Kamandi, the Last Boy on Earth #29 (1975)

Kamandi, the Last Boy on Earth #29 (May, 1975)

"Mighty One!"

Writer, Artist & Editor - Jack Kirby

Inker & Letterer - D. Bruce Berry

Idea Suggester - Steve Sherman

Cover Price: $0.25

I had absolutely no idea I owned this issue.  I love little surprises like this... Was flipping through one of my DC bins for Kamandi stuffs, as Reggie and I are taking the Cosmic Treadmill all the way out to the Great Disaster this week for our segment on the Weird Science DC Comics Podcast (that's Episode 91 for fellow time-travelers).  Came across this iconic cover, and knew I wanted to discuss it here on the humble blog.  My copy, sadly, looks as though it was used as a coffee filter (or worse)... but we can make this work!

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We open looking over Kamandi and Ben Boxer's shoulders... in the distance we see what appears to be... not a bird, nor a plane... but a man flying!  Before we move on we check in on the Tablet of Revelation which tells the story of the new Arctic-Atlantic continent.  Lucky for us it does so using "Comic Strip Terms".  We learn that this new continent was formed in the wake of the Great Disaster.  The world split and fire spewed from its core.  A man they refer to as "Mighty One" sprang into action and capped the flames with tons upon tons of rock.  It is also said that the Mighty One died for his efforts.  Oh, by the way... the Mighty One wears a cape and an "S" on his chest.

Suddenly the twosome are taken by surprise by a troop of Ape Men.  The elder Ape takes one look at Ben... in his wacky "don't cause a nuclear meltdown" costume and believes that the Mighty One has finally returned!  He's all "Huh?", but Kamandi urges him not to be so quick to say anything.  Great advice, kid!  Moments later Ben gets clobbered by an Ape Man named Zuma.

The two tussle for a bit, despite the pleas for them to stop.  Kamandi doesn't want his buddy too banged up, and the Ape Men believe Ben to be the reincarnated Superman Mighty One.  Once the fracas dissipates, Kamandi asks the elder for some details on thi Mighty One... like, for instance... did he wear an "S" symbol on his costume...  The elder is both surprised and pleased to hear such a question, and escorts the two humans to the three-stage "demonstration course".  The first part of the course is... get this, a slingshot.  It sends prospective Super-Ape-Men into the air to see if they can fly.  Wow!  So that's what our fellas saw during the open...

They watch a demonstration, which ends about as well as you'd imagine.  Zuma is still being an ass, and challenges Ben to go for a ride.  Kamandi, not being able to keep his mouth shut insists that Ben can fly without the aid of a catapult!  In order to demonstrate this, he has Ben push his Cyclo-Heart patch and go full fission.  So, to demonstrate his flight acumen... he changes his body to look like it's made of steel.  Wha?  Okey dokey... if it's good enough for the Ape Men... it's good enough for me.  One task down, two to go.

The next task is a demonstration of strength.  Inside a stone arena stands... or sits, I guess... a gigantic boulder which they call the, heh, Daily Planet.  Whosoever can move this rock, yadda yadda yadda.  Zuma's up first... and the poor goof can't get the job done.

When it's Ben's turn, it appears as though he can't move the boulder either.  So he changes up his plan and uses his dense steel foot to crumble the ground beneath him a bit to put the boulder off-balance... which in turn makes it move.  Ben's not too shy about cheating, as he announces it straight away.  This dude is pretty funny.

At this point, the Ape Men have seen enough to believe Ben Boxer is the reincarnated Mighty One.  Zuma, however, is still being a jerk.  He insists upon subjecting him to the final task... being faster than a speeding bullet!

Kamandi thinks this is a great idea, and I'm spit-balling here, but seems to really believe that somehow the Mighty One will come back because of this... it's weird, he says he's "worth all risk".  Suddenly the gatling gun starts blasting away... Ben pushes Kamandi out of the way just in the nick of time.  When the smoke clears Ben lay there unharmed by bullets... which makes the Ape Men think he'd avoided them... rather than them bouncing off his steel skin.

The elder Ape Man is completely convinced now, and Ben unfissions to his flesh and blood form.  They are led to the vault of the super-suit.  It should come as no surprise that Zuma is still a massive tool... and as such, he rushes in pushing our human pals to the side so that he may take the suit himself.  This is where we get our first look at the Mighty One's familiar duds.

Zuma and Kamandi wrestle over Superman's costume... while the others just stand around, I guess.  Kamandi hurls a stone at Zuma causing him to drop the suit.  As he recovers he tugs steps on Superman's cape... which ya just don't do... I think there's a song about it or something.  Well Kamandi won't stand for that so he yanks the cape causing Zuma to fall... into a lava pit.  Sheez man, that's hardcore!

