Flash (vol.5) #13 (February, 2017)
"Date Night"
Writer - Joshua Williamson
Art - Neil Googe
Colors - Ivan Plascencia
Letters - Steve Wands
Assistant Editors - Amedeo Turturro & Diego Lopez
Editor - Brian Cunningham
Cover Price: $2.99
I don't usually talk "numbers" here... because, I dunno... it's kinda tacky, innit?
I'll break that rule today though.
Despite our little span of Christmas comics coverage being some of my favorite times writing this blog, it doesn't really do all that well in the ol' "views" department.
Add to that, anytime I cover a non-Waid Flash book... numbers also dip, for whatever reason. Not sure what it is about the Flash, but the numbers don't lie. Folks don't seem to wanna read about him... or read what I have to say about him. Not sure why that is... but, it's certainly a trend.
So, for the even-smaller handful of you reading, I hope you enjoy the Seventh Day of Christmas on Infinite Earths!
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It's Christmas Eve, and Kid Flash is taking care of business in Central City (not Keystone City, right?). He's "on the job" tonight in order to keep all potential distractions away from Barry and Iris, who are finally on an official date. They're quite serious about things going right this time around... as they enter the restaurant they promise not to let anything interfere with their evening... not news, not work, not the Flash.
Back on the streets, Wallace is doing the normal "street level" superhero gig... saving a woman from having her purse snatched and all that. During this he provides a bit of a monologue to talk about how difficult it's been for Iris and Barry. It's clear to anyone that they're really into each other, but interruptions never fail to keep them apart. Speaking of interruptions, Kid Flash comes across... Tar Pit, who is in the middle of robbing a toy store!
Back in the restaurant, Barry and Iris have a... well-meaning, but still contentious chat about all the other women that Barry has been involved with since Flashpoint. He's a regular Brand New Day Peter Parker, I tells ya! Hell, have you ever seen Carlie Cooper and Patty Spivot in the same place?! Anyhoo, the crux of this discussion is that Barry was able to find time for his other relationships... but not for Iris.
Back to Wallace... he approaches Tar Pit, and even swipes his goodie bag... only to find that it's rather hot (as you might imagine). Tar Pit reveals that he's not there to steal any toys... just the money (go figure!). What's more, he needs the money. Well, I guess we oughta let him go then. Anyhoo, much to his own surprise, the baddie manages to tag Kid Flash with a hunk of hot slag.
As Tar Pit lumbers away, Wallace cools himself off in the snow. He catches up with the baddie, and decides to run circles around him in order to whip up some snow. Tar Pit pleads with the kid that he doesn't know the whole story of why he had to rob the place.
Back to the restaurant... and hoo boy, Barry and Iris are having one heckuva hot date. Realizing they don't have all that much to talk about, or want to talk about, Iris breaks her own ground rules and starts talking about work.
Outside, Tar Pit reveals that he only robbed the toy store in order to pay off some goons who are holding his niece and nephew for ransom. Ya see, his late-brother was kind of a jerk, and racked up some pretty big debts before passing away. The folks he owes are looking to take this out on the children. Wallace think about how his own father is a villain... and how he can relate to the "sins of the father" and what-not. He decides to help Tar Pit save the kids... but assures him when all's said and done, Tar Pit will be going back to Iron Heights.
Before we know it, Kid Flash rescues Tar Pit's niece and nephew... and drops the kidnappers off at the Police Station. That's that!
We rejoin Barry and Iris as they head back to her place. Iris comes clean about not fully committing to their relationship. She's afraid that if it doesn't work out, she'll lose Barry as a friend. He assures her that's not possible. They enter her house just as Wallace is preparing them a couple'a mugs of hot cocoa... he buzzes off to let them have the rest of their evening.
We get a bit of an Animal House montage as we draw to the end. Wally heads over to the local kitchen to lend a hand... Tar Pit, back in Iron Heights, is visited by family... and Barry and Iris make s'more small talk.
