Quiet, You Blithering Boob!

Ah, the American depiction of Britain . . .

Back in 1983, in the pages of Justice League Of America #210, the bad guys came a'calling to the shores of dear old Blighty bringing with them threats of death and destruction and some truly, truly terrible dialogue.

The story itself was not one of Gerry Conway's best: The Atom discovers Earth is running out of Element X which will cause untold disaster across the planet as fires won't light, rain won't fall, and the world will, as you can see from the cover, die screaming. Ready to take advantage of all this are a band of aliens called the Treasurers who, being the scheming capitalists that they are, offer to replenish the supply of Element X for a small fee.

And what better way of announcing your arrival than by crashing a bloody great space ship into Big Ben, years before Dr Who did it?

Actually, the Treasurers seem spoiled for choice as there appear to be not one but two Big Bens in that picture.

As dreadful as the story is, I couldn't help but laugh at the even worse dialogue that Conway places in the mouths of the Londoners.

First, for some reason only known to Conway, he has the character of Andy Capp appear in an issue of Justice League! Andy Capp! and not once, but twice as he's on the next page as well, accompanied by his long suffering wife Flo.

The bowler hatted gent - because everyone in London wears a bowler - comes out with "This is hardly cricket!" and then mentions that "the Yanks" have "dropped one on the moon" This is 1983! Fourteen years after Neil Armstrong walked on the moon! Surely the surprise of that event must have worn off by now?!

Once the ship opens its doors and the Treasurers come out, someone in the crowd exclaims that they're riding "some sort of flashlight beam!"

Gerry, they're called torches over here, not flashlights, okay?

Somehow the bank clerk overheard the conversation in the street asking the Treasurers "if you aren't Yanks - then who are you?" proving that 1980's Londoners, in the grip of Yuppie fever, may not have had worthy dialogue but they could hear like nothing else!

As if building to some sort of cliche crescendo, Conway's next lines just get better and better. First another clerk warns the first that it "Won't do to lose the old stiff, upper lip, what?"

But that's not the best - this second clerk is hushed with the immortal line, "Quiet, you blithering boob!"

Marvelous, simply marvelous. I intend to use the phrase as often as I possible can from now on.

More Notes Than You Could Possibly Imagine

Just finished, and published, notes on Countdown issues #51 to #27 inclusive on The Annotated Final Crisis site.

With a bit of luck and an uninterrupted weekend, I hope to get notes on Countdown To Final Crisis issues #26 to this week's, #6, done as well.

And then there's the other Countdown tie-ins that need to be noted before Final Crisis #1 comes out in less than two months . . .

Why did I leave it so late, can anyone tell me?

** Edit ** Didn't see much point in a whole new post just to say that I've managed to get the notes up to and including Countdown To Final Crisis #6 out as well.

The Martian Heat Ray

For once I had another post already planned - images scanned in and ready to go, rapier wit style observations (kinda) primed and waiting, poking gentle fun at the quirky little scenes I had found in an old copy of Justice League of America (I promise I'll start looking at other titles any time soon) when something else turned up in my feed reader.

I've mentioned before that I enjoy Salvation Run and last week's issue #5 was no different. All different kinds of crap hit the fan as the bad guys started battling each other in earnest and the League's favourite Martian Manhunter was caught in the middle of it. Having posed as Blockbuster in order to gain intelligence about what was happening to the villains, J'onn J'onnz has his cover blown by the self serving Catwoman. It's no surprise that the bad guys stop beating each other up and instead beat the crap out of J'onn.

What I obviously missed, though, was J'onn killing Metallo! In the heat of battle, I just figured he'd caused him some nasty damage but no, it's confirmed here on Matthew Sturges's blog. Check out the note for page 15.

Ouch, that's gotta hurt.

Who'd Like A Cocktail? #17

I had a hard time choosing this week's Cocktail post (which I'm endeavouring to make a little more regular than they have been of late.)

Green Lantern Corps #22 seemed little more than a vague attempt to give Boodikka a background; Countdown To Final Crisis #7 was confusing to say the least, and not just because the heroes ended up on an Earth other than their own; Green Arrow And Black Canary #6 sported the gorgeous artwork of Cliff Chiang which, if I'm honest, is fast becoming the only reason I'm reading it; and JLA Classified #54 brought the series to a somewhat limping end.

Meanwhile, Countdown To Mystery #6, Lord Havok And The Extremists #5 and Salvation Run #5 were all in the running for the post and Booster Gold #7 almost pipped it but it was Suicide Squad #7 that really nailed it for me this week.

As I mentioned before, John Ostrander's writing on this series - once the somewhat laboured return of Rick Flag was out of the way - has been spot on and with the Squad in action and with just a single issue left, this is easily one of the best mini-series out there.

