Linkage

Jacque Nodell's boyfriend checks in with a post on collecting romance comics as a teen.

1997 was a great year. I was 18 years old then, and now look back on it quite romantically. I was a traveler exploring new lands and acquiring new treasures. From Detroit to Chicago to Indianapolis, I took back with me to Lafayette, Indiana hundreds of romance books. All of which were gifted to Jacque around 2008. And though she has acquired many more hundreds over the past few years, you might say that these books were the foundation on which Sequential Crush was built.

I confess that in my collecting years, I don't think I ever bought a romance book. But it is one of the oddities of romance that it's the one storyline twist that appears in every other genre. It's no surprise to find a romantic interlude in a superhero comic, or a sci-fi mag or even Sgt. Rock. So even though I didn't buy romance comics per se, I did buy plenty of comics with romantic elements.

Superman Fan has reached the end.

Over the years, I’ve had a great time digging through old comics to come up with things to say about Superman and his world, and even more fun interacting with visitors who’ve shared their own opinions, expertise and ideas. The hard truth, however, is that I’ve just about exhausted my collection of comics to review and clippings to share, though obviously I’ve only just scratched the surface of Superman’s long career.

I've often regretted that I made the subject matter for this blog so incredibly vast, but one thing's for certain; I'm not going to run out of material anytime soon!

Commander Benson takes a long look at the second set of teamups between Green Lantern and the Flash. What I am struck with in reading those stories is how much Hal and Barry (and Iris and Carol) became friends over the course of those adventures.

Over at Chasing Amazing, Mark covers a horrifying new trend: turning old comics into trading cards.

Yes, that’s somebody taking an issue of Amazing Spider-Man #2 (please note, one of the missing issues in my quest) and cutting out a panel of the Vulture (his first appearance in a comic) to be featured on an Upper Deck trading card. In mint condition, that comic could net someone thousands of dollars. The comic featured in the video, by my humblest guestimate, is probably in Fair, maybe, MAYBE Poor condition (though I feel the cover is too complete to be considered a Poor), which would only net the reseller a few hundred dollars. According to Beckett.com, these comic book cards, dubbed Upper Deck Marvels, are already bringing bids as high as $80.

I'm not a terribly religious person, but that strikes me as downright sinful.

Brian at Comics Should Be Good covers the five goofiest moments in the first five Human Torch stories in Strange Tales. I enjoy the heck out of these five goofiest moments, because a) they're really goofy and b) Brian does them with a real love for subject matter while accepting that they were intended as throwaway entertainment for kids. Plus he absolutely nails the single silliest bit, which was the effort to make the Torch have a secret identity in those stories, even as the Fantastic Four issues made it obvious that he didn't.

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Around the Comicsphere

Comic historian Mike Madrid covers the history of female superheroes in a terrific interview at Collector's Weekly.

Batwoman was well-intentioned but Batman spent so much time telling her how incompetent she was and how fighting crime was not a woman’s job that they never developed much of a romance. She was portrayed as an inferior character that couldn’t be trusted. Batman trusted Robin, a 13-year-old boy, more than this grown woman.

Indeed, one of the main themes of Detective #249, where Robin teams up with Batwoman, is that the Boy Wonder is a much better sleuth than she.

Speaking of the fair sex, Jared at Blog Into Mystery has a post on one of the two stories in the Silver Age featuring a revolt of the girl members of the Legion of Superheroes. I touched briefly on the earlier story with the same plot here.

H at the Comic Treadmill covers four of the Silver Age Hawkman tryout issues in Brave & Bold. Excellent reading, and I heartily agree with this point:

Their three-issue tryout over, the Hawks vanished for a year of Earth-Prime time when they returned for a second three-issue stint in Brave & Bold. The first two issues had a mini-arc going with the goal of establishing a reason the Hawks would stay on Earth. The problem with it that it was the foundation of the series and Fox failed to sell it. The idea that Thanagarian police could learn from Earth methods required a smooth talking pitch by Fox and he failed to deliver. What did primitive Earth have to offer advanced Thanagarians? Apparently as shown in B&B 42’s, The Menace of the Dragonfly Raiders, Earth turned ropes into lariats, which turned out to be more effective than Stun Guns in subduing crooks mounted on dragon flies.

