave and the Bold #109
Batman and The Demon
“Gotham Bay, Be My Grave”
Writer: Bob Haney
Artist: Jim Aparo
This weird humanoid entity rises from Gotham Bay and starts attacking and usually killing anybody who looks like a ship’s captain. He looks like he’s covered in barbecue sauce. Batman starts investigating the case.
The BBQ-sauce entity attacks Harry Matthews, who is dressed as a captain because he is just about to go on his yacht. Harry Matthews is part of the supporting cast for The Demon, and he is probably best-remembered for the long period of time that he was a sofa cushion. That era is in the future though. Here he is still an obnoxious millionaire who is pals with Jason Blood. The attack on Harry is more than enough to involve Blood and his yellow-skinned alter ego Etrigan.
Jason Blood was based in Gotham City, so it’s not at all contrived that Etrigan and Batman should cross paths now and then. It happened twice in the pages of TBATB and it’s surprising it didn’t happen more often. Look at how often Batman ran into Wildcat, and they aren’t even based on the same Earth! (More on that topic in the next review.)
It turns out the BBQ creature is some kind of spirit of petty revenge. Going back to the 1880s, it seems there was an incorrigible sailor who was about to be hanged aboard ship for unspecified crimes. But the execution was interrupted by the eruption of Krakatoa! And the ship sank and the captain was killed and somehow the very bad person was barbecued by Krakatoa and became the spirit of petty revenge.
H.M.S. Pinafore this ain’t!
That’s your Bob Haney moment. The eruption of Krakatoa transforms an evil sailor into a revenge-seeking BBQ monster.
And they beat him by finding the rope that was going to be used to hang him because that completes the circle of mystical justice or something. The rope had fortunately been salvaged and was on display at Gotham Museum. Somehow.
Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the Haneyverse.
Fun story. Great art by Jim Aparo.
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Post by Hoosier X on Jun 15, 2023 19:16:53 GMT -5
The Brave and the Bold #110
Batman and Wildcat
“A Very Special Spy”
Writer: Bob Haney
Artist: Jim Aparo
Wildcat was a frequent guest star in the early days of the Batman team-ups in TBATB, appearing five times with Batman (#88, #97, #110, #118 and #127). (He also appeared in #62, with Starman and Black Canary. Or did he? I will tackle this question at some point in the next few days.)
In TBATB, Ted Grant has (temporarily, it turns out) given up his Wildcat identity. He says it’s “corny.” Nowadays he’s using his fame as a former heavyweight champion to travel around the country and promote products for an oil company. The story begins in the desert, where Ted has invited his pal the Batman to attend some tests for a new fuel additive that will make race cars go faster and be more efficient. And there’s Batman, somewhere in the Southwest, standing there in his costume, watching a car go really fast on the sun-baked desert floor.
There’s your first Haney moment. This issue has a lot of them.
Anyway, some dude runs in front of the car and almost cases an accident. He claims his father actually created the fuel additive and he’s going to sue the chemical company.
Well, Batman and Ted Grant have to figure out what’s going on and so Ted puts on the Wildcat costume again and gets the Cat-o-cycle out of storage and various Haneynanigans ensue.
It’s such a great comic. I wasn’t yet reading comics in 1973 when The Brave and the Bold #110 first came out but I wish I had picked it up for 12 1/2 cents at a used-book store a few years later.
Great art by Aparo, that’s for sure.
At this point, I could just say I enjoyed the story and not say anything about Wildcat’s TBATB continuity. But I don’t want to do that. I’ve been thinking about Wildcat and The Brave and the Bold and this crazy continuity problem for decades. As a kid, I didn’t have any idea that there was a problem ... at first. I bought TBATB #127 with Wildcat at a used-book store when it was just a few months old. And I thought, this Wildcat guy is pretty cool! But I bought a few more issues, including a few back issues from 1973 and 1974, And somewhere in the letter columns, there were a few letters here and there talking about Wildcat and the Spectre as Earth-2 characters, and current (1970s) Batman as an Earth-1 character.
I knew about Earth-1 and Earth-2, but not in any great detail because I didn’t read that much DC at the time. But from what I could gather, Wildcat was an Earth-2 character (a member of the JSA, no less) and modern Batman was from Earth-1. And in The Brave and the Bold, these characters were good friends who teamed up a lot.
