Tuesday, July 20, 2010

The Superior Humor of the Inferior Five Tuesday!

Today, we finish our two-day tribute to one of the forerunners of snarky humor, the Inferior Five. Today's panels come from their last Showcase appearance (not including the 100th anniversary issue which included dang near everyone who ever appeared in the title), number 65.

Yesterday, we took a look at some not-so-subtle jabs and fun at the expense of Marvel's new (at the time) character, the Hulk. The following issue, they targeted the original X-Men:


Instead of being early examples of the evolution of mankind, this team cleverly consisted of genetic "throwbacks." They weren't the future. They were leftovers. And while having the primate-resembling Beast of the X-Men as the intellectual of the group was a clever lesson in not judging a book by its cover, this was a great jab at how it could have gone.

And here we have the spoof of the Angel:


I love how he's the favorite of the administration "because his father is very wealthy and very rich." You know Professor Xavier thought that of Warren Worthington III at one time or another.

The other X-Men got off rather lightly, but that can easily be forgiven when we get moments like these, where the Blimp finally asks the question we've been asking about the Angel for years:


Brilliant! I couldn't have done it better myself.

I'm a total fanboy for titles like the Inferior Five and Not Brand Ecch! because, just like we do here at CMNS, they acknowledge the logical inconsistencies of what takes place in comics and gives us all a chance to laugh and say "So I wasn't the only one who wondered about that!" Of course, this was back in the day when DC and Marvel were more interested in taking shots at one another's plot holes rather than their own, but funny is funny.

So here's to the Inferior Five! Off to the Character Hall of Fame with the lot of you!


Heh. These books tickle me. They really do.

See you tomorrow!

8 comments:

Anonymous said...

It's very simple, she said huffily, Angel being one of her....well, OK, I really TRIED to like him because he could fly....liked characters, he used to strap them tightly to his body, and this meant that he could get shirts and so on over them without anyone noticing. They did explain it, you know. The fact that his wings STILL stuck up over his shoulders is something we....gloss over rather a lot.....

LadyBlack

Adam Barnett said...

Yes, LadyBlack, but how did he get his costume on over those wings when they weren't strapped down? I suspect that's why they always made Hawkman shirtless....

I always liked Angel...

Britt Reid said...

"I suspect that's why they always made Hawkman shirtless...."

Hawkman's wings (in most incarnations including both Golden & Silver Age versions) are artificial.
They're usually attached to the harness he wears, and apparently he likes to go bare-chested.
(As Fred Hembeck once pointed out, the only way a Hawk-title would sell is if Shiera wore Carter's uniform...) ;-)

Getting back on-topic...
Either Angel's wings are VERRRY flexible to get thru tiny slits on the backs of his shirts or the shirts are made of (drumroll) unstable molecules!
But then, no one ever explained how Batman & Robin changed costumes while sliding down the Bat-Poles...(and the "costume-change" switch doesn't explain the physics of it!)

Adam Barnett said...

True that, Britt. I was thinking, though, artificial or not, getting a shirt over wings would be a booger.

Although Hawkman DID have a shirt on in the 90's, didn't he? I kind of liked the red outfit for about six months. I think the current version (both from a character and a costume perspective) is the best Hawkman we've had.

E. Bernhard Warg said...

Before I saw the 1966 movie and the "Instant Costume Change Lever: Up, Down," I thought there was a changing room halfway down the "Access to Batcave via Batpoles: Dick, Bruce" and they changed during the opening credits and commercial break.

Britt Reid said...

"I thought there was a changing room halfway down...and they changed during the opening credits and commercial break."

Considering they always started out the concluding episodes of the two-parters with something like "...mere seconds have passed since last we saw our heroes...", I always took it as given that time between eps or commercial breaks were pauses where everything "froze" until we came back.
Also, if the costume change occurs any time except after the opening credits, it takes less than 30 seconds to get from the study of Wayne Manor to the BatCave, too quickly to stop off on the way down the poles!
It's a mystery we mere mortals will never be privy to...

Anonymous said...

Ummmmm.....OK, they....folded up really small? He wore a special strap on pack into which he could stuff his wings and that folded them down? *sigh* This isn't working, I guess there is no explanation.

I really wanted to like him, but I met him when he seemed to be pretty arrogant (New Defenders) and very rich. I felt that a rich playboy should just pass off a pair of wings as a sort of eccentric plastic surgery, and then worrying about them under his shirts would never have come about. That and the fact that he didn't seem to be able to do a lot. At least Peregrine (The Wild cards books) had fighting claws.

LadyBlack

Unca Jeffy said...

I remember reading my big bro's "Not Brand Eccch" as a boy and thinking too, "It's great they see all the foibles I do!".

At age 8 I felt like such an insiteful insider.