It's the turn of the bad guys again to steal the spot light as The General betrays the rest of the Squad with his fellow traitors at his command.

Not only can this issue be seen as a lesson in how to become a turncoat after laying some very careful plans, but it also reveals the sound someone's head makes when it is literally squeezed off their shoulders.

General Eiling's plans don't all go according to plan, though, as Plastique rejects his call to betray the Squad and instead informs Bronze Tiger of his intentions, just as another of Eiling's lackeys - Cliff Carmichael - takes control of Chemo, resulting in the death of Windfall. Carmichael himself, though, is quickly dispatched, leaving Chemo running wild.

With the Squad divided, it isn't long before the two sides are pitched against each other, fighting in the rubble as they wait to find out whether Flag and Deadshot have managed to find and kill the board.

That, in itself, may not be the easiest thing due to Deadshot having been partially blinded in one eye and having to deal with Marauder who, under Eiling's orders, is protecting the board.

Unlike some of the more recent events in - among other series - Countdown To Final Crisis - the deaths that take place in Suicide Squad seem much more believable. Ostrander isn't killing characters for the sake of it or to make a point or to try and create an event. These characters are dying because the story demands they do, and while it's a shame to see even the bad guys die, I can at least accept those deaths within the context of the story.

There's only one more issue to go and it's looking to be a corker but please, DC, give John Ostrander a monthly title again.

The League That Never Was

While hunting through my old copies of Who's Who, trying to track down the identity of a character in the hardback edition of Infinite Crisis, I came across this picture of the Justice League in Who's Who Update '87 #3.

With the relaunch of the title - after the less than brilliant Legends crossover - most of the old guard were swept away, not to mention the new guard that had recently replaced them in the first place.

By the time this issue saw print (cover date is Oct '87) most of the characters shown weren't even members of the League any more; hell, Captain Atom and the Creeper weren't even members at the time, Steel was literally in pieces and comatose and Vibe and the Flash were dead!

Given the lead in time on comics, I can't help wondering if this was put together almost as a wish list. Maybe it was drawn (by the excellent Kevin Maguire and Terry Austin) before the League's membership had been finalised . . . ?

In all likelihood, this was done simply for the two page spread in Who Who's Update '87 #3 and nothing more which is a shame. I for one would loved to have seen Vibe and Captain Marvel on the same team.

Dancing In Superhero Comics: Outlawed!

It's the summer of 1980. Paul McCartney and Wings, followed by Billy Joel, top the charts in the States; Sister Sledge and the Eurythmics do the same in the UK; the punk era has exploded some years before and has largely been replaced by the upcoming New Wave Of British Heavy Metal, at least in the UK, though there are the beginnings of the New Romantics starting to swan around as well.

Firestorm has just joined the Justice League of America, sponsored for membership by none other than Superman himself and the League's satellite era was fast approaching its height.

With all this in mind, how does the two-part story that introduces Firestorm - which ran in Justice League Of America #179 and #180 - to the League begin?

By taking us to the disco, baby!

That's right - the nightmarish dance craze of the 1970's lives on in "New York city's hottest new disco." A new disco in 1980? Had no-one told Gerry Conway that disco was dead on its arse by 1980?

Apparently not as we're introduced to Rosco Remington in his high collar, purple suit, shirt open to the navel and - of course - medallions, in full foot swinging, butt shaking glory.

The late 70's and early 80's were a different time, obviously. Can you imagine Geoff Johns, Bill Willingham or Grant Morrison starting a story in a disco?

Actually, Grant Morrison's a maybe on that one . . .

Anyhow, the disco setting is merely laying the groundwork for what may be one of the League's strangest foes, a woman who prowls the discos of New York looking for young men to bewitch and steal away for her own nefarious purposes.

Trouble is, this time she's picked on Rosco, the brother of a friend of Ronnie Raymond (who is, of course, one half of Firestorm) I know what you're thinking - I mean what are the odds that she's going to pick someone who vaguely knows someone who happens to be a superhero?

When Ronnie hears about Rosco going missing, he's understandably concerned unlike his friend, Cliff Carmichael who seems convinced that Rosco's packed in the disco dancing and taking up fox hunting.

Rosco's brother - who is inexplicably wearing a bow tie - knows he's wrong though as "dancin' is Rosco's life!"

It might be worth mentioning that Carmichael, the boorish foil of Ronnie's college years, would later go on to be The Thinker, a full blown supervillain who would battle Firestorm time and again.

If only he'd been as interested in disco as Rosco was, things might have been very different . . .

