The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 2084: Adventure Comics #409, August 1971

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 Late Silver Age finds us in an era of Supergirl that I really love, even though quite often the stories are kind of lame. One part of these tales that tickles me is that they dress the Maid of Steel in fan-submitted costumes, occasionally, like this crazy get-up on the cover. Now, it looks a bit crazy to us, but considering the fashions of the early 70s, it's not that far a stretch. Is it utilitarian? No. But in these stories, Supergirl often seems as concerned with looking good as she is with doing good.

Though there are some times that a writer gets their hands on the character and does something interesting. I spoke about a sort of neo-gothic sensibility in some Supergirl stories at the Fan Expo a few years back, but those cool tales are definitely interspersed in this era with some cheeseball romance stuff.

However, the backup story, a reprint from 1963, tells the story of Satan Girl, who claims to be the equal and enemy of Supergirl, and who incapacitates the female-identifying members of the Legion of Super-Heroes. Who turns out to be a Red Kryptonite duplicate of Supergirl who was trying to kill her way to retaining her existence, and who fades out and recombines with Supergirl at the end of the story! Fucking dark.

I love 1970s Supergirl. She's unfailingly good, interestingly flawed, and really sexy, as Kara or Linda, really. Worth checking out for an interesting perspective on the DC universe.

More to follow.

The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 2079: Action Comics #369, November 1968

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Honestly, some really rather mediocre stories today. Superman manages to screw up an alien plan to bring peace and harmony to Earth (though the aliens don't really give anyone a choice, so it's a bit weird to begin with), and Supergirl decides to use her powers to win over a womanizing toxic male because...reasons. Honestly, the guy's a total crapsack and every woman in the story thinks he's just great. Like they know he's a player but they still want to get played? It's really no wonder that we have a culture that's as fucked up about gender dynamics as we do when you see some of the nonsense that got pumped out into peoples' formative years.

There's a weird little meta moment at the beginning of today's comic, where we get a full-page shot of 5 kids gathered around Action Comics #369, debating how Superman could possibly blunder. They never reappear, and it really is a strange moment - did they need another page filled for the issue? I suppose it creates a sense of disbelief, or reminds readers of the ways in which a story of Superman making a mistake could take place, but there's surely better ways of doing that than this Greek Chorus-esque gathering of pubescent boys ruminating on how the story might unfold.

More to follow.

The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 1927: Countdown Special: The Atom #1, February 2008

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I watched, for the first time, Batman v. Superman last night. The "Ultimate" edition.

Bear with me for a moment.

It was 3 hours long, which, even for me, is a long time to spend with superheroes. But I, to be totally honest, didn't mind it. While I was watching it, I was texting my kid, and I suggested to them that the thing about Zack Snyder films is that, to a certain extent, they just play like fan fiction. For superheroes, Mr. Snyder has a very clear vision of what he wants to see: a combination of Moore and Gibbons' Watchmen and Miller's The Dark Knight Returns. But literally. Hence fan fiction. That said, and acknowledging that that's what was going on, it was a decent enough superhero movie with some good set pieces, and Ben Affleck is fucking amazing as old Batman. I would bring him back to that role in a heartbeat.

Near the end, however, I was chatting with my housemate about why it was so panned, and why, again by the end, I had just had enough. And she suggested that, quite rightly, people are just so fucking tired of seeing angsty white dudes on the screen, working out their issues in godlike exercises of power. There's a stab at diversity, in crowd casting for certain, and in the fact that we have an Israeli woman, a Japanese woman, and a Black man in supporting roles. But the three leads, the Bat, the Boyscout, and the Reporter, are white. And angsty. Today's comic reminded me of that.

With the exception that there were no People of Colour in the comic. Okay, I lie. There's one panel, in the latter half of the comic, the part illustrated by my featured creator today, Arvell Jones. In one panel, a group shot of a bunch of telepaths' heads, there is front and center a Black man. I have to assume that Jones placed that there himself. The rest of the comic is, as Batman v. Superman is, a bunch of white dudes. And Supergirl.

Mr. Jones has had a few mentions in the blog, having illustrated a Doom Patrol story in Super-Team's predecessor publication, and having been featured in my first Black Lives Matter-related readings, with Super-Villain Team-Up, and one of the weirdest comics I've ever read.

