I skipped a few issues of The Incredible Hulk because if it doesn't involve a super-villain (and I mean a real one, not just some one-shot alien invader), I ain't got time for that. So you can imagine my delight when I came upon a two-part struggle with the Sandman starting with issue #113. He's still wearing the outfit the Wizard gave him from his Frightful Four days which also apparently gave him a massive vocabulary boost:
First: REVENGE! (tm!)
Second, why is he talking like an evil scientist? He never talks like this. And it keeps going:
And Sandy's verbal skills have escalated to the point where he is able to manipulate the Hulk by nothing more than fast-talking him:
Granted, it's not the toughest thing in the world to confuse the Hulk, but still.
Anyway, he talks and thinks like Dr. Doom through the whole issue:
Now we go to part 2 in the next issue:
First: REVENGE! (tm!)
Second: I note that the creative team on this issue is exactly the same as the previous issue. But notice the drop in proper grammar:
Followed up by some racial name-calling:
And one more time with the racism because Asians are still fair game in comics during the Silver Age:
Why the sudden personality shift? I have no idea. I also noticed that Sandman is wearing the suit that enables him to mix various chemicals with his sand and doesn't use a single one while the Hulk is beating the sand out of Sandman's shorts. Not a great showing here, but it's better than an alien.
I was wondering how I could "make" every party....
Wow! Thanks, comics! People will love my swinging, rocking, exciting hootenannies!
Fun fact: "Hootenannies" is in the Google dictionary.
See you tomorrow!
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4 comments:
Hmm, maybe Stan had a self-imposed limit of one "grandiose villain-speak" character per issue? Or maybe it was just an example of Stan's frequent memory lapses?
I'm with George. Between writing the two issues someone pointed out that Sandy didn't talk that way and Stan quickly switched back, hoping no one would notice. Unfortunately someone did.
There was a television show called HOOTENANNY. I won't look it up because it is snowing out and reading about a show that was on when I was a kid is even more depressing. Hell, knowing that HEE HAW! was on ten times longer than the other show depresses me, too.
Adam: "As you can see, judge, my client is mentally unfit because of his incessant babblings about old-timey, banjo-licking television shows that had jokes so simple-minded even the prosecution could write them!
Judge (Judy): Oy! Why didn't I take that job with CNN?
I remember reading in FF#61 that the Sandman got a personality change when he designed a new costume for himself and "took a refresher in science". His confidence improved as did his vocabulary, but I can't explain this shift in personality from this issue to the next. Nice blog!
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