We wrap up with Captain Cold rendezvousing with some dirtbag in the desert. Cold has paid this goof to provide him with some plans... when, dude decides he might wanna raise the price. Cold complies exactly the way you'd expect him to!
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A pretty fun, if a bit breezy, issue!
One of the things I miss most about comics in the 80's and 90's is that, every so often, they'd take a break and deliver a "down time" or "quiet" issue. It would usually come on the heels of a big event or crossover, but they were great... they let everybody (inside the book and out) catch their breath before moving on to the next thing.
In the age of decompression and writing for the trade, we kinda lost the luxury of having a one-off every now and again... so, when we get an issue like this, it's really quite special!
Let's talk Wally/Wallace. Most of my Wally-experience comes from his appearances in Teen Titans... where he is probably the worst part of the book. He's just such a wingey, whiny, milquetoast pain in the butt... I cringe every time he shows up on panel. He's always complaining, quitting the team, or threatening to quit the team. Just not a pleasant character. Here though? I like him!
Sure, the rescuing Tar Pit's niece and nephew got solved a bit quick... but, really... we didn't need to see much more of it, did we? It was probably the right decision to just jam through that scene the way they did. I do wonder why Tar Pit was making such a to-do about robbing the store... you'd figure he'd at least try and be low-key about it.
Over to Barry and Iris. I thought their date was pretty well done. I mean, I'm against them "dating" to begin with... in my head, they're still married... but, if ya gotta have 'em date, this was as good an awkward "first (real) date" as any.
I dig Iris' fear that a romantic entanglement might hurt their actual friendship. That's a natural fear and definitely something to keep in mind. Barry's optimism that there's nothing to worry about is pretty refreshing too.
The uncomfortable-bordering-on-contentious dinner discussion they shared felt calculated... but in a good way. We can tell that there's a lot Iris wants to say, but in choosing her words the way she did... didn't quite "get it all out". It's like she wants to gauge Barry's responses before she lets herself dig in deeper... both in questioning and the overall relationship.
I appreciate Barry's relationships being called to the fore. I really wasn't joking when I compared him to Brand New Day Peter Parker... that was my initial take when I read the first post-Flashpoint issue... even down to his "safe" nerdyish love interest.
Overall... a really good issue, with a nice Holiday backdrop. Neil Googe probably wouldn't be my first choice as a Flash artist (now, if they did an Impulse book, he'd be a natural fit!), but I gotta admit, I was pleased to see it wasn't DiGiandomenico. This is an issue well worth checking out. This issue is available digitally (at full cover price? Really? Okay.).
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Batman and the Outsiders #31 (March, 1986)
"The Truth About Looker, Part 4: Pawn of the World Below"
Writer/Editor - Mike W. Barr
Artist - Alan Davis
Letters - John Workman
Colors - Adrienne Roy
Cover Price: $0.75
Now, we've been covering Christmas comics for three years at this point... and I feel like during every go-round, we get an issue of Outsiders! It's surprising for a property with so few issues (relative to DC's legacy books) to have so many Christmas issues!
I mean, the I feel like the Teen Titans are still living off The TT's Swingin' Christmas Carol! for a half-century whereas the Outsiders, for a time, were havin' one a year!
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We open, and it's Christmastime in Gotham City. A pair of lovers might be forced to celebrate the Holiday without their mates... first, Greg Briggs, the husband of Emily... second, Sapphire Stagg-Mason, the wife of Metamorpho. Turns out they, and the rest of the Outsiders, are currently in the down below... in the kingdom of Abyssia. Batman, Black Lightning, and Katana are being held captive... while Geo-Force, Halo, and Metamopho are under the control of the Princess (who is one of the most Alan Davis-y looking characters you're liable to see).
Mousy Emily Briggs is also there... and way out in space, Haley's Comet is nearly ready to make it's once-every-seventy-something-years pass of Earth. I remember that being a hyooge deal back when I was in the second grade.
The Princess of Abyssia demands a Priest to "transfigure" Mrs. Briggs... this turns her into Looker!