After straight-up murdering an Ape Man, Kamandi goes running into Ben's waiting arms to sob.  Ben takes the costume and hands it back to the elder Ape Man for safekeeping, as he knows one day the true Superman will return.

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Well, this one came out of nowhere... what a fun read!

I just love it when series' tie into one another... having Kamandi as part of the DC Comics canon is really cool.  I'm not sure if this was the first indication of this world being the actual DC Universe post-apocalypse... but, I couldn't imagine anything being more striking than actually finding Superman's costume.

I really dug the trials the Ape-men had to undertake in order to prove they were in fact, Superman reincarnated.  Such a silly concept, but it totally works.  "Leaping Tall Buildings" "Faster than a Speeding Bullet"... how cool is all that?  The reference to the Daily Planet for the test of strength was a nice touch as well.

This issue tells us much about the Ape-People.  First, they believe in reincarnation.  I'm not sure how or why an ape-person would come up with that... but it's a cool piece to the Kamandi puzzle.

It was pretty humorous how Kamandi kept getting Ben deeper and deeper into this asinine competition.  I'm not sure what his motivation for doing so is... just bragging about his buddy's powers?  Trying to make the Ape-Man Zuma look foolish?  Dunno... maybe Kamandi's just a little jerk.  Hell, he gets Ben out of testing his flight prowess, so I guess he's not all bad.

Definitely had more fun with this than I thought I would.  For whatever reason the entire Kamandi concept never really gripped me, but this was really quite good.  If you're on the fence about the character, give'm a look... I'm glad I did!

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Batman #412 (1987)

Batman #412 (October, 1987)

"The Sound of Silence"

Writer - Max Allan Collins

Penciller - Dave Cockrum

Inker - Don Heck

Letterer - Agustin Mas

Colorist - Adrienne Roy

Editor - Denny O'Neil

Cover Price: $0.75

Back to the 80's with a little bit of post-Crisis post-Year One Batman.  This issue stood out to me, first because I thought this Mime character was a new incarnation of my ol' favorite Magpie.  Sadly, no... this is not her.

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It's Sunday morning and after a long night patrolling the streets of Gotham, Batman and Robin settle in for their weekly ritual of listening to the bells of St. Martin's Cathedral... however, on this morning there is no gong!  Batman informs his young sidekick that there's still work to be done tonight... er, morning.  They pop into the Cathedral and meet with a priest in the bell tower.  Robin drops down to see what's wrong with the bell and comes to find that "somebody copped the clapper!".

The dynamic duo take their leave, only to see the Bat-signal hazily hanging in the morning sky.  They head off to meet with Commissioner Gordon... who tells them about a string of church bell vandalism!  Am I watching the Adam West show here... how weird is that?  

We shift scenes to later in the evening.  A mime is performing in the street... like the middle of the street.  It appears as though she's doing the "robot" and is doing quite well for herself if her tip-hat is any indication.  For a minute here, I feared she had some sort of Mime-Control powers... har har.

Ahem, anyhoo... like I said, she's performing in the middle of a busy street... and as such, traffic is rather backed up at the moment.  This draws the attention of Batman and Robin who are on their, previously quiet, patrol.  A cabbie pulls up to the Mime and starts givin' her the business.  So she straight up shoots him!  Bad ass.  You'd never guess this was the fella who wrote another one of my 80's faves, Wild Dog, right?

Batman and Robin swing into the scene, and the former gives chase to our Ms. Mime while the latter ensures the cabbie gets proper medical attention.  Batman does his best Neal-Adams-drawing-Batman pose while booking into the park.  It's not long before he catches up with his face-painted target, and she submissively gives up.  She puts on her frowny face and sits down in the dirt... and, get this... Batman shows her mercy.  Bad move, Bats... this broad's packin' 10K volts!

This next scene is just too much.  The cabbie, who (somehow) only suffered a shoulder wound is brought into the police station to look at a line-up... of clowns... and clown-alikes.  We shift into Jim Gordon's office, and see Batman lounging on the couch... with his legs crossed.  How awesome is that?

The next day we watch as Bruce Wayne heads to the offices of Vue magazine where one Vicki Vale works.  He tells her that he's considering running some theater... Mime theater!  To do so, he needs to get the skinny on the somewhat famous lady-mime Camilla Cameo, who Vale had recently done a series of articles on.