Indeed, assuming the Absorbascon worked as advertised, wouldn't Hawkman have learned all he needed to know about Earthling police methods without even bothering to set foot on the planet? And as H hints, he really wasn't studying police methods so much as he was studying ancient weapons.

Cartoon Snap reviews a collection of Felix the Cat comic book stories from the 1950s. As a second-grader in the early 1960s, I loved the Felix the Cat cartoons, although I recognize now that they were pretty crudely made. But the comics were very interesting and completely wild.

Bill Jourdain covers the latest release from DC's Golden Age, featuring the earliest adventures of Superboy. I am thrilled to hear that DC is finally reprinting significant material from that series, one of my favorites as you can probably guess from the way I've been covering it lately.

The Magic Whistle has a post on a rather bizarre 1960s book of one-panel gags called "My Son, the Daughter". Definitely not something that would have met with the approval of the CCA!

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Hot Links

New blog noted: Blog Into Mystery. Not entirely Silver Age, but several of the posts do relate to that era. I like his comparison of the cover to Batman #165 and a mid-1980s Flash issue; I would never have caught the similarities, but it is clearly Infantino using key elements from one of his earlier covers.

Dick Giordano's passing gets tribute from Gorilla Daze. Giordano came to DC in the late 1960s and took editorship of several titles, including Teen Titans and Aquaman, among others. Giordano was at least partly responsible for bringing some of the younger talent to DC, including Denny O'Neill, Steve Skeates, Jim Aparo and Mike Friedrich. He was a long-standing penciller and (mostly) inker as well for DC. although I confess I don't recognize his work automatically, like I can with many of the other artists.

Booksteve has more on Giordano, particularly relating to Batman:

Dick Giordano drew a unique type of comic book realism. His superhero women were not the supercute, overly busty fanboy favorites. He didn't draw girls--he drew adults. He drew women who looked like women and looked genuinely heroic. He drew city scenes that looked more like real cities than anyone since Will Eisner (with the possible exception of the late Marshall Rogers). He drew a BATMAN who was a sane grown-up who would save me if I needed saving and do so for all the right reasons. He drew MY BATMAN.

Sounds like I need to do a post on Giordano for Nothing But Batman.

Silver Age Gold features a full Jack Davis story called Betsy from Two-Fisted Tales. Brilliant sequential artwork; Davis turns a pretty dull story into a breathtaking adventure.

Jacque Nodell scores an interview with Susan Loeb, an advice columnist for Marvel's romance comics. Is it too much to hope that someday she'll actually locate Marc, on the Man's Side?

Super ITCH has the background story on some sensational Golden Age original artwork featuring Jack Kirby on Captain America. I don't want to think what that first page, with Bucky and Cap in fine form is worth; I'd guess I could almost retire on it.

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Around the Horn With Some Contributions

Superman Fan has been doing a series of posts on the Greatest Imaginary Story You've Never Seen (Part I and Part II). Actually, I have seen it; I have a coverless copy in my collection. It is a very cool story in which Jor-El and Lara escape to Earth with baby Kal-El when Lara (surprise) gets the brilliant idea of enlarging the test rocket ship with a ray she's been working on.

The rest of the story is kind of a Jor-El Ex Machina; with Superman's father solving all of the problems that his son would face in the "real" stories. Lex Luthor goes bald? Not with Papa El's magical hair restoring ray. Mxyzptlk creating constant annoyances? Jor erects a shield preventing him from entering our dimension. Kandor stuck in miniature? Jor-El rebuilds Lara's enlarging ray. Superboy in love with Lori Lemaris, the mermaid? Daddy gives her a pair of legs. But amusingly, when Superboy first encounters Kryptonite, Jor-El has a senior moment:

Yes, don't lift my son who probably weighs 150 pounds, instead drag that several-ton boulder of Kryptonite! Of course, after that he designs a Kryptonite disintegrator, so his reputation as a super-genius remains intact.

So far Osgood hasn't covered the final part of the story, but I will mention that it's another one of those endings where the inexorable nature of fate is once again highlighted.