The with-it Outsiders are taken aback by this. What's worse, Looker proceeds over to Princess Tamira's throne, and kneels before her. The Priest announces that Looker is of the same blood as Abyssia's original ruler, Loron.
Emily is stood before a full-length mirror, where she gets her first look at her new bod. She is captivated, and protests when they go to take the mirror away. Tamira plies her with a goblet full of a concoction she calls "Obedience". Sounds like the name of one'a those Calvin Klein fragrances.
Our attention now turns to Tamira's brother, the Zack Morris-esque Prince of Abyssia... who is about to be put to death. When asked if he has any last words, he tells Emily that she is a "Looker"... which, appears to have triggered a post-hypnotic suggestion of sorts. Looker uses her eye beams to roast Princess Tamira!
The rebels rise up, and amid the distraction, Black Lightning attempts to burn off his bindings. Unfortunately, Geo-Force is there to perform a little noggin knocker with Jeff and Batman. The rebels are commanded to kneel... and a few look to the heroes, just waiting for the right time to go back on the offense.
Prince Mardo and Looker make out for a bit, with the former promising to make the latter his queen. He then commands her to, get this... crush Princess Tamira under a stone statue in her own likeness... and she does! The Princess gets smooshed!
Looker's next order of business... blasting the Outsiders! When Batman and Company come to, they are outside in the snow. Mardo feels it important that they see what's to come. Looker commands Haley's Comet to, not pass the Earth... but crash into it!
Ya see, Mardo's plan... is a pretty smart one! The way he sees it, Haley's Comet will smash into the Earth, busting through the atmosphere and stirring up a torrent of dust which will block out the Sun. Those not killed by the impact, will die off quickly, as without the Sun, the plants will die, and without plants, there'll be no more oxygen. The Abyssians will wait out the Earth's recovery (they are apparently quite long-lived) and take the planet for themselves. So, in his words, Mardo is creating a Nuclear Winter without the radiation! We shift over to an observatory... and the Comet's shift in trajectory has not gone unnoticed.
Batman turns to the rebels and asks for a hand. At first they're hesitant, but ultimately come around. Unfortunately, Looker sees it coming and neutralizes the attempt. Batman pleads with her that she's about to murder billions of people. She only smiles. Katana asks her to try and remember her husband, Greg Briggs. Still smiling, she says "no".
Mardo takes Looker by the hand, removes her wedding ring from her finger... and crushes it! This is what it takes to shock her back to her senses! She blasts the Prince, and vows to be a pawn no longer!
Prince Mardo threatens to kill the Outsiders, but before he can do much of anything, Emily both frees those captive and brings the rest back to their senses!
A battle rages, and Prince Mardo sidles up to Looker and goes to stab her in the back. Unfortunately for him, Katana is in the same room, and she strikes first!
As the dust settles, Looker releases Haley's Comet from her control and it returns to its natural trajectory.
The Abyssians all look to, well, Looker for leadership... which she relinquishes. She hands the power over to the people, which I'm sure won't come back to bite her.
The Outsiders head home. On the flight, Emily calls her husband to let him know she's okay. He notices that she sounds a little different... but she assures him that she's fine, and they plan a place to meet. Back in Gotham, Rex and Sapphire are reunited.
We wrap up with Greg Briggs meeting his wife in a suite at the Hotel Lancaster. After initially thinking he'd gotten the wrong room, the Briggs' start goin' at it! Merry Christmas, Greg.
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Not much of a Christmas issue, but a good one regardless!
I love the inclusion of Haley's Comet. I'd wager that it was a big deal in my six-year old life for maybe 2-3 days... I honestly can't even remember if I saw it... or if it was even visible, but in looking back, it feels like I talked about the Comet for months!
Wanna talk about a scene that kinda shocked me. I'm surprised they had Looker actually crush Princess Tamira under the statue! I mean, that feels like a point of no return, doesn't it? I get that she was under Mardo's control, but still... seems a bit extreme, though perhaps necessary.