A few years later, I had collected a few more issues of TBATB. And every time I got a new issue, I would sometimes notice that Batman was acting kind of weird! Going to baseball games as Batman. Walking around on the Gotham sidewalks dressed as Batman, enjoying a sunny day. Traveling all over the world at the drop of the hat.
I started wondering if maybe this Batman wasn’t from Earth-1 OR Earth-2! I called it Earth-B & B. And since then, I’ve heard comic-book fans call it Earth-B or The Haneyverse! Yes. That’s it. The Haneyverse!
Reading so much Brave and the Bold lately has got me thinking about this stuff again. So before I move on to the next individual review of TBATB (which will be #112), I want to spend a few days on continuity.
So here’s our three main possibilities for making sense of the Wildcat stories in The Brave and the Bold:
1. There’s a separate Earth-1 Wildcat. He was never in the Justice Society. At some point, long after his prime years, he became friends with Batman and had a few adventures with the Caped Crusader.
2. He’s the Earth-2 Wildcat. For unknown reasons, he was on Earth-1 from about 1970 to 1975. He was a member of the Justice Society for a few adventures in the 1940s. He was present for a few of the JLA/JSA cross-overs in the 1960s. He was on Earth-1 for a few years, then went back to Earth-2 in the late 1970s to appear with the Justice Society in the revived All-Star Comics and then for a few issues in Adventure Comics.
3. He’s neither the Earth-1 Wildcat or the Earth-2 Wildcat. He’s the Haneyverse Wildcat! And he’s appearing with the Haneyverse Batman! And most, if not all, the issues of The Brave and the Bold are a separate universe!
I’ll be tackling each of these possibilities in more detail over the next few days.
B & B there or B & B square!
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Post by codystarbuck on Jun 15, 2023 19:29:15 GMT -5
Pretty much option 3 fits best, for me.
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Post by Hoosier X on Jun 16, 2023 23:06:09 GMT -5
Earth-1 Wildcat
There’s an Earth-1 counterpart to the more well-known Wildcat of Earth-2, Ted Grant. His name is also Ted Grant and it seems reasonable to conclude from the stories in TBATB that his solo super-hero career closely resembled that of the Earth-2 counterpart. He was a boxer and the heavyweight champion for a time, retiring undefeated. He rode around on a motorcycle and fought crime through the 1940s and maybe into the 1950s and 1960s. In the late 1960s, he was recruited by Bruce Wayne to coach the U.S. boxing team for the World Youth team in Vienna (The Brave and The Bold #89). This led to a Batman team-up where Ted Grant boxed with an old rival and Batman hunted down a spy. The Earth-1 Wildcat had several other adventures with Batman and one adventure with the Creeper (Super-Team Family #2). He doesn’t appear again, so he probably retired.
Earth-1 Wildcat was never in the Justice Society because there was no Earth-1 Justice Society!
Earth-1 Ted Grant could have been a mentor to young Bruce Wayne when he was traveling the world and learning the skills he would need to become Batman. He could have been an inspiration to many of the Earth-1 heroes who started popping up in the 1950s and 1960s.
If you think about it, he probably wasn’t the only costumed adventurer in the 1940s. There’s several DC characters who never interacted with other Golden Age DC characters, but who later interacted with Silver Age (presumably Earth-1) characters. Like Congo Bill (and later Congorilla). Maybe even Aquaman!
One great candidate for a 1940s Earth-1 adventurer is Zatara. He goes all the way back to Action Comics #1 and, as far as I know, he didn’t appear with any of the other Golden Age heroes (except in a few issues of All-Star Squadron, set in the 1940s, but not published until the 1980s). But in the 1960s, when his daughter Zatanna was searching for him, she sought the help of the Atom, Hawkman, Batman and other Earth-1 heroes, suggesting that Zatara is an Earth-1 character, unless he had migrated from Earth-2 to Earth-1 for some reason.
Honestly, I really like the idea of a very small, elite group of 1940s adventurers operating on Earth-1. They weren’t as flashy or as well-known as Superman and Batman and Wonder Woman and the Flash, but at least DC’s Earth-1 wasn’t completely unprotected from Nazi death rays, costumed villains and aliens with evil intent.
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Post by Hoosier X on Jun 17, 2023 18:14:54 GMT -5
Earth-2 Wildcat
So maybe the Wildcat who teamed up with Batman in The Brave and the Bold in the 1970s was the same guy who joined the Justice Society for two adventures in the 1940s and he’s the Earth-2 Ted Grant that we all know and love.