The gang head down to the disco and find someone who saw Rosco leave with the villain of the piece - the beautiful model Sabrina Sultress, also known as . . . the Satin Satan! They decide to visit her at her penthouse in Charon Building (get the reference, folks?) and see if they can find Rosco. After all, his brother's convinced that something's wrong: "Rosco - - stopped dancing - - for a girl? Uh-uh, no way, not Rosco!"

Yeah, like any teenage boy would stop dancing for a model who wanted to take them back to her penthouse . . .

Within moments, Firestorm's appeared and got himself snared by the Satin Satan but manages to hit the emergency League communicator which is how the League get involved with a disco dancing sorceress/model in the second part of the tale.

Following the emergency signal, the League crash into the Satin Satan's penthouse and, after trashing the place while battling a magical demon left to protect it, Green Arrow stumbles across a portfolio and recognises the penthouse's owner.

No sooner has Green Arrow realised who they're up against than Batman remembers her nickname: "They call her the Satin Satan."

There follows another trip to a disco but this one is a roller-disco called Hell On Wheels which seems appropriate on more than one level.

As a side note, I was tempted to scan that picture in but it seems there's only so much disco my PC can handle.

Within this hell, the League battles the Satin Satan's minions - disco dancers that she had turned into animated mannequins. Realising that the model is a sorceress, it's largely up to Zatanna to battle her, freeing the captured Firestorm who, in turn, transforms the mannequins back into the mustachioed, flared collar and cuffs wearing dancers that they are.

The final showdown between Zatanna and the Satin Satan reveals that the model has apparently been possessed by Sataroth, daughter of Satanni and once Zatanna removes this evil spirit, Sabrina Sultress returns, explaining that it was the demon who drove her to commit the crimes.

So everything wraps up fairly neatly and Firestorm's first case with the League is a success.

But wait - Gerry Conway obviously likes his villain and thinks the Satin Satan is too good to waste as the last panel shows:

Has the story truly ended after all . . . ?



Yes, thankfully - the Satin Satan is never heard from again.

Who'd Like A Cocktail? #16

No hesitation in picking this week's Cocktail - two gorillas fighting on the cover, one beating the other with the disembodied brain of the other's lover? What's not to like?

Booster Gold #0 was a Zero Hour tie-in (fourteen years after the mini-series finished! And people moaned about Last Son and Who Is Wonder Woman? taking a while to complete!) and was a treat though not as good as the series has been; Suicide Squad #6 showed once more why the DCU needs John Ostrander writing a monthly title again; everything began to go pear-shaped in Countdown To Final Crisis #11 for our heroes; and Boodikka's retconned back story in Green Lantern Corps #21 was something of a scene setter and didn't really do much. There were a couple of other titles I picked up, including Green Arrow And Black Canary #5 with its cleavage-laden flashbacks but it was easily Salvation Run #4 that won out this week.

Despite the emphasis on the gorilla fighting in the first line, there was more to this issue that giant simians beating the crap out of each other.

Martian Manhunter's presence on the prison planet has been discovered by Catwoman and his cover identity of Blockbuster appears to have aroused the suspicions of Lady Vic; members of Luthor's team quarrel and are calmed down by the man himself who promises Deadshot and Bane "an even million apiece when we get back home"; meanwhile Joker's group has its own frictions with Bolt demanding to be fed and Kid Karnevil saving Joker's life so that he can kill him at some point and skin him alive; and Vandal Savage takes four ladies and finds the Safe Zone where he intends to build paradise.

That said, it is the gorilla battle that takes centre stage in this issue with Monsieur Mallah approaching Joker's group under a truce to privately discuss with Grodd the idea of them ruling both groups of villains. Rejecting his idea, Grodd insults Mallah leading to a fight during which Grodd beats Mallah half to death with the Brain's jar, killing the pair of them in the same attack.

Mallah gets his shots in (literally) before the end, using a pistol to shoot Grodd in the chest several times. Wounded, Grodd slumps to the ground on the edge of the cliff where the Joker finds him, in pain and in need of help.

It's no surprise that, with a kick, the Joker sends him plummeting over the edge. You'd think, by now, people (and apes) would learn that the white skinned fella in the purple suit can't be trusted.

The chances of Grodd having died are - to my mind - minimal. It's something of an unwritten rule that if you don't see the body then there's always a chance they'll come back and with three issues left to go, I doubt this is the last we've seen of the "proud child of Gorilla City!"

I really like Matthew Sturges's writing on this series - he's taken over from Bill Willingham seamlessly and with the ape-fight (have I mentioned there are gorillas fighting each other?) Salvation Run has reached new heights. Maybe Ostrander isn't the only writing who needs an ongoing monthly in the DCU?