Actually, what shocked me the most about this issue was probably the fact that it involved a race of "underworlders" and it didn't bore me to tears! These kind of stories very rarely engage me... and I usually just "blur" through em in order to get to the good stuff. This issue actually worked for me though!
I'd say it's worth a look (no pun intended). We've already covered Part 1 of The Truth About Looker here on the blog (over two years ago!)... we'll eventually get to the middle two chapters. This one is available digitally.
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Captain Atom #13 (March, 1988)
"We Three Kings..."
Writer - Cary Bates
Co-Plotter - Greg Weisman
Pencils - Pat Broderick
Inks - Bob Smith
Letters - Duncan Andrews
Colors - Nansi Houlihan
Editor - Denny O'Neil
Cover Price: $0.75
Today we're going to visit Nathaniel Atom as he faces a truly dangerous concept... spending Christmas all by his lonesome!
Let's keep the poor guy company, shall we?
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It's Christmas Eve, and we open with Nate tossing his United States Air Force identification card (with his Cameron Scott alias) into the drink, symbolizing how he'd just quit working for the organization. He reflects on the position he'd recently been put in where he was coerced to endorse Major Force. Force was a fella who underwent the same sorta splody-origin as Captain Atom, and was eventually expected to be his successor. Turns out he wasn't nearly as stable as our man Atom, however. This is a good and bad thing... good, as in, Nate can use this information to slip out of his subservience to General Eiling. Bad, as in, hey we've got a new atomic villain.
While Nate burns his clothes, we shift scenes over to General Wade Eiling, who is up in the mountains getting ready to celebrate Christmas with his father, and step-children. His step-children, if you'll recall, are Nathaniel Adam's biological children. Wade married Nate's wife following the Captain Atom Project. He stands by the fireplace, lost with his thoughts, when his father offers him a penny for 'em.
Back to Nate... he's sitting along in his apartment, running recent events through his mind. He has no family, no friends, no job... and worst yet, it's Christmas! Who wantsta be alone during the Holidays? Well, at least he doesn't have to deal with Eiling anymore... well, not counting the whole "he raised my kids" thing.
We jump over to a nearby phone booth, where we meet a man named Chester King. He's calling his wife to let her know he'll be running late... again. He has something he has to do for his boss, Mr. Wiley. You might think that with a name like "wiley", nothing good will come of this... and you'd be right! Chester has been tasked with burning down a condemned hotel!
It's cool though, with the Christmas bonus Wiley is willing to cut, the King family will be able to take a trip to the Bahamas! So giddy at the prospect, Chester hands over a wad of cash to a beggar.
Back up the mountain, the Eiling men chat, while Nate's kids have a snowball fight. Papa Eiling notes that his son has changed... he's always been a "business first" type'a guy, but now it's even worse. As he expresses his concern, Wade cuts him off to take a phone call.
Back in D.C., Nate aimlessly wanders the streets. He thinks to himself how he's not sure he belongs in this world. Having lost two-decades, he's a man out of time and place... and without being bossed around by Eiling, he's really quite lost. On his way into a bar, he hands that same beggar a quarter.
We rejoin Chester as he rigs a ramshackle building to go boom. Little does he know, however, a dozen of the neighborhood homeless has been squatting there to escape the frigid cold.
With his job completed, Chester heads into the same bar Nate's cooling his jets at, and offers to buy a round for the house. We get a whole bunch more exposition from Nate's thought-bubbles... man outta time, yadda yadda yadda.
Back with the Eilings, Papa is regaling the children with his story of the time he had a run-in with Hans von Hammer, Enemy Ace! Ya see, Papa's plane was leaking fuel... and yet, he still attempted to take Enemy Ace on. He lost the dogfight, however, Ace let him live. Rather than shoot him down, he offers a salute before parting.
