Hello friends and Internet travelers, and welcome to the start of a new month of Bronze Age comics! We begin September 1971 with these two books, and once again the Super Family leads off, though the stories themselves might not quite live up to that moniker. Let’s find out as we journey further Into the Bronze Age!
If you’re new to this little journey, you can check out the first post to learn what it’s all about.
- The Irish Republican Army set off a number of bombs, causing damage and injuries across Ireland
- Qatar regains complete independence from Britain
- Watergate team breaks into Daniel Ellsberg’s doctor’s office
- A baby girl and several soldier are killed in separate shooting incidents in Northern Ireland
- Alaskan 727 crashes into Chilkoot Mountain, kills 109
- British Prime Minister Edward Heath meets with Irish Prime Minister/Taoiseach Jack Lynch at Chequers in England to discuss the situation in Northern Ireland
- William Craig and Ian Paisley speak at a rally in Belfast before a crowd of approximately 20,000 people and call for the establishment of a ‘third force’ to defend ‘Ulster’
- 1,000 convicts riot & seize Attica, NY prison, leading to the deaths of 11 guards & 31 prisoners
- John Lennon releases his “Imagine” album
- Two North Ireland Loyalists are mortally injured when the bomb they were preparing exploded prematurely in Belfast
- 6 Ku Klux Klansmen arrested in connection with bombing of 10 school buses
- Momofuku Ando markets the first Cup Noodle, packaging it in a waterproof polystyrene container
- US performs nuclear tests at Nevada Test Site
- 90 Russian diplomats expelled from Britain for spying
- MP David Bleakley resigns in protest over the introduction of Internment and the lack of any new political initiatives by the Northern Ireland government
It looks like this was a tempestuous month in 1971, with the Troubles in Ireland escalating and the death-toll rising. We also see the opening moves of the Watergate scandal taking place, though these events wouldn’t come to light until later. This month also saw the infamous riot at Attica prison, which proved bloody and traumatic. This is an event that would loom large in the memory of the decade. Notably, it seems that the domestic terrorist group, The Weathermen, got involved in the action, launching a retaliatory bombing during the conflict, because there’s nothing like blowing up innocent people to accomplish your goals! We’ve also got more domestic troubles on the list, with continuing racial conflict in the form of the activities of the KKK. It’s a bleak, grim time, and that’s for sure. I imagine that the adventures of some colorful superheroes were a welcome escape for some. I know how they felt.
On top of the charts this month was Donny Osmond’s “Go Away Little Girl,” the sweet innocence of which stands in pretty stark contrast to the events of the day.
Roll Call
(You can see everything published this month HERE)
- Action Comics #404
- Adventure Comics #410
- Batman #235
- Brave and the Bold #97
- Detective Comics #415
- The Flash #209
- Forever People #4
- G.I. Combat #149
- Justice League of America #92
- New Gods #4
- Superboy #177
- Superman #242
- Superman’s Girlfriend, Lois Lane #113
- Superman’s Pal, Jimmy Olsen #141
- World’s Finest #205
Bolded entries are covered in this post, the others will be covered soon.
Action Comics #404
“Kneel to Your Conqueror, Superman!”
Writer: Cary Bates
Penciler: Curt Swan
Inker: Murphy Anderson
Editor: Murray Boltinoff
“The Specter of 3000-Moons Lake!”
Writer: Gardner Fox
Penciler: Gil Kane
Inker: Murphy Anderson
Editor: Julius Schwartz
“The Coward and the Hero”
Writer: Jack Miller
Penciler: Ramona Fradon
Inker: Ramona Fradon
Editor: Mort Weisinger
“The Day They Killed Clark Kent”
Writer: Leo Dorfman
Penciler: Curt Swan
Inker: Murphy Anderson
Editor: Murray Boltinoff
We’ve got rather exceptionally yellow cover on this month’s Action issue, and Neal Adams makes the Roman-esq figure in the center look rather like Superman, which makes the scene a tad confusing. Still, it’s a solid if unimpressive representation of the tale within, though the yellow isn’t terribly attractive. As for the story in question, it’s a fairly forgettable one, starting with Clark Kent getting an assignment to do a story on a government think tank. On the way to the coastal facility, an earthquake strikes, and Superman goes into action, shoring up the cavern underneath the building. Yet, when he arrives at the lab, instead of finding the scientists panicked, he finds that they were expecting him to arrive and save the day precisely when he did. This was all predicted by a genius named Caesar, who plugs into a massive computer and runs calculations, forming the basis for much of their research.