So what to do with this comic. First things first, it's a late 2000s reprint of stories from the late 70s. I've noted a couple of times in the last few days how strange it must have been for Black artists of the Bronze age to illustrate stories in which they saw nothing of themselves. Do we have to look to the colour artists, perhaps, or whomever it was who created the colour guides for each page. Why are all the background characters white? In fact, by this point in DC continuity, there had been a Black Green Lantern for 6 years. Why not use John Stewart in the story, rather than Hal Jordan? I mean, the short answer is systemic racism. The people involved in these stories very likely aren't racists - they're people who have been brought up in a society that has racism woven into its fabric. There was a default society, and it was white, and that was simply how it was. As comrades to the Black Lives Matter movement, it's incumbent on us to recognize how that racism has manifested so that we can pull the threads, unravel the fabric, and make something new together.

More to follow.

Further Reading and Related Posts

The Atom has shown up occasionally in my 40 Years project.

Slightly more so the Green Lantern.

The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 1568: The Daring New Adventures of Supergirl #9, July 1983

We finally get a good look at Tempest's origins in this issue, and of the origin of Reactron. It's easy to forget sometimes that the Vietnam War was still very much in the consciousness of America at the time that this series was being written. Both Tempest and Reactron have their geneses in the jungles of Vietnam, Krullen (Reactron)'s violence toward civilians causing the emotional catalyst that caused Tempest's powers to manifest. Josh is often called a mutant, something that is quite rare in the DCU, and the link of emotion to his powers manifesting definitely aligns with Marvel's mutants. Reactron, it turns out, is also a mutant of sorts, though his change comes from being a witness to atomic testing in his time in the service. I find it interesting that as culture moved further and further from the first nuclear weapons, and became more accepting of them, that the consequences of those weapons shifted quite radically. Think of the depictions of atomic mutants that we see in old pre-Code horror comics. Those creatures, though perhaps superpowered, were certainly not superheroes. And the changes they underwent resemble far more what exposure to radiation would actually result in. More so, for certain, than Reactron's abilities. Does it reflect the acceptance of nuclear power as an energy source that the shift in its comic book consequences is from destruction to elevation?

Looking ahead, aside from tomorrow's slight jump back in time, we're on to more solo Cliff Steele adventures in the company of the Titans, and then we get, for the first time ever, a number one issue of Doom Patrol. Though I may give myself a break before jumping into that series. There's so much else to read!

"Oh man, if there's anythin' better'n absorbin' this much radiation, I don't think I could stand it!"

The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 1567: The Daring New Adventures of Supergirl #8, June 1983

I have somehow managed to misplace all of my old Supergirl comics. I had them up in frames for a while, and now I have no idea what's happened to them. Very odd.

The New Doom Patrol really are very mediocre. I've read a few bits and pieces of interviews with Paul Kupperberg of late, and even he acknowledges that he completely missed the point of the Doom Patrol. They were never just another superhero team, as the new DP are, but a support group that occasionally acted pretty heroically.

Today's issue is no exception. I really like Josh Clay (Tempest) in his role as team support in Morrison's Doom Patrol - here, unfortunately, he is a pretty bad stereotype, sporting many of the hallmarks of the Blaxpoitation movies that were de rigeur a few years before this comic came out. I had a similar problem with Val in the Showcase issues, in that she was little more than a cardboard cut-out Soviet defector. I have no problem with using some of these tropes, but that's not all the character should be. There is some attempt at development in the budding relationship between Josh and Val, but Josh's overtures verge on creepy (at least from a contemporary point of view), and Val seems only mildly interested in returning them.

I did realize as I was reading this issue that I made a chronological error. DC Comics Presents #52 comes before this story, and explains why Val is now bandaged like Larry Trainor was. I'll finish off this story and then jump back in time and read that one!

Another interesting thing I found out today is that in the wake of Crisis on Infinite Earths, the New DP's adventures with Supergirl are retconned to feature Power Girl instead. She shows up late in Paul Kupperberg's Doom Patrol, and represents one of the few changes to Doom Patrol history that is changed by the Crisis.

"The let's not just sit here like we was watchin' reruns of 'Star Trek'!"