After a long solo super-hero career that certainly lasted into the early 1950s and maybe into the 1960s, Wildcat of Earth-2 showed up again in TBATB #62 (1965) to team up with the Black Canary (still based on Earth-2 at this point) and Starman to fight the Huntress and the Sports-Master. Over the next few years, Wildcat joined in on several of the JLA/JSA cross-overs of the Silver and Bronze Ages.
.In addition to his appearances with the JSA in Justice League cross-overs, Wildcat also teamed up with the Earth-1 Batman in several issues of TBATB, starting with #88 in 1970 and ending with #127 in 1976. (There’s also a Wildcat team-up with the Creeper in Super-Team Family #2 in 1975.)
Wildcat seems to be jumping around between Earth-1 and Earth-2 quite a bit from 1970 to 1976. His appearance in JLA #82 is several months after TBATB #88. He takes part in the epic JLA/JSA adventure where the two teams search for (and find) the Seven Soldiers of Victory in JLA #100 to #102 (August to October 1972), which is between the Batman/Wildcat team-ups in TBATB #97 (August/September 1971) and TBATB #110 (December 1973/January 1974). And the JLA/JSA cross-over in JLA #123 and #124 takes place in 1975 between TBATB #118 and Super-Team Family #2.
And then Ted Grant is back on Earth-2 for the first three issues of the revived All-Star Comics #58 to #60 (January to June 1976) before his final TBATB appearance (on Earth-1) in #127 (June 1976).
For some reason, Wildcat spent a lot of time on Earth-1 in the early 1970s. And he seems to have been popping back and forth between Earth-1 and Earth-2 at will for the JLA/JSA reunions.
What was he doing on Earth-1 so much of the time? I’m guessing he could have been on a mission of some kind. Maybe one or more of the Earth-2 villains fled to Earth-1 and Wildcat volunteered to spend months or years at a time (with the help of the Spectre or Dr. Fate) on Earth-1 monitoring the situation, looking for the fugitives and occasionally getting involved in adventures with Batman and the Creeper.
I was going to pretty much end it there with the idea that we don’t know what the mission was. Maybe there was no mission. He just liked getting away from Earth-2 every once in a while. My idea that he was looking for Earth-2 fugitives was just an idea. But then I remembered ... there’s actually some pretty good evidence that there were some Earth-2 villains running around on Earth-1 in the 1970s! They were JSA villains! And one of them was Wildcat’s primary foe!
Let’s start with the Wizard! He’s a JSA foe from way back. He was one of the villains in two of the JLA/JSA cross-overs. And in 1976, he was definitely on Earth-1, a member of the Secret Society of Super-Villains.
And then there’s the Huntress and the Sports-Master! The Huntress was Wildcat’s main villain, appearing in Wildcat’s Golden Age series six times! (She was also a member of the Wizard’s Injustice Gang in All-Star #41.) The Sports-Master was a Green Lantern villain who also popped up in the Injustice Gang. They were the villains in the Black Canary/Starman/Wildcat team-up in TBATB #62 where it was revealed that the Huntress and the Sports-Master has gotten married. They appeared on Earth-1 in 1976 fighting Batgirl and Robin in Batman Family #7. Later that same year, they showed up in DC Super-Stars #10, organizing a baseball game between the heroes and the villains! (If Wildcat was on some mission to get them back to Earth-2, he must have succeeded because they were back on Earth-2 for All-Star Comics #72 in 1978.)
And then there’s the Gentleman Ghost! He seems like another Earth-2 rogue who was wandering around on Earth-1 when he should have stayed in his own dimension!
Honestly, I wasn’t really very keen on the idea of an Earth-2 Wildcat who jumped back and forth between the two dimensions on a regular basis. But while I was writing this article, I thought of the villains running around between the two Earths, and it doesn’t seem as far-fetched as it did this morning before I started writing.
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Post by Hoosier X on Jun 18, 2023 22:08:42 GMT -5
THE HANEYVERSE!!
And then, we must consider the possibility that the Wildcat who teamed up with Batman in TBATB was neither the Earth-1 Wildcat or the Earth-2 Wildcat. He was the Haneyverse Wildcat!