It turns out that this fellow, Rufus Caesar, is a major fan of the Man of Steel, and he invites the hero back to his home to view some of his awards. Once there, the Action Ace sees that the scientist has a big collection of Superman memorabilia. Apparently, the fellow is not only a fan, he idolizes the hero. Things take a turn for the creepy when Caesar has the Metropolis Marvel try on a piece of a salvaged Superman robot, only to reveal that it is a trap, which paralyzes the Kryptonian.
Plugging the helpless hero into a strange machine, Caesar begins to siphon away his powers one by one, declaring that he has admired Superman for so long that he now wants to be him. Unlike the Man of Tomorrow, this sinister scientist will use such powers to make himself the ruler of the world.
Despite his butler’s misgivings, Caesar carries on with the procedures, testing his newfound abilities as he gets them. Yet, using stolen vision powers, Caesar discovers a cable-car nearby that is in danger of falling. After trying to fly through the wall before getting invulnerability, he decides to finish the job before going to the rescue.
Super Head-Trauma!
Donning a custom-made costume, he becomes “Super Caesar” (how creative), and plugs into his machine once more. Yet, things don’t go as he planned, as Superman, who has been resisting the energy drain all this time, suddenly gives in, and the power flowing into Caesar’s body is far too much for his mortal frame to hold. In a panic, the butler reverses the device, and the powers flow back into their rightful owner, who rushes off to save the cable-car. When he returns, the Action Ace discovers that “Super Caesar” has become “Super Vegetable,” as the machine fried his brain! In a rather macabre coda, this makes for a great story for Clark Kent, and Morgan Edge is pleased by the scoop.
So, this is a rather uninspiring rehash of the ‘someone steals Superman’s powers’ bit. It’s fine and inoffensive, but it isn’t terribly compelling either. There are some interesting elements here, like the fact that the fellow’s turn towards evil springs out of his obsessive hero-worship of the Man of Steel and the butler’s reticence, but Dorfman makes little of these highlights. That’s a shame, because there is a good dramatic potential in a character who is as much a symbol as Superman dealing with the dangers of hero-worship. We do get further evidence about the deplorable state of higher education in the DC Universe. I know grad school tends to scar folks, but what must be going on at the universities in this setting where every third PhD decides they want to rule the world? Maybe I’m being too hard on them. After all, I know plenty of PhDs, and some of them are none too stable. Perhaps the real difference is that in the DCU they actually have the technology to allow them to do it! Either way, I suppose such ruminations have caused me to wander from the point. I’ll give this story an average score of 3 Minutemen.
“The Day They Killed Clark Kent”
Our backup this month is another tale of the college Clark Kent, and this one is a fun and unusual offering. The theme of this collegiate yarn? Hazing, of all things! It begins with Clark interrupting the rowdiest frat on campus hazing a kid he knows named Dave. The poor schlub is tied to a chair having his face covered in shaving cream, and Clark decides to intervene while making it look like an accident, pretending to slip on the shaving cream and smacking each of the offending frat boys in the process. It’s a funny little scene, though, I have to say, if this is the worst frat’s idea of hazing, Dave is getting off easy! I’ve seen much worse in my time.
Dave is none too thankful for the rescue, and when the “brothers” approach him, wanting to prank the mild-mannered journalism student, he agrees. Of course, privacy is nothing to Superboy, who eavesdrops on the conversation and is ready for their antics. When the boys ask him to join the group and show up for some harmless initiation ceremonies, he is prepared.