The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 1566: The Daring New Adventures of Supergirl #7, May 1983

I've said it before on this very blog, I'm sure - Carmine Infantino draws a very lovely Supergirl. I'm not 100% a fan of the rest of the fashions in this book, but Supergirl's look is fantastic.

The rest of the cast wear early 80s fashions, and they're just awful. I was talking to someone the other day about how 80s fashion is making a comeback. It stuns me. I really thought the decade's fashions were terrible at the time.

Today's comic is really more of a wrap-up of a previous adventure. Supergirl tears apart an underwater base for reasons I'm unclear on, and then runs into Negative Woman at a music festival a few days later. There's really not much of the Doom Patrol in this issue, though the focus on Val Vostok got me interested in seeing where the character ended up going, as I noted a few days ago. It turns out she does indeed maintain an existence post-Doom Patrol, carrying on through some of the more espionage-oriented titles in the DCU, such things as Checkmate and Vigilante. I may or may not track all of these down, as they're not really adventures involving the Doom Patrol. For much of them I'm fairly certain Val isn't powered, and it really does seem that she escapes the vortex of strangeness that is the Doom Patrol's existence.

"That woman -- I'm getting incredibly bad vibes from her --!"

The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 1333: Supergirl (2016) #23, December 2018

Read this today. Have some thoughts, but it's too late to express them now.

But that cover is something else.

I know what it is that's been bugging me about the Rogol Zaar story in Superman. It's too soon. We've literally just spent 6 weeks with Superman, Supergirl, Bendis, and co. ramming themselves into Rogol Zaar. I don't need another 6 months of basically the same thing. I feel like this should have been, at least, a kind of mid-season mega-battle. But instead it's simply round two of Man of Steel.

I am, however, enjoying Kara's part in the Rogol Zaar story - she's investigating, getting answers. This is definitely the superior route to be following with regard to this particular villain. I think Supergirl actually supplants Superman in my rankings of these titles right now.

And that cover really is something else.

More to come... 

The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 1330: Supergirl (2016) #22, November 2018

I wish the comic within were even remotely so carefree, though there are some very good moments of Krypto "dogging" hard, and that's always nice to see.

I think Krypto may be swaying me over to the idea of dogs. I haven't been a fan for a long time, but they just seem so friendly, you know?

There's been a lot of playing with Kara's Kryptonian side of late, some acknowledgment that she would have to present qualities that came from the culture within which she was raised. It's inevitable, and happens to all of us. I teach in my Communications class the idea that we are prone to fall into the idea that the culture within which we're raised is the "correct" one, and all others are somehow less than. It's not the case, of course, but it's also sometimes hard to overcome. Kara has this problem, I think. She's still sweet, but she assumes that her status as Supergirl will grant her special privilege with the Green Lanterns. Instead they treat her like any other alien with a giant axe invading their central archive. Which is what she is. I wonder if this is some of the vaunted Kryptonian arrogance that Rogol Zaar yelled about in Man of Steel? And just how problematic is it?

The other cool thing this issue did is it seemed like we're going to get answers about Rogol Zaar, and the Circle, much sooner than I anticipated. That's kind of great. If the threat is of a truly great magnitude, it can really increase the drama of the subsequent issues. If the threat is of magnitude. Let's wait and see...

More to come...

The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 1327: Supergirl (2016) #21, October 2018

We'll take a slight departure from Mr. Bendis's Metropolis to follow the other Kryptonian into outer space. Kara does a nice job of articulating survivor's guilt here to Clark, in a way that he simply can't understand. I wonder if the Martian Manhunter has had a similar conversation with Kara as the one he has with Clark a few days ago. In fact, Kara and J'onn would have much more in common than Clark and J'onn, given that they both retain memories of the civilizations that were lost, unlike the infant Kal-El. Not to diminish Superman's trauma, but it seems that these two characters would have more in common. Perhaps that's why they're being paired to such excellent effect on the Supergirl television show.

More of the mystery of the Circle is being revealed. Information redacted from the Green Lantern files? Just who is Rogol Zaar?

More to come...

The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 1040: Wednesday Comics #12, September 23, 2009

Alright, alright, let's wrap this up!

My votes for the best three features in this series are "Metamorpho," "Supergirl," and "Hawkman." Not how I would have seen things turning out when I started the series. Each does something cool or different with the format. "Metamorpho," much like its protagonist, shifts and melts and fits into the tabloid-sized page in a number of different ways. There are traditional panel arrangements followed by a two-page table of elements-as-dialogue/maze that really pushes what one is able to do, visually at least, with this kind of space. The story was okay - clever, but not really that entertaining.