Because, to be honest, Wildcat is not the only anomaly in TBATB. Batman is out of character a lot of the time. Some of the DC characters who pop up don’t act much at all like what you’d expect from their Earth-1 versions. Sgt. Rock isn’t supposed to have survived World War II, yet he’s adventuring with 1970s Batman on a regular basis. The Spectre shows up quite a bit. Catwoman is the villain in TBATB #131 and she’s an international espionage agent in Europe.
So ... maybe the Haneyverse isn’t such a crazy idea.
After reading about half of the Batman team-ups in TBATB (which, admittedly, includes a lot of stories that Bob Haney didn’t write) I see a lot things that are explained best by the Haneyverse.
Bear with me while I cobble together a tentative narrative that shows how a separate Haneyverse answers a lot of questions that you might have after reading too many issues of The Brave and the Bold.
The Batman of 1940 is the father of the Batman of 1970. They are both named Bruce Wayne. The Batman of 1940 teamed up with Sgt. Rock, Blackhawk and the Unknown Soldier during World War II, and these stories are told in TBATB.
Years later, Batman of 1970 teamed up with his father’s old friend Sgt. Rock on several occasions. This Haneyverse Sgt. Rock survived the war.
At some point, probably around 1960 to 1965, the father passed on the Batman mantle to his son, Bruce Wayne, Jr. I’m inclined to think that the second Batman has Dick Grayson as a sidekick named Robin who doesn’t generally appear in the team-ups. There aren’t enough stories about the Haneyverse Batman of the 1940s to know what he did for a sidekick.
This second Batman has a different worldview and different experiences from his father. He has completely different ideas about his two identities. That’s why he strolls around Gotham City dressed as Batman in broad daylight and goes to baseball games as Batman and books a flight to the Caribbean in his Batman identity.
The Haneyverse has Sgt. Rock, Wildcat, Plastic Man, the Spectre and whoever else it needs. It has a Catwoman who specializes in international espionage. This Catwoman has a sister named Felicity who died during an adventure with the Swamp Thing.
The Haneyverse Wildcat was a heavyweight champion who retired and then lost all his money trying to establish an inner-city gym for ghetto kids. He was barely getting by when Bruce Wayne II found him in a flophouse and recruited him to coach the US boxing team for the Youth Games in Vienna. This Ted Grant later became the spokesman for a chemical company and, still later, owned a Caribbean island where he ran an exclusive resort for the very wealthy.
There are several stories where our Haneyverse Batman explicitly crosses over into other dimensions and meets other versions of himself, or he meets someone (like the Huntress in #184) who has crossed over to find him. The answer to this is very simple. The Haneyverse has its own Hanryverse-2! Just look at TBATB #182, where Batman goes to the other world and runs into Batwoman. In the DC universe we knew in the 1970s, Batwoman was not an Earth-2 character! But apparently in the Haneyverse, she’s in all the Haneyverses!
I think I’ve just about worn out all my thoughts on the Haneyverse and I will soon be returning to short reviews of specific issues of TBATB.
Next: The Brave and the Bold #112.
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Post by Hoosier X on Jun 21, 2023 22:35:34 GMT -5
The Brave and the Bold #112
Batman and Mister Miracle
“The Impossible Escape”
Writer: Bob Haney
Artist: Jim Aparo
This one ... it’s not one of my favorites. It’s a 100-Page Super-Spectacular with the first Batman/Mister Miracle team-up and some reprints. Usually, I love the 100-page comics that DC published in the 1970s. I bought a few of them at used-book stores later in the 1970s, and I remember books like TBATB #116, Batman #257 and Detective Comics #443. Those were some great comics!
But, wow, I would probably not have such fond memories of the Super-Specs if TBATB #112 had been among the first ones I collected.
In the lead story, Batman runs into Mister Miracle and Barda and Oberon, who are practicing (in secret) a new series of dramatic escapes for Scott Free’s comeback. Barda and Oberon disappear after a few panels, and we don’t see them again.
Mister Miracle and Batman end up in Egypt in a previously undiscovered ancient pharaoh tomb and there’s an evil archaeologist lady and a weird cult and some aliens. Mister Miracle and Batman put their heads together to get out of a death trap. The end.
The art’s great! I should probably skim through it again to double-check my summary and look at the Aparo art.
I’ve never been such a big fan of Mister Miracle. Well, that’s not quite true because I read the original series (in reprint collections from the library) over the last few years, and I really like the original Kirby series.
But without that Kirby link, without the Apokolips connection, without Funky Flashman, I just don’t find Mister Miracle to be very interesting.