The punks put their victim in a movable platform and tell him he’s on a pirate ship (rather imaginative for frat boys, really). They throw sand in his face and hit him with a fan, but Clark uses the confusion of the prank to use a bit of super breath to wreck their frat house and make them think it was their own fan. Next, they try to make him walk the plank into a tub of water, but the Teen of Steel drives it right through the floor! Finally, they get Dave to use a cattle prod on the blindfolded boy! Now that’s definitely hazing!
Clark fakes being electrocuted by a short-circuit and stops his heart, causing the prank-happy punks to panic and leave him there, possibly dead. Planning to capture them as Superboy and let them sweat about having killed someone (!), the Campus Marvel observes Dave rally the other morons and bring them back to help their victim. Clark pretends to come to, and the little episode comes to a happy conclusion as the frat boys clean up their acts and convert their party pad into a study area to help struggling students. That’s quite a switch, but I’m wondering if these knuckleheads are really the ones you’d want tutoring you!
So, this fun little college adventure definitely has the feel of an adult trying to write about youthful antics, but it manages to be fun despite that, and it actually delivers a worthwhile if clunky moral about the problem of hazing. Now, as someone who teaches undergraduates and has seen plenty in his day, I can tell you that this remains a problem, and a serious one, despite the fact American culture tends to think of it as harmless fun. In fact, I imagine it has probably gotten worse, despite attempts by institutions to crack down on the practices, and let me tell you, the fairly innocuous pranks in this comic don’t hold a candle to the kind of insane and simply stupid stuff kids get up to these days.
In general, I’ve found Greek Life to be an overall detriment to campuses and students, and hazing is just one part of that. To my mind, the negatives of these groups far outweigh the positives. I can’t tell you how many struggling students have confessed to prioritizing asinine fraternity or sorority activities over their coursework or who get wrapped up in the poisonous drinking culture centered on these groups. Anyway, I seem to have wandered afield from the fairly innocent story at hand here. I’ll give this silly but entertaining little tale 3 Minutemen.
Adventure Comics #410
“The Nature of the Beast!”
Writer: John Albano
Penciler: Bob Oksner
Inker: Vince Colletta
Letterer: John Costanza
Editor: Joe Orlando
“The Revolt of the Girl Legionnaires”
Writer: Jerry Siegel
Penciler: John Forte
Inker: John Forte
Letterer: Milt Snapinn
Editor: Mort Weisinger
“The Ruler Without a Planet”
Writer: John Albano
Penciler: Bob Oksner
Inker: Vince Colletta
We’ve got a couple of rather odd Supergirl yarns this month, and in an unusual switch, the cover story is not our lead feature. It is a solid enough design, a surprising image, well rendered, and it represents its tale well. Yet, our first adventure, strangely enough, would have made for a much better and more exciting image, as it features some really cool looking monsters. Why pass up creepy creatures for a kid? Either way, the story in question, begins with Linda Danvers visiting Nasty Luthor at her new apartment. The scheming femme fatale is trying to convince Linda to be her roommate so that she can spy on her and prove that she is Supergirl. *sigh* This again? I was hoping this incredibly stupid plot thread would be dropped when Sekowsky left the book! Unfortunately, that’s not the only stupid moment this issue.
Leaving aside for the moment the question of why Linda would even begin to consider rooming with her nemesis, something much more interesting interrupts the conversation, as the Maid of Might observes the man next door being attacked by a pair of really nicely designed bird-men! Making her excuses about having a hair appointment, the mild-mannered maiden dashes off, only to return as Supergirl and burst in to tackle the monsters. She makes short work of them, but her superpowers fade out again just as she pursues them out the window.