"Supergirl," on the other hand, uses a very traditional technical structure, but tells a story that is just charming. It's nicely-plotted, something interesting happens in every segment - I think what I want to say about it is that it suits the medium of its publication - the newspaper strip. It wasn't trying to be deep and philosophical. It was trying to be entertaining Saturday morning breakfast comics. And it succeeds.

I have to admit that "Hawkman" was not one of the strips I'd have said I'd enjoy - he's never been my favourite character. But in this iteration, told by Kyle Baker, he's much more interesting. Add to this that somehow in the space of these 12 pages, Baker manages to tell us two really awesome, really short, superhero stories disguised as one story. It really is pretty great.

And we're done with Wednesday Comics. Not my favourite series that I've read, but overall pretty cool.

Tomorrow. Oh, tomorrow.

We'll start with early Image stuff. Oh yes.

To be continued.

The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 1039: Wednesday Comics #11, September 16, 2009

Climax achieved! (Not that way - get yer mind out of the gutter!)

All that remains for each story is a brief moment of crisis, and then a denouement. I'll be in a better position to comment on the narratives tomorrow, I think, as I'll finally have all the pieces I need to see them fully. There are definitely strips that got it right, "it" being that feeling of the newspaper comic supplement strip, but there are others that were more 12-page comic stories published as 12 separate pages. There's a difference, I think.

One strip that I'm actually consistently entertained by, and that I've overlooked thus far, is Kyle Baker's "Hawkman." It's good, solid, adventure, full of terrorists, aliens, dinosaurs, and superheroes, and is actually a very interesting look at the superhero in crisis management - (SPOILER) the plane that Hawkman is rescuing crashes on an island populated by ferocious dinosaurs, and his harness is destroyed. And there's no help coming. We get to see what kind of a hero Hawkman actually is, I think. He's brutal, often to the point of savagery, and in that way resembles at his best that other famed comic book superhero survivalist, Wolverine.

To be continued.

The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 1038: Wednesday Comics #10, September 9, 2009

I've figured out the perfect analogy for reading Wednesday Comics. It's like when we had really slow dial-up Internet, and you'd have to wait 20 minutes for a single image to load. You saw the image in little tiny increments, which in a lot of ways took away from the image in its entirety when it loaded. Sometimes the power of a work of art is in its immediacy.

There's another problem I've encountered, and it's one that regular newspaper comics wouldn't necessarily run into. As the series was set up as a limited run, with a finite number of issues, each creative team was aware of how many pages they had, and when the story had to end. As a result, every story in this series is hitting its climax right now. It's hard to maintain that level of emotional investment for all of the stories, and this inevitably leads to a lack of emotional investment in any of them.

And yet, I still think I like the series. Perhaps its the characters they've chosen, or just the sheer size of the art. There's something quite wonderful about Wednesday Comics, even though, as a collection of stories, I just don't think it's working that well.

To be continued.

The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 1037: Wednesday Comics #9, September 2, 2009

Sort of continuing on from my post yesterday, we're seeing each story hit its high point, its climax. I teach a very simple way of understanding narrative to my classes, called "Freytag's Pyramid." It's a very basic tool for thinking through narrative, but quite effective. These newspaper strip styled comics are adhering to the pyramid quite nicely. These climactic moments are presented in a nice array of styles, from Superman's figuring out of his dilemma to the Flash's maddening skipping through time and dimensions. The climax is the highest emotional point in a story. So how is it that a story told in single pages across 12 weeks can have such a thing? Is there not something to the sense of immediacy a climax has when one is reading a novel or a short story? What if you had to read the story in chunks of predetermined length? Would that affect your enjoyment of the climax when you reached it?

I think I might be talking nonsense today. But that's fine - I've given the ol' brain a few weeks off.

To be continued.

The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 1036: Wednesday Comics #8, August 26, 2009

I've been trying to figure out why it is that I just don't have a lot to say about this series. It could be that it's because I'm blogging and reading it at a very busy time - some days, I'll admit, I just don't want to write anything about the comic I'm doing. But I feel like there's been an unusual preponderance of posts for Wednesday Comics that I haven't felt like writing.