Papa Eiling responded to that gesture with... a torrent of gunfire! Enemy Ace vanished in the distance, so this was a futile gesture at best. The elder Eiling tells the kids that it's taken him his entire life to understand Enemy Ace's "code of honor" in letting him live. Basically, when lives are on the line... it really doesn't matter who wins or loses. Life's not a game at that point... there's no "scorecard" when you're faced with your own mortality. Wade calls this "life lesson" a bunch of crap, and suggests Papa's gone soft... or senile.
Back in Washington, D.C., the bar patrons hear an explosion! A frantic passerby rushes in to tell them that the old hotel is all lit up. The bar empties into the street, when someone mentions all of the squatters. This is brand-new information for budding arsonist, Chester King!
Suddenly, a man... engulfed in flames, rushes from the Dixie Hotel... it's the same beggar that Chester gave money but a few hours earlier. Chester smothers the flames with his coat... but, it's clearly too late.
An onlooker suggests there's nothing anyone can do... it's best to just wait for the fire department and emergency services. Little do they know, they've got a bonafide superhero in their midst! Captain Atom takes to the crisis, all the while thinking to himself that this feels like the first time he's acted truly heroically since coming back.
Back up the mountain, the Eiling men talk s'more... and it's just as contentious as ever. It's plainly clear that Wade has little affection for his father... or at least that's the impression he's trying to give. Nate's son, Randy overhears the discussion.
Back in D.C., emergency services have arrived, and the burned beggar is pronounced dead. Chester stands there with a blank look on his face for a bit before dropping $5,000 into a Salvation Army bucket. Yeah, that about evens things up, doesn't it?
We close out with Captain Atom's heroism being celebrated at the bar... they've got him hoisted on their shoulders and everything... just like on the cover! He is approached by a woman named Eve Eden (Nightshade), who tells him they have a "mutual uncle". They decide to head out and spend the evening together. Let's hope she didn't mean "uncle" literally, eh?
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This was an interesting issue. It's not often in comics that we take a look at the loneliness the Holiday Season can bring. I guess maybe that's not something we necessarily want to think about.
We look at Nate, and... well, dude is very much alone. Being time-displaced, he no longer has a family... he doesn't have any friends, and since quitting his gig in the Air Force, he no longer has any direction.
That's one of those things you don't really think about when quitting or leaving a job. Even if it's not a dream gig, it's not the absolute worst thing in the world to have a "direction". Having worked a bunch of contract positions in my time, there have been a handful that I've hated... but, those first few days after they wrap up... eesh, talk about becoming a wandering soul. It was actually during one of those "nebulous interims" that I read through this volume of Captain Atom for the first time!
Not sure I'd suggest hitting up a bar when in that sort of state, but I ain't here to judge. Something I will say though, Nate refers to the bar as a "pub". Was that ever American slang for a bar? Seems like people use that word to sound worldlier than they are. Ehh, maybe I'm projecting.
Let's look at the Eilings for a bit. Another big part of the Holidays for many folks is facing their family dysfunction. Usually in entertainment, that's ramped up to comical levels... but here, it's pretty... I dunno, dark. We don't get a happy ending, or even a mutual understanding. Only disdain... and, while it's not terribly pleasant to read, it's refreshing that we didn't get the cliche hug and clink of eggnog mugs.
Also, I don't have much of a frame of reference for DC's War characters, but it was neat seeing Enemy Ace here. Love the effort DC made to tie their characters together. Seems the opposite is true nowadays!
Finally, there's Chester King. Dude burns down the Dixie Hotel... and in so doing, kills a bunch of homeless. Seems he learned his lesson, right? Only... there's no real comeuppance. Can't remember if King and Wiley show up again down the line... I suppose it wouldn't surprise me either way... and at the end of the day, I guess it doesn't really matter. Dude did something bad, and it facilitated Captain Atom's first (non-government mandated) outing as a superhero.
Overall, this isn't a comfortable issue... and probably not one I'd add to my normal Christmas rotation, but I did enjoy it for what it was. I'd recommend checking it out, though it will help if you have the proper context for Nate's lot in life. This issue is available digitally.
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