Over at the Comic Treadmill, Mag notes the futility of Captain Boomerang attempting to send the Flash on a boomerang to the Moon; surely it would just return? What I find amusing, however, is that in each of Captain Boomerang's first three appearances, he had essentially the same deathtrap for the Flash. In Flash #117:

You can see that's not substantially different from the setting in Flash #124. Ditto with Flash #148:

Incidentally, in that last story, the Flash escapes by grabbing hold of the flag atop Mount Everest:

Bill Jourdain appeared on Comic Geek Speak to discuss the early days of DC comics (from about 1935-1947). Bill's always worth a listen due to his vast knowledge of Golden Age Comics.

The House of Cobwebs analyzes the horror that was Freddy, Charlton's attempted knock-off of Archie Comics. The post is much more entertaining and humorous than the actual Freddy Comics. I'll have to dig around and see if I can pull up an issue of that comic for a review.

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Around the Horn

Collectors Weekly has a terrific interview with Greg Theakston regarding Golden Age Comics in general. I found this quirky aside fascinating:

You also had Captain Marvel and Captain Marvel Jr., who was Elvis’ favorite comic book hero. You know the emblem with Elvis’ motto, “Taking Care of Business” with the lightning bolt? Captain Marvel Jr. had a lightning bolt on his chest, plus a little Elvis-like curl of hair in the middle of his forehead. Elvis wore the jumpsuits with the high collar; Captain Marvel Jr. had a high collar. So while Jr. may not be as widely known as Captain Marvel himself, he had a profound effect on Elvis Presley.

Well worth the read. More fascinating discussion of DC's Golden Age era at Bill Jourdain's site in a podcast with the Comic Geek Speak guys.

Out of This World posts the entire Jackie Johnson story from Our Army At War #160. You may recall that I reviewed that issue back in January.

While we're on the topic of Our Army At War, Mykal posted the entirety of Our Army At War #120, featuring a pair of excellent stories including the origins of the Ice Cream Soldier, Wild Man, and Bulldozer. But it is the other story in that issue, a one-off tale featuring the Saucy Lady that really won my heart.

All's fair in Love and War, right? Jacque Nodell recently hosted a comics chatcast on the topic of Romance Comics, while Aaron from Silver Age Gold hosted one on his favorite comics. They are scheduled again on March 15 (Aaron) and March 16 (Jacque) at 8:00 PM eastern time, and this time I promise to remember to attend Aaron's.

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Blogroll Surfing

Aaron at Silver Age Gold covers the meeting of Tomahawk and several troglodytes and points out in a very interesting aside, why the revolutionary war character should not have known that they would be called cavemen. You learn something new every day!

Jacque at Sequential Crush covers the ironic story of a gold-digger who missed her Prince Charming. Love that little "Oh!" at the end of the story.

I've added a few new blogs to the sidebar. Al Bigley (Big Glee) covers comics nostalgia, and also seems to be a big fan of the Monkees (and who isn't?). I have "Last Train To Clarksville" on my MP3 player more or less permanently.

Ian Sokoliwski, a professional comic artist, has his own blog. Check out his photos from the Central Canada Con. Lots of very attractive gals in costumes, what's not to like?

Joyville is another artist's blog, dedicated to appreciation of some of the more cartoony artists, who don't get enough recognition these days. Check out his post on Sheldon Mayer and Dizzy Dog.

Hey! I thought Dial B for Blog had disappeared, but apparently it's back on the web. Go check out the greatest comics blog that ever was, or ever will be.

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Around the Horn

Jacque at Sequential Romance scores an interview with Irene Vartanoff, one of the most prolific DC letter writers of the Silver Age, who went on to have a career in writing including comics and romance graphic (and non-graphic) novels. Irene's own homepage is here.

As a 1960s DC comic fan, I occasionally fantasized about writing great letters like Irene, but as it was I did not develop my writing skills until my college years. At some point, I should do some features on the great letter writers of that era, many of whom went on to have careers in the field. It's all part of the milieu, although I freely acknowledge that I've started my post on Alter Ego and Jerry Bails and Roy Thomas about five times and always felt like I couldn't do the topic justice.

H at The Comic Treadmill continues his long-running series on the Giant Props in Batman stories, with some wonderful Golden Age material. How can you go wrong with something like this:

Joker tries to roll the Giant Penny (not THE Giant Prop Penny, but a completely different one) to smash the door to the cashier’s office. But Batman was disguised as the Santa on the Giant Christmas Holly pie and rolls the Giant Pumpkin to deflect the Giant Penny.