But what I think it might actually be is the format itself. A single page of a story isn't really that much to talk about. I could perhaps go on about the art, but, if we're to be honest, the art is the side of comics that I know the least about. Narrative is kind of my jam. And while the pages are pushing their respective stories ahead, each story is so short that these page-by-page installments might actually be too short to offer much insight into their respective plots. Perhaps we need just slightly more information. This might be why Ben Caldwell's "Wonder Woman" works relatively well, despite my earlier misgivings, because it manages to include so very much on one page. There's an arc to the chunk of narrative that's presented in that strip.

Perhaps. Whatever it is, I'll finish out the series, but I'm not really getting too much out of it. I'm tempted to re-read the stories in completion to see if I appreciate it more. I'll let you know how that turns out.

To be continued.

The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 1035: Wednesday Comics #7, August 19, 2009

So let's do the back end of Wednesday Comics.

I seem to recall when I picked this up, it was purely out of excitement over Neil Gaiman and Mike Allred's collaboration on "Metamorpho." I've always been partial to the character, as he for some reason holds a similar resonance as the Doom Patrol, though I don't know that their adventures are really anything like one another. It's just an odd association, I guess. And while it is a pretty good strip, I have to say that the "Deadman" and "Superman" strips are knocking it out of the park. Particularly "Deadman." I've mentioned before, but it's got that DC Animated U look to it, but it's so much more visceral. Quite an interesting combination, and is making for excellent "newspaper" comics.

I'm kind of into the "Kamandi" strip as well - it's set up like a Prince Valiant-style comic, where the characters don't speak in speech bubbles, but in the text boxes that accompany each panel. It's not my favourite style of comics, but it works quite nicely in this pastiche of the old adventure strips.

To be continued.

The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 1024: Wednesday Comics #6, August 12, 2009

Losing my interest in this series, I'm afraid. Though the Superman story continues to be pretty great, as does the Adam Strange strip, the rest aren't really blowing my mind that much. But that's okay - I'm going to take a break for the next little while and start reading Christmas comics - if I can find any that I haven't already read for the project, that is.

I will say that the Deadman strip is actually pretty cool - it's riffing on the DC Animated style (as is Wonder Woman), and it's kind of a cool take on Boston Brand. He's one of those heroes I'm not super familiar with, but whenever he shows up in a comic, I enjoy his sarcasm. Also, should you ever get the chance to read any of Kelley Jones's work on him, do it. Jones is a treasure.

So, tomorrow we'll start with some holiday cheer. I wish I had some Hanukkah comics, or anything else that celebrated the various holidays that happen this time of year. I'm sure there must be some Yuletide ones out there. And, I'm embarrassed to admit, I still don't have all of Grant Morrison's take on the early days of Santa in Klaus. Maybe I'll treat myself to an early present.

To be continued.

The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 1023: Wednesday Comics #5, August 5, 2009

Not quite half way through the series, and I still think the Superman story is the best one. I really quite like the Wonder Woman strip as well, though I think that Ben Caldwell's decision to use tiny, tiny panels in the strip might have been a mistake. Sometimes I have trouble figuring out what's going on.

And that's all the brain I have today. To be continued.

The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 1022: Wednesday Comics #4, July 29, 2009

Hopefully you'll forgive the brief reviews this week. Not only am I sick (though getting better), but I'm also deep in marking for the end of term. It leaves me with very little brain power at the end of the day.

Wednesday Comics is a pretty great read, though. What I'm curious about is whether, when it was reprinted, the stories were collected together, or the weekly page-by-page format was kept.

To be continued.

The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 1021: Wednesday Comics #3, July 22, 2009

Apologies. Same situation as yesterday. Even typing hurts.
This comic was pretty cool. The Metamorpho and Superman features are definitely my faves.
To be continued.

The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 1020: Wednesday Comics #2, July 15, 2009

Really quite sick right now. I thought it was allergies.

I'll say, the "New Frontier" era Green Lantern (and perhaps Flash) stories in this series are excellent. And John Arcudi's take on Superman is really pretty great. The only dark spot is the Titans story, not for its content, but because it was written by disgraced former-editor Eddie Berganza.

Afraid that's all I've got for today. To be continued.