And where’s Big Barda? A little more Barda would have helped this story A LOT!
There’s three reprinted stories, and all of them are from past issues of The Brave and the Bold. And ... they’re OK, I guess. Just not very inspiring. Not the kind of thing that would compel me to read this comic over and over like some of the other Super-Specs.
Except I do like the Silent Knight. He’s grown on me over the years. Nice art by Irv Novick. The story was written by Robert Kanigher, and it’s the only story in the issue not written by Bob Haney. The evil Sir Oswald challenges the Silent Knight to face three dooms in the forest, and the Knight bravely rides and meets every contest, including a trap to expose his secret identity. But the Knight outwits Sir Oswald and the Knight’s secret identity is safe!
Then there’s a team-up between Aquaman and Hawkman from TBATB #51, the second team-up in the series, and I get the idea they were still working out some of the wrinkles. I read this a few years ago when I was reading the earliest TBATB team-ups online, and I thought it quite wretched. This time around, I don’t dislike it nearly as much. It’s OK. It’s about an Atlantean named Tyros who has been exiled from Atlantis and he finds some artifacts, including one that turns him into a giant, winged frog. He also has mental control over sea creatures and uses that to attack Atlantis. Hawkman and Hawkgirl show up to help out, and Tyros has another device that gives him control over birds. He also turns Hawkgirl into a harpy and she attacks Hawkman. They figure it out somehow.
Finally, there’s the Batman/Green Lantern team-up from TBATB #59. This is Batman very first team-up in TBATB! Batman and Green Lantern team up to face the challenge of the Time Commander. The original comic has a cover by Gil Kane and the interior art is by Ramona Fradon, so it’s all very nice to look at. This is another one I’ve read before. It’s only been a week or so since I read it (for the second time) and I don’t remember what happens. But I do have fond memories of the Ramona Fradon art.
Next: A much more enjoyable comic, The Brave and the Bold #116.
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Post by Hoosier X on Jun 21, 2023 23:27:34 GMT -5
I just looked up Ramona Fradon. She is still alive at the age of 96!
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Post by MDG on Jun 22, 2023 10:03:53 GMT -5
I just looked up Ramona Fradon. She is still alive at the age of 96! Joe Staton recently posted a photo of himself and his wife at dinner with Ms Fradon, along with Walt and Louise Simonson, Terry Austin, and Todd Dezago. (It's on his FB page--not sure is this link'll work.)
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Post by Hoosier X on Jun 22, 2023 22:26:17 GMT -5
The Brave and the Bold #116
Batman and The Spectre
“Grasp of the Killer Cult”
Writer: Bob Haney
Artist: Jim Aparo
This!
This is more like it!
TBATB #116 is one of the earliest 100-Page Super-Spectaculars that taught me that 100-page comics are AWESOME! I think it was either this or Batman #257 that was the first 100-Page Super-Spectacular that I ever bought. I got both of them at a used-book store where my dad traded his old used mystery novels for new used mystery novels. The place had a small room in the back where all the walls were lined with magazine racks and they were filled with comics! Each comic was priced two for a quarter, except for annuals and other giant-sized comics, which were 25 cents each.
And I certainly remember that TBATB #116 looked like it must be the best comic ever made! 100 pages! Batman ... and the Spectre! I knew about the Spectre from reading the giant-size reprint of All-Star Comics #3 I had seen at somebody’s house at a birthday party. The Spectre story is the best thing in All-Star #3! Oom is pretty scary! I’ve never liked any regular Spectre series because it just can’t live up to how terrifying is Oom!
That illustration of the idol of Kali crushing Batman while the Spectre glides to his rescue was enough to get me to buy the book. But there’s also the Teen Titans, another team-up (Batman, Wonder Woman and Batgirl) and the Silent Knight. I probably bought a stack of comics that day (they were only 12 1/2 cents each) but the only thing I remember is The Brave and the Bold #116.
And it delivers! The spirit of Kali has taken over the bodies of some army construction guys who bulldozed a thuggee cemetery in India during World War II. And now these possessed soldiers are strangling random people and offering the victims to Kali. It’s more than a little disturbing to see so many innocent people killed just to satisfy a bloodthirsty deity. And the murderers are blameless because they are possessed! They don’t remember committing the crimes.