I am sorry to see that the Absorbascon has joined the list of blogs calling it quits in 2009; Scipio always had interesting things to say.

Ol' Groove remembers the Demon Hunter, one of the short-lived comics from Atlas-Seaboard in the 1970s. I actually have that issue, and always felt it was one of the best values in the history of comics per actual drawing. The second page of that issue has an incredible 27 panels.

Hube at Comics of Rhodey has a nice tribute to the late George Tuska. One of the sad things about doing a nostalgia blog like this is that there's an awful lot of the creators we talk about who are passing away.

Karl at The House of Cobwebs talks about the time he scored a nice batch of Charlton Horror from the 1970s. Some very nice and horrific covers on that trove, Karl!

Christine at the Other Murdock Papers has a long, and amusing discussion of Daredevil #30-32 featuring the "Blind Daredevil". Wait a minute, wasn't DD always blind? Yeah, but not in the way he was in those issues. Recommended!

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Around the Comics 'Sphere

Bill Jourdain has two terrific podcasts up on his site. In the first, he gives the history of Crimebuster, a golden age boy hero. I confess, I did not know much about CB, but when Bill described his origin story I was blown away. And thanks to the miracle of copyrights actually expiring, you can read the origin story online by downloading the CBR file from the Golden Age Comics site. It's arguably a better origin than that of Batman, which I still rate as the gold standard. Bill also has a podcast up of his adventures at the Baltimore ComicCon, including some interesting moments with Don Rosa, the creator of the Life and Times of Scrooge McDuck. As you all know, I'm a Silver Age fan, but I heartily agree with Bill that the L&T of SMcD is among the greatest comics series ever published.

Have I mentioned lately how much I love Superman Fan's blog? Almost better than surfing over there every day is surfing over there every week and seeing all those new awesome posts. But surf over there every day and get a jump on me! I love this post on the bipolar Superman, and this one on Jimmy Olsen, movie director and this one on the Ghost of Jor-El. Great blogging!

If you haven't been checking out Jacque's posts on Marc on the Man's Side, you have missed quite some entertainment. Apparently DC hired/created this hilariously sexist advice columnist around 1971, whose general admonition to women can be summed up this way: "Be glad a man's taking you out to dinner, and don't gripe that it's McDonalds." Very entertaining!

How to Get a Job, circa 1969, and Will Eisner.

Discussion of the Comics Code Authority at Speed Force.

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Great Posts on Other Blogs

Our buddy Chris is dedicating the entire month of March to the Bat-Mite canon. Bat-Mite is one of the characters that disappeared with the New Look Batman of 1964, but he was a fairly regular character, and was introduced in the 20th anniversary issue of Batman's first appearance in Detective Comics.

While we're on the subject of Batman, go check out Building Batman, the most unique concept I have ever seen for a blog. "Bruce" is training himself in the various Batman skills, from boomerangs to lock-picking to knot-tying. If you always dreamed of being Batman, this guy is living the dream!

Sticking with the Batman theme, the Comic Treadmill has another one of his "Prop Star" posts about the giant props that Bill Finger used to feature in his Batman stories. It's an interesting and different way to look at the Silver Age Batman.

Bill Jourdain has a long and informative post on the first year of Batman. As you probably know, Batman is approaching his 70th anniversary either on April 18th (the date Detective #27 went on sale), or in May (the cover date of that issue).

Highly recommended for inside dope is Funny Book Fanatic, the blog of Dave Olbrich, the former publisher of Malibu Comics. I know, their output was minimal in the Silver Age (probably because they didn't start until 1986, the slackers), but Dave's not just interested in the modern stuff and he's got some interesting tales about the inner workings of the biz as well as trivia quizzes and the like. Hat Tip to the Groovy Agent for pointing me to Dave's blog.

Comics of Rhodey has a reminiscence of his own history with comic books.

I pretty much ceased purchases after college as marriage soon beckoned. During my second year of teaching (the early 1990s), my wife told me she wanted me to get rid of some of those boxes of comics I had lying around.

Nicholas Cage had something similar happen to him as I recall. ;)

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