Never Have I Felt So Good as I Do Now Tuesday!

Young Bruce Wayne watched his parents killed before his eyes and swore to do everything he could to keep others from becoming victims of crime. As the Batman, he works tirelessly, at his own expense, without thought of reward, sacrificing a personal life, thanklessly,


.... and, every so often he travels to another planet and gets himself declared king.

Okay, so with the Comics Code telling everyone they have to keep things squeaky clean, Batman lost some of his oomph. But even so....:


Batman speaks much better Eskimo than most super-heroes. That should count for something. Whenever Superman talks to people, he expects them to respond in perfect English. At least Batman makes an effort.

Hey! It's time for Fun with Out of Context Dialogue! (tm!):



See you tomorrow!

Keep the Sling in Your Jerkin Monday!

Whether or not Batman should have a Robin has been a hot topic of discussion among comic geeks for generations. When I started reading comics, Dick was off at college and would pop up every once in a while, but Batman was solo for the most part. Personally, I liked Robin and would pick up any appearance I might find, from the Teen Titans to his solo stories in Batman Family.

Non-comic nerdlingers may not know this, but Dick Grayson, the original Robin and the one most non-geeks think of, abandoned the Robin role in the 1980's. Since then, there have been several other Robins, ranging from annoying (Jason Todd) to quite awesome (Tim Drake). The Tim Drake incarnation of Robin enjoyed a solo Robin series that spanned 185 issues (a fifteen year run!).

Which is just my way of leading into today's post.


Kids, there's nothing wrong with drawing the sling from your jerkin, but do it in private.

I apologize. See, I really like Robin, but I just can't let that kind of thing slide. I have a responsibility here.

And now, an Uncomfortable Moment in Comics! (tm!):


There are certainly times you can understand why people looked at Batman and Robin's relationship with some questions.

But no one can deny the awesomeness of roller skates!


From a practical perspective, I would imagine that any jet propulsion unit worn on one's feet would be limited to the speed of your average golf cart or you are asking for trouble. I could be wrong.

Then it occurred to me: Someone must have tried this, and the Internet is only a click away...



Yup. It's a shame that most of us are less like Batman than we are like Wile E. Coyote. Still, I appreciate that it saved me the trouble of testing my theory.

See you tomorrow!

Escape-Proof Facepalming Friday!

One thing that I particularly enjoy about over-sized comics is the inclusion of stories that wouldn't be published on their own. World's Finest was particularly good about that by giving us Hawkman, Black Lightning, and Marvel Family stories at a time when they didn't have their own titles.

Not that even a Captain Marvel story was without its flaws:


Hmmmmm.... I'm not one to argue with a guy using the wisdom of Solomon, but I'm pretty sure all prison cells are designed to be escape-proof. I mean, what's the alternative? Dang it! I knew we should have built those cells to be escape-proof! I told you the honor system wouldn't work!

And I don't think the artist was quite that dedicated to the story, either. The Monster Society of Evil included Mr. Atom, King Kull, and Black Adam. Nerdlingers who follow DC Comics will remember that Black Adam took on dang near every hero in the DC Universe by himself a couple of years ago. So somehow, I don't think that putting the Monster Society in a cell that looks like it would have a hard time holding Otis the Town Drunk from The Andy Griffith Show was going to be that successful. Details, people, details!

Prepare yourself for a Superman-Related Facepalm! (tm!):


The fact that Superman, for even the briefest of moments, thought that this might be a natural cloud formation gives us our very first CMNS Superman-Related Facepalm!(tm!)

Break it down!:



Whee! That was fun!


Man, those Keebler Elves don't take kindly to outsiders, do they?

See you Monday!

The End of the Super Sons Thursday!

I realized this morning that I have totally left you hanging on the fate of Superman Jr. and Batman Jr. I guess I was too distracted by Nature Boy.

Anyway, you may recall that Superman Jr. and Batman Jr. were the "Super Sons" tales written by Bob "I'll Write Whatever I Dang Well Please" Haney. In July of 1975, World's Finest #231 was the last appearance of the Super Sons for a half decade, and no one seemed to notice or care.

Now remember, Bob Haney and the powers that be at the time were hardcore that the Super Son stories weren't "imaginary," meaning they were meant to be a part of the DC Universe, albeit taking place at some time in the future where people would still inexplicably wear bell-bottoms and adults would say 60's slang.

Fast forward five years to World's Finest #263. Five years have passed, and I guess someone realized that no one ever really resolved the whole Super Sons thing. Along comes the usually-talented Denny O'Neil to wrap up the loose ends. Thusly:


Okay, so the stories I read of the Super Sons were real, except they weren't, because they were part of a computer simulation. So, they weren't imaginary because they were really being made up in the DC Universe. They just never really happened, nor would they, because they were imaginary, but since they were imaginary in the "real" DC Universe, they weren't imaginary at all. Everyone got that?

DC Comics: Making Continuity Our Bitch Since 1940.