She notes that she’s not wearing her power devices, which were designed for just such a situation! There’s no explanation, no editorial note, just a big dose of idiot-ball powered stupidity to create some drama as she desperately clings to the avian antagonists, only to fall helplessly before snagging a ledge at the last minute. It’s a fine adventure sequence, but it’s catalyst is just moronic. Anyway, back in the apartment, Nasty responds to the commotion and finds the victim of the attack, Mike Merrick, who is in full 70s sleaze mode from the first moment he wakes up. Thinking Nasty has somehow chased away his attackers and seemingly completely unperturbed by being assaulted by six foot tall talking canaries, Mike asks Nasty out to dinner. When Linda shows up, feeling a bit jealous about her nemesis getting the credit, he asks her too. That can’t end badly.
Mike takes the two ladies out dancing, but he ignores Nasty all night and just dances with Linda, which is sort of a jerk move in general but especially if he thinks the former saved his life! On the way home, they are kidnapped by another pair of bird-men, who call Mike “the evil-one.” They carry them far out to sea and deposit them on an island inhabited by more of their kind. There the squawking chief of the tribe tells the story. Apparently these monsters are no natural occurrence but poor natives, mutated by the cruel experiments of a scientist, who was helped by…Mike Merrick! The chirping-chief also claims Merrick stole a sacred jewel from their idol and killed the scientist to keep it for himself. Linda is horrified that her handsome date could be so cold-blooded.
Mike refuses to return the gem, claiming innocence, but the atavistic avians are having none of it. They strap Linda to a cross and tow her to the central volcano, threatening to throw her in unless her paramour cracks. Finally, Mike gives in, and he tells them where to find the jewel. Yet, the mutant natives lock the couple up nonetheless. While imprisoned, the disguised Maid of Might confronts her date about the accusations against him, and he continues to claim innocence, saying he didn’t know about the experiments and that the professor’s death was an accident. Suddenly, the treasure thief tosses a lit match into the hay in their cell, creating a blaze and luring a guard in where he can grab him. Selflessly, Mike holds off their creepy captors, allowing Linda to escape.
Fortunately for him, she changes to Supergirl and rescues him, only to run out of power and plunge into the ocean because she still isn’t wearing her devices. Mike pulls her from the waves and reveals to her unconscious form that he knows her secret (which, realistically, he would almost have to after Supergirl’s arrival on this remote island, just as Linda disappeared), but that he lied about where he hid the treasure. With a stolen kiss, he heads out on the lamb, knowing she’ll try to hunt him down.
The end…What? You want to know what happened to the innocent natives who were turned into monsters after being subjected to inhuman experiments? Well, too bad, there is star-crossed romance afoot! Seriously, Joe Albano just completely drops that plot, ignoring the plight of the real victims of this story, which is a shame, because that is vastly more interesting than anything else happening in this book. Despite that, and despite the stupidity of Supergirl just forgetting to wear her life-saving exo-frame and flight ring, this isn’t a bad read. Mike Merrick is an interesting character in the little we see of him, a bad boy to whom Supergirl is obviously attracted in the way women are often attracted to jerks, but one who does have some scruples and who has a certain adventurous daring that is admirable. Essentially, he’s Supergirl’s distaff (technically “spear”) version of Catwoman. If we were introduced to him more as Indiana Jones and less as Casanova, this would be a stronger tale.
And that is really the problem with this yarn. The focus is consistently on the wrong notes, or at least, the right notes are dropped while trying to cram too much story into 14 pages. If this had been a book-length tale, I imagine it would have been a good deal stronger. There are still some fun and interesting ideas here, not least the dynamic between Supergirl and Mike. The love triangle with them and Nasty is sort of funny, but the real highlight of the book is the reversal Albano pulls off with the monsters being the victims of the tale, while still remaining antagonists. Those bird-men are wonderfully designed and drawn too, with great detail and a wonderful sense of reality by Bob Oskner, whose work I don’t really know. He does a solid job with the rest of the book, but I really love these anthropomorphic avians. They have an animalistic quality in movement and mannerism that is impressive and rather unusual. They remind me a bit of the “monkey-birds” from The Pirates of Dark Water. With art that is better than its writing, I’ll give this story 3 Minutemen, as it intrigued me, even as it frustrated me.