Bruce gets all learnt up and shares his newfound knowledge with his young ward... and us!  Ya see, Ms. Cameo's father was Oscar Ortin, the "fireworks king".  She "rebelled" by devoting her life to quieter things, such as ballet... and mime.  This was all well and good until the "political climate" changed and less money went to the arts.  

Batman concludes that the Mime's next target will be a noisy rock 'n roll show featuring a band who is named Blister Twister (gross) and looks a lot like KISS.  They are apparently a heavy metal Simon and Garfunkel cover band... ay yai yai.  Anyhoo... The Mime is there.

The Mime cuts the power to the stage, and then runs about zapping the geeks in the band with her "juice" hand.  The crowd all thinks this is part of the show... but they ain't impressed.  After all, Alice Cooper is bloodier.

Finally Batman swings in.  Knowing she's outta luck, she does the whole frowny-face thing again.  Batman's learned his lesson... once shocked, twice shy.

The Mime grabs a nearby guitar and wields it like an... ax... get it?  Luckily Robin is nearby to throw the power switch back to the "on" position causing a raucous amount of feedback to bleed from the guitar.  Now the crowd is into it!  C'mon, ya call dat music?

Shortly, the Twisted Blister... Blister Twister... whoever they are resume their horrific set.  The Mime is led away in handcuffs... and we get the piece de resistance when an officer informs her that she has "the right to remain silent" wonk wonk wonkkkk...

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This was such an odd time for Batman.  I mean, here we are just months after Frank Miller shook things up with Year One... and we get a markedly lighter Batman and Robin story here.  Like, Batman smiles... more than once!  That's weird, right?

Maybe this was an inventory story that meant to see print much earlier.  Jason Todd isn't nearly as big'a tool as he would be in the march to his death... instead he comes across not unlike a young Dick Grayson.  He speaks with alliteration and just sounds goofy.  Not a bad goofy... just goofy.

We hear about the Mime's career going south when the "political climate changed".  This is 1987... seven years into the Reagan presidency... which I'm guessing is what he's alluding to... wouldn't this have happened much earlier?  Not sure... I could be speaking out of my ass here... just really feels like this should have occurred pre-Crisis.

The premise here is that there's a mime girl who wanted everything to be silent... because, get this, her father worked in the noisy fireworks industry.  Yup, this is all to get back at daddy... almost fitting, such a silly motivation for this silly story.  I do dig the character design for the Mime... It's rather striking in that late 80's post-punk sort of way.

While on the subject... really enjoyed Dave Cockrum on art here.  I must subconsciously associate him with X-Men, and X-Men only that I forget how much work he'd done for DC.  

A fun issue, and a novel look at the lighter side of Batman.  I really enjoyed my time with this one, and would be interesting in checking out more from this era.

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Impulse #29 (1997)

Impulse #29 (September, 1997)

"Conflict Resolutions"

Writer - William Messner-Loebs

Penciller - Craig Rousseau

Inker - Barbara Kaalsberg

Letterer - Chris Eliopoulos

Colorist - Tom McCraw

Assistant Editor - Jason Hernandez-Rosenblatt

Editor - Paul Kupperberg

Cover Price: $1.75

Over these past several months I've reviewed a good bunch of DC Comics... as such, the room in which I keep my longboxes currently looks as though it was hit by a tornado.  It's almost to the point where I can't fit the entirety of my body in there... and I'm not that huge'a dude.  I try to fit in a few minutes a day where I begin undertaking the ever-growing endeavor of "putting crap away".

I said all of that so I may say this... I wish my library room was cleaner a few months back when Reggie and I were discussing the Comics Code Authority (for five-weeks straight!) on our Weird Comics History Podcast... because I definitely would have reviewed this book then!  Not that it has much anything to do the Code, Kefauver, or Wertham... but, it does have a rather striking cover, no?

Well, today I put in my 5-10 minutes of tidy time, and came across this one.  Figure better late than never... it's always a good time with Impulse... right?

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We open with Bart Allen's history teacher Mr. Snodgrass giving a lecture on something related to the Revolutionary War... I like that the word balloon drags out each and every word, as though it's taking several seconds to say.  I dig that because, hell... we've all been there... but also, ya gotta figure this is how the fastest boy on Earth would receive a boring lecture.  Veeeeerrrrrry sllllloooow.

As he pontificates, Bart's thoughts wander to a recent argument he had with his guardian, Max Mercury over entering the MegaDemon video game contest.  Max feels it would be unethical for Bart to compete against fellow gamers who happen to not be gifted with super speed.  His flashback is interrupted by Snodgrass, who asks Bart to elaborate on the conflict between Benjamin Franklin and his natural son.  Taken aback, Bart suggests the root of the conflict was Ben not letting his boy play MegaDemon!  This does not go over well with Snoddy.