It takes a while to figure out what is going on but eventually Batman is captured when infiltrating the cult and the Spectre saves him by animating the statue of Kali and telling the possessed soldiers that she needs no more victims and they should stop killing people. Then she rides away on a spectral tiger that appeared out of nowhere.
Wow! More than enough blood and guts for me, even when I was 12! But it drives home the idea that the Spectre is a serious character! The stakes are high! Scoff at your own peril!
Aparo’s art always made TBATB worth a look, and this is one of the stories where Haney really comes through with a story worthy of Aparo. Haney pulls it off a lot of the time ... but not always!
And then ... the reprints!
I’m not such a big fan of the first few years of The Teen Titans but I occasionally read one I like. A little 1960s Teen Titans goes a long way. This issue reprints “The Dimensional Caper” from Teen Titans #16. It seems that some inter-dimensional aliens are trying to take over a high school, but only one kid has seen these aliens and everybody is treating him like he’s crazy! (It reminds me a bit of the 1998 film The Faculty.) The Teen Titans show up and try to figure out what’s going on. One think I like about the Teen Titans is that Wonder Girl is the muscle! It was very rare in the super-hero comics of the 1960s to have a girl knocking down doors and rushing into battle to throw the first punch. She’s so little! And she has that ponytail, yet she jumps up to punch a hole in the wall or throw a truck at a weird monster. She cracks me up!
So, yeah, a better-than-average Teen Titans story, written by Bob Haney with great Nick Cardy art.
And then The Brave and the Bold #78, which is still my favorite TBATB story after 45 years of reading TBATB. This is the team-up with Batman, Wonder Woman and Batgirl where the villain Copperhead is terrorizing the city with a crime wave and he’s to clever for the police or the costumed heroes. So Batman has a plan to make Copperhead overconfident and careless; Wonder Woman and Batgirl will pretend to be in love with Batman and this will bring Copperhead out into the open because he thinks the heroes are too distracted to thwart his crimes. But ... it backfires when Batgirl and Wonder Woman really do fall in love with Batman! Oh dear! What a mess!
This one was also written by Bob Haney! With art by Bob Brown! I’ve had my own copy of TBATB #78 for about 15 years. I read this one a lot!
The Silent Knight is also pretty cool. One of the great things about the 100-Page Super-Spectaculars was all the stories reaching way back into DC’s past to show new readers stuff like the Viking Prince, Eclipso, the Black Pirate, Star Hawkins, Ibis, Alias the Spider, Quicksilver, just whatever was available in the inventory. The Silent Knight story was written by Robert Kanigher and drawn by Irv Novick and it’s more exciting adventures for young Brian as he dons the identity of the Silent Knight to foil the scheming of the evil Sir Oswald.
Yeah. Now THAT’S a dang comic book!
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Post by Hoosier X on Jun 24, 2023 13:28:55 GMT -5
The Brave and the Bold #118
Batman and Wildcat, co-starring the Joker
“May the Best Man Win Die!”
Writer: Bob Haney
Artist: Jim Aparo
I had not read this before a few weeks ago. It’s now one of my favorites. As a matter of fact, this run (from about #105 to #130) seems to me to be the high point of the series. The Aparo art is great and Haney seems to be confident with his craziest concepts and very much in control of his tendency to go a little too far. There’s still a lot of TBATB that I’ve never read so I might change my mind in the future. But at this point, most of my favorite issues are right here.
This story’s so crazy!
It starts in Sparta Prison in (I presume) upstate New York. A convict named Dubcek is being held in solitary. He’s a former associate of the Joker, see. His former boss is on the loose again, and the authorities are hoping they can get him to rat out the Clown Prince of Crime. The Joker is concerned that Dubcek is going to crack and he starts making plans to get rid of him.
Meanwhile, retired heavyweight champ Ted Grant has agreed to participate in an exhibition boxing match at the prison. The warden thinks the convicts would enjoy a really good match, so he lets Dubcek out of solitary to fight Grant. It seems that Dubcek is a former boxer who almost beat Grant for the heavyweight title long ago, and he still feels that Grant got lucky. (This (and similar plot points in some of the other Wildcat stories in TBATB) indicate that this version of Wildcat has quite a history on Earth-1 (or whatever alternate Earth this is), making an Earth-2 origin more and more unlikely.)
It’s a tough fight, but Ted Grant prevails! Dubcek continues to grumble that Grant just got lucky.