So anyway, the Super Sons escape the computer and become "real" because Superman is throwing away some radioactive waste while the computer is running the simulation. It's like running the dishwasher and the garbage disposal at the same time - it's just never a good idea.

Anyhoo, Superman and Batman round the boys up and confront them with their imaginary (but not IMAGINARY) status.


That was actually kind of slick, because in the real but not real but not imaginary because it was part of a real imaginary simulation in the DC Universe stories, the mothers of the Super Sons were never seen.

Let's say you're Denny O'Neil, and you've inherited this mess. What do you do?

Well, like the rest of us, O'Neil just had them throw themselves into a disintegration pit:


Which I found extra funny because you know that by the time he was through writing his way around the Bob Haney madness, O'Neil was resisting the urge to have Superman take a super-whiz on their ashes. We all have those moments.

Farewell, Super Sons! I have no idea what the word "imaginary" means in the DC Universe any longer. That's probably why they started using the term "Elseworlds" for stories that aren't part of the big DC Universe scheme of things.

I never had a Stretch Armstrong because the idea of just pulling on a gel-filled rubber doll didn't have a lot of entertainment value to me. Neither did these:


Do these things look even slightly fun to you? I turned up my young nerdlinger nose at these things. Yet, had they made a Plastic Man or Ralph Dibney version, I shudder to think of the lengths I would have gone to get my mitts on one.

See you tomorrow!

Now with Extra Twaddle! Wednesday!

Hey! Some of my old childhood chums have started dropping by! Make Allan and Ellen feel welcome, gang!

I'm the first to say that I learned everything I know from comics. I remember reading an editorial (I think by Dick Giordano) back in the 80's that suggested comic readers branch out. The rationale was something along the lines that if you enjoy Batman in Detective Comics you might enjoy a text on forensic science, or a reader of Captain Atom might enjoy learning more about quantum physics.

Folks, who were they kidding? There is a backlog a mile long of comics I have yet to read. If anyone thinks for one second I'm going to put down a comic and pick up a textbook, well... let's just say I appreciate the optimism, but it's not happening. I'm a middle-aged man, I'm good at my job, I take care of my wife and dogs, but I'm not reading anything I don't have to if it doesn't have pretty pictures and could possibly end up on this blog.

But I still learn stuff. I give you, "twaddle" :


This is my new favorite word. Thanks, World's Finest #260! Twaddle, twaddle, twaddle....

This girl is going to die, Superman!:


.... and, judging by the look on her face, she seems pretty okay with that. Must be one of those "emo" kids I keep hearing about.

Hey! It's Lois!


Oh, Lois.... you quit being a "girl" anything about 15 years ago. Don't test my chivalry.


Wow, Bruce! Not only did you just tell Lois she was old, but you got her to thank you for it! That's the kind of thing you can get away with when you have lots of money. I'm pretty sure Billionaire Bruce Wayne could hook her nostrils with two fingers and lead her around the room and she'd just tell him how wonderful his manicure was. Chicks are that way if they think a guy has money.

You know what else World's Finest #262 gave us? Auntie Gravity:


It took two parts of this story for Green Arrow to take down Auntie Gravity and her nephews. Two parts. With Black Canary's help.

Not that I blame Green Arrow for being psyched out. Have you ever run cross-ways with an elderly woman? No one will lay more entitlement crap on you than an elderly woman. They think you owe them anything you have, any service you can perform, or any amount of time they demand, whether you are related to them or not.

Seriously, unless you are somewhere near a cafeteria or it's time for her "stories," don't mess with an elderly woman. She will jack you up with yard work and trips to the pharmacy like it's her responsibility to the world to keep you busy. Sending you spinning off into the hemisphere is the least of your worries!

Whee! We were silly today! Twaddle, twaddle, twaddle....

Love Thy Neighbor, Unless They are Overweight Tuesday!

A few more dandies from sPat!

Why don't I like Superman? The question really is, "How can you like Superman?"


She gained a few pounds? Why, she has no right to live, much less find happiness in a relationship! You're too good to her, Clark! You really dodged a bullet there!


Maybe he didn't need his X-Ray vision to count 'em, but he certainly needed a calculator, because Superman's answer is wrong. I love it when that happens.

I guess the writers of Lois Lane thought it would be a public service to keep nerdy comic book readers (and let's face it, if you were a regular reader of Lois Lane you were a nerd among nerds) hip to the latest slang. Thusly:


Now, I'm not saying that "fileboner" wasn't a slang term. But as I did my research, I can tell you it wasn't a very popular slang term, ever. However, we now have the right to call everyone who did better than we did at school a "fileboner" to their face without fear of consequences. So, I guess there was a bit of public service there after all. Frankly, I'm not convinced comic book writers didn't just make up slang to see if any of it caught on. I'd do it.

Thanks again, sPat!

See you tomorrow!

The Slap as a Critical Plot Device Monday!

I have never run an entire story before, but courtesy of sPat, this is the most slap-centric, and therefore perhaps one of the most awesome, stories in the history of the medium from Jimmy Olsen #61:









Slaps and kangaroos.... Comics, you are too good to us.

See you tomorrow!