“The Ruler Without a Planet”
Our backup is, sadly, not a new Legion story. Our dose of Legion legends this month is just a reprint. Instead, we get another somewhat half-baked Supergirl adventure. It begins in dynamic enough fashion, with a massive monkey (really an ape, but who’s counting bananas?) who is reenacting King Kong in downtown. He smashes through a wall, and, when Supergirl arrives, gives her a belt for her troubles. She manages to knock out the big ape, notably thinking about not wanting to hurt him but reasoning that, while she can disable him without permanent damage, the police would have to kill him. That is a small but pleasant piece of characterization.
Suddenly a fire breaks out, and just as she goes to use her superbreath, the Maid of Might’s powers putter out. Just then, a little girl steps in and uses her own dose of superbreath to extinguish the blaze. The powerfully precocious little poppet tells Supergirl that she’s an alien with superpowers who accidentally took off in her step-father’s ship, landing on Earth shortly before the craft exploded. The girl, Judy, demonstrates other powers when the Girl of Steel balks, and she requests to be the hero’s assistant, while revealing that she knows the Kryptonian’s secret identity.
Supergirl takes this all way too much in stride and happily inducts the flying five-year-old into superheroing. I know there’s a tradition in comics of kid crime fighters, but this is just excessive! Super powers or not, if a kid isn’t old enough to tie their shoe, they probably shouldn’t be capturing crooks! The tone of this whole insane episode is just crazily casual, as the two go on to have various adventures. Apparently Linda just sort of adopts Judy (one wonders how she explains having a flying, super recognizable child just show up living with her in her secret identity.
“I guess I’m your mother now?”
Things change one night when Judy is contacted telepathically by her step-father, who reveals that this was all actually just a set-up, and he sent her to Earth to eliminate heroes like Supergirl. He tells the child that kindness is weakness and only strength matters, brow-beating the little girl into carrying out his plan. Yet, when Judy goes to murder the sleeping Supergirl, she can’t do it. In response, her step-father removes her powers and tries to zap her from space. Fortunately, the Maid of Might intervenes and takes off after his craft, only to watch helplessly as the Air Force jets shoot him down! So as not to upset the child soldier, Linda tells her that her step-father got away, and together they watch his ship’s fiery death, pretending it is a falling star.
Whoa, heavy ending for a cute, silly little story. Once again, Albano just doesn’t really develop his plot and leaves a major detail hanging. This one, however, is a point that really can’t be ignored. As of the end of this tale, Supergirl still has a little girl living with her. What in the world is she going to do with her? The wiki seems to imply that Judy returns at some point in time, but having looked ahead, it seems that she completely drops out of the strip. This whole episode feels like a Silver Age comic or a particularly poorly thought-out Zaney Haney offering. There’s not enough space given to the story for it to have much an impact, and while Judy’s choosing kindness over ruthlessness is sort of sweet, it all happens so quickly that it doesn’t have much weight. I suppose I’ll give this silly little story 2 Minutemen. It just doesn’t quite work.
P.S.: This issue is notable for being the debut of Supergirl’s primary 70s costume, which, interestingly enough, was actually designed by a fan, which has been true of several of her costumes. Fun! The costume itself is incredibly 70s, almost as 70s as her 80s costume is 80s (one word: headband). It’s not a bad look, really, being simple and recognizable, though it isn’t my favorite of her looks. It’s also a bit too much of its time, and I generally prefer more timeless, iconic costumes. I think such designs better capture the archetypal power of superheroes.
And with those issues finished, so is this post. There are some interesting seeds planted with this month’s Supergirl tales, and I’ll be curious to see if anything comes of them. I’m also curious if there was any particular instance of hazing in the zeitgeist at the time that might have lead to the college Clark story. Whatever the case, I hope that y’all enjoyed my commentaries and that y’all will join me again soon for the next step in our journey Into the Bronze Age! Until then, keep the Heroic Ideal alive!
The Greylands 