A few days later, a rare and deadly tropical disease is ravaging the prison population, including Dubcek. Batman and the authorities figure out that the Joker paid someone to infect Dubcek’s water bucket during the fight, and the disease has spread through the prison.
But luckily, there’s a scientist in Gotham City who has been studying the disease and he has a dog named Spot whose blood is full of anti-bodies. The police provide an armored truck to transport Spot to the prison, with Wildcat (riding on his Cat-O-Cycle) and Batman following behind to thwart any attempts the Joker might make to abduct the dog.
This is where the fun begins! Spot is a cute little pooch, probably about fifteen pounds, white with a black ring around one eye and a spot on his back. I guess he’s some kind of terrier mix. On the Joker’s first try at stopping the delivery, Spot escapes! And so there’s several pages where Batman, Wildcat and the Joker are trying to find the dog while Spot is just running around in Gotham City, enjoying dog adventures. It’s so great! This little sequence elevates this issue from being a great TBATB story to being one of my top three favorites.
The Joker finds the dog first! And he forces Wildcat and Batman into the boxing ring to fight for the life of Spot! The combatants are wearing cesti, spiked Roman boxing gloves! Oh dear! It’s very brutal! And not at all out-of-character for the 1970s Joker. And one of his henchmen is clutching Spot and holding a gun to his head!! Geez Louise!! I can hardly stand it!
Batman and Wildcat beat each other senseless, and while the Joker is gloating, Spot bites his wrist! This makes the Joker VERY ANGRY and he orders his henchman to get rid of the dog NOW! So the henchman goes out to a nearby pier with the intention of drowning Spot in the harbor with a rope tied around his neck and the other end of the rope tied to a rock. Just awful. Bob Haney is not flinching even the slightest bit in establishing how awful the Joker is.
Batman raises his head and tells the Joker that he has the disease now. Spot’s saliva is teeming with germs, you see. The Joker jumps in the harbor to save Spot, but he’s forgotten he can’t swim! (Which is ridiculous! But whatever.) Batman rescues the Joker and Spot as Wildcat takes care of the Joker’s henchmen.
With Spot rescued, he is transported to the prison and all the convicts are saved! Hoo-ray!
The End
If THAT doesn’t make you want to read this as soon as you can get your hands on it, I don’t even understand why you read comics.
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Post by Hoosier X on Jun 24, 2023 21:06:35 GMT -5
The Brave and the Bold #122
Batman and Swamp Thing
“The Hour is the Beast”
Writer: Bob Haney
Artist: Bob Haney
Swamp Thing appeared in TBATB twice. This is the first one and I think it’s much better than the second one several years later. I’ve not read very much 1970s Swamp Thing, so I can’t really judge this story based on how true it is to the 1970s Swamp Thing series. But I like it a lot. It’s certainly a worthy addition to “look at the crazy bananashenanigans going down in Gotham City!” genre.
Batman travels across town to see the latest exhibition in Gotham City ... noted huckster and showman B.B. Riggs has Swamp Thing secured to a board and is charging admission! He’s going to be rich! Batman and Swamp Thing had met in Swamp Thing #7 so Batman knows that Swampy is not a mindless creature but he can’t persuade Riggs to give up his meal ticket.
Meanwhile, the leader of a secret U.S. military operation finds out that Swamp Thing is in Gotham City and he sends Storm Unit Alpha to go get him! (I assume this is from the regular Swamp Thing series. Sort of like DC’s answer to General Ross and his Hulkbusters.)
Also meanwhile, a government plane crashes in a storm and releases powerful bio-spores into Gotham City’s water supply. The next morning, fast-growing plants are taking over the city, knocking over buildings, blocking traffic.
The angry Gothamites think Swamp Thing is doing it! So instead of being nice and letting him go so he’ll stop, they go to kill him! Batman saves him and persuades him to help him figure out how to stop the plants.
It’s all very exciting! Swamp Thing is rather reluctant to save the city because of the crapweasels that brought him to Gotham, exhibited him, jeered at him and then tried to kill him! The hostile plants are destroying the city! Storm Unit Alpha is trying to capture Swamp Thing! (They are also trying to cover up the fact that the hostile plant growth is the government’s fault and that their plan to fight it is actually making things worse!) B.B. Riggs is trying to get his exhibit back!
But things work out in the end.
This came out over the first summer (1975) when I started buying a few comics regularly, and I kind of wish I had picked it up back then. Maybe I would have been more of a Swamp Thing fan if I had read it in 1975.
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