We shift scenes to the Mercury home where he is struggling to repair the television set.  His newfound daughter, Helen enters and begins lecturing Max on how he dealt with poor Bart.  The chat becomes contentious, and Helen winds up walking out after making a passive-aggressive comment.  Max sits and stews for a bit, however is soon interrupted by the daily mail call.  Among the envelopes, one stands out... and appears to shock our silver-haired speedster.

We rejoin Bart as he's walking home from school with his probably-gonna-be love interest Carol, and douchey pal Preston.  Due to his outburst in class, Bart's gotta deliver some bad news to Max... there's another "attitude conference" on the horizon.  As they chat, a... latex truck from, and I'm not kidding... Vandalay Industries goes careening by, driving directly toward a tree.

Carol grabs Preston by the face so Bart can get into his Impulse duds... so, I guess she already knows... and he runs off to stop the truck.  He stands before it and waves, trying to create wind to bring the rig to a stop... and either he does, or the driver hits the brakes at just the right time.  A goon in a ski mask hops out and aims his gun at our boy.

Suddenly three more goons appear from the truck... all packing heat.  They begin just rat-at-atting away in Impulse's general direction.  This is when Impulse works best... in the split second before the bullets make contact he is able to logically plan his next few steps... and consider all the potential alternatives.  He decides that if he wants to keep everybody safe, he must catch every single bullet... and then throw them deep into the ground.

This turns out to be not his finest idea... everyone's still alive, so I guess it wasn't his worst one either.  Carol yells out to distract the goons, and almost gets blown away for her trouble.  Preston dives to push her out of the way.  Impulse sees that his friends are endangered, and he gets pretty ticked off.  He beats down all the goons, including their Joe Dirt-looking driver.  Turns out they were toxic waste dumpers posing as a potential George Costanza employer.

As the dust clears, Bart Allen returns to his friends claiming to have called the police.  We see that Preston's arm was grazed by a bullet... and he just won't shut up about having been shot.  He's quite proud... as I guess one would be.  Bart's not impressed, however... all he can think of is just how close his friends were to being killed real good.

The police arrive and Preston and Carol remain to answer some questions.  Bart splits off and heads home, all the while hoping that maybe somehow Max won't be in when he gets there.  As luck would have it... Max ain't there!  Helen says it's as though he disappeared... but to where?  We are... [to be continued...]

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It's been a long while since I read an issue of Impulse.  This is one of those series I look back on fondly... from a time in DC Comics history I really enjoyed.  It's also one of those series I dreaded revisiting, because rose-colored glasses and all that.  This (along with Superboy and Robin) came when I was in my late-teens myself, and, while I wouldn't say it/they were my favorite... I did always look forward to reading it/them.  Now that I'm in my *groan* late-30's... I was afraid I may not dig these as much.

Well...

It's definitely a sillier book... and the art... man... I remember loving this style of art when I was a kid.  I still think it fits the tone of the series, and the character... but, I gotta say... I don't think it aged all that well.  Maybe my tastes changed... or maybe it just really drives home that this is a late-90's book... and it feels ever so dated.  If I had to guess, I'd say Rousseau is either working in a manga style... or a Humberto Ramos style.  Ramos, if I'm remembering correctly was the original artist on this title when it launched with Mark Waid on writing chores.  If Rousseau's doing his best Ramos impression, well... fair play then... this is very much in his style.

Keeping with the aesthetics for a bit... I love that Bart thinks in pictures.  This was something they had managed to keep up quite well during this period, even seeping into other titles like Young Justice.  That's actually one of the few things I remembered from this, and it still makes me smile when I see it more often than not.

The story is decent.  I like how Bart is looked at like he's a goof-off when in his civvies, but when he's in costume he actually forces himself to think logically... to plan things out.  Here, he had to figure out his best course of action while catching bullets.  That's not something one would expect from that dopey kid in class.  He also acts rather selflessly... which is cool.  

I remember the ongoing Max Mercury plot going on for quite awhile.  It wasn't bad or anything, it just felt very slow... which is probably appropriate given this book doesn't carry the title Max Mercury.  I do really like how the speedsters kind of took care of their own during this time period.  Throughout this series the Garricks, the Quicks, and Max Mercury all play fairly sizable roles.  Almost makes me homesick for this era.  I miss how much so many of DC's books felt like "families" back then.

While I can't say this is the best thing you'll read in a given day, I think I can safely say it won't be the worst.  Definitely worth a flip through, like so many of DC's late-90's offerings.

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