December Answers From the Vault part 2

Welcome back to part two of this month's Answers From the Vault. Yesterday we fielded questions about the dearth of female supervillains, the lack of Image discussion at the Vault and why more superheroes don't wear pants. as hard as it is to believe, though, we have an even more exciting pile of queries today, so put on your thinking caps and let's jump right to the questions.

Or, actually, let's not. Before we get to them, we do have a little addendum from yesterday. Fervent comic book lover Chesley was wondering if we might be able to provide pictures of female supervillains Cheetah, Moonstone and Mist for her, and since we aim to please, here they are. Both Cheetah and Moonstone have gone through a number of costumes, but I went with this slightly savage but not outright feral version of Cheetah, while for Moonstone I decided to go with her classic original costume. And, of course, Mist only looks like this when she is using her powers; otherwise she's just a slightly butch goth girl who could be serving you lattes at the corner Starbucks. Hey, if her archenemy Starman doesn't wear a costume, why should she have to either?

Click on this to make it slightly larger:



Okay, now on to the questions.


Why is Mary Jane the hottest chick in comics? -- Ben


Well, I'm not sure I agree with you, but I don't necessarily disagree with you either, so I'll just answer the question under the assumption that Mary Jane Watson is the hottest chick in comics. I think the reason she is the hottest is because she's not just hot, she's also cool. She's accessible. She seems like someone who would be fun to hang out with and would accept you for who you are. In other words, even though she should way out the reader's league, she's not some unattainable ideal.

This goes hand in hand with the popularity of Spider-man himself. He became an icon because he's just an average nerd with average nerd problems; he could be you or me, but more probably you, because I'm a little cooler than that pencil-neck Peter Parker. Yet, Mary Jane still dug Peter; and if we could be Peter, then by extension, Mary Jane could fall for us.

But of course, if we're Peter, then our relationships will likely be erased because we sealed a deal with Satan to destroy them. So that equation isn't necessarily all positive.


What's the best issue of What If? -- Ben

For those not familiar with What If?, the Marvel series told hypothetical stories about what would have happened if key moments in Marvel history had gone differently. For example, what if the Fantastic Four hadn't defeated Galactus in Fantastic Four #50, or what if Phoenix hadn't died in X-Men #137? It was a cool series, though slightly limited by the fact that you had to already be familiar with the original story for the new ones to mean anything. Because of this, in the second What If? series, they eventually started just creating alternate realities that didn't necessarily have a jumping on point in continuity, making them more accessible but less meaningful.

Ben's fellow reader Rob pitched in with his own pick, which is What If? #29, featuring "What If the Avengers Defeated Everybody?", which spins out of the classic Avengers story in Avengers Annual #2, which itself is already an alternate universe tale. As an Avengers fan, I have to say that's a fine choice, though I would probably go with What If? #3 as the best issue, which tells the story of "What If the Avengers Had Never Been?", which shows what would have taken place if the Avengers had disbanded in Avengers #3.

But for sheer WTF purposes, my actual choice is going to be What If? #14, featuring the tale of "What If Sgt. Fury Had Fought World War II in Outer Space?", which is a strange blend of Nick Fury's WWII adventures with Star Wars for reasons that still escape me.

I strongly suspect, though, that each person's individual favorite issue of What If? will be strongly influenced by which original stories they liked the most, so this is a hard question to objectively answer.


Why doesn't Aquaman get any respect? -- Rob

Thanks for the question, Rob. Another fellow reader, James, also jumped in to answer this question, suggesting that it might be worth the time to check out this anti-Aquaman rant, which does, in fact, go a long way towards explaining why Aquaman doesn't get much respect.

But, as it happens, I think there's a simpler reason: he's not Namor the Sub-mariner. Namor, you may or may not know, first debuted in 1939, while Aquaman didn't appear until two years later, in 1941's More Fun Comics #73. What was more fun about it? Well, that issue also is the debut for Green Arrow, meaning there was, in fact, another character in the comic that was more fun than Aquaman. But the point is that comics already had a big name hero that had underwater powers; and, more to the point, Namor was also granted a truly unique and interesting personality among superheroes, being the original anti-hero, which led to compelling battles against other heroes (like his opposite number, the Human Torch) and character development.

Aquaman, conversely, didn't have any of that; he's basically a bland, whitebread version of Namor. He's not as visually compelling either. So while some fine writers and artists have done their best over the years, and there is a dedicated but small fan base for the character, Aquaman's main crime is that he is not, and will never be, Namor the Sub-mariner, no matter how many times DC tries to grit him up to make him more like the original.


Can I call you Brother Power the Geek? What is your favorite riddle? Who are you voting for on December 8? -- Lance

Thanks for the questions, Lance. For those of you who don't know, Lance is a hardcore comics fan, so he probably already knows the answers to all his actual comics related questions. Still, I'm happy to answer these as well.

1) I'm afraid that Brother Power the Geek is still copyrighted by DC Comics, which likely also has a side agreement with legendary creator Joe Simon, who developed Brother Power the Geek for DC back in the late 60's. I'm sure it would be a fine nickname, but for legal reasons, it wouldn't be advisable.

2) I actually don't care for riddles. Sorry, Edward Nigma! For the most part, I think riddles are kind of annoying. About the only one I can think of off the top of my head is the old "what walks on four legs in the morning..." groaner. By default, I guess that would be my "favorite," which is a bit misleading since it implies that I don't find it trite and annoying. Because I do.

3) Lance is referring to the Massachusetts Democratic primary on December 8 to fill the Senate seat made vacant by the death of Edward "Nigma" Kennedy. There are four candidates; three of them are viable and one is Steve Pagliuca. As you can guess, I won't be voting for ol' "Money Pags," because he's such an empty shirt that he actually makes Mitt Romney look like a man of substance, which is almost boggling to contemplate. Hey Steve: you can buy name recognition, but you can't buy competence.

That leaves Michael Capuano (who seems competent but also irritable, angry and petty in many of his debate appearances); Alan Khazei, who has a lot of social programs and interesting ideas and details plans and positions on every major issue and thus, as you might expect, is badly trailing in every poll and has no chance of being elected; and Martha Coakley, the Attorney General of the state, who has had solid debate performances as she sits back and grins while the others blow themselves up on stage.

So who am I going to vote for on Tuesday? Well, if it looks like Coakley has a big enough lead in the polls, I might vote for Khazei just to bump up his numbers for future races. Otherwise I'll have to vote for Coakley to make sure she gets in. Not that Capuano would be a disaster, but why take a chance.



Okay, that wraps it up for this month. We'll be throwing the doors of learning open to the internet public again some time next month, so if you didn't get your answers this time, don't worry. We'll get to it sooner or later.

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December Answers From the Vault part 1

Welcome back to this month's edition of Answers From the Vault. Yesterday we threw open the doors of knowledge to the general public and the result was a torrent of queries. The reading public has an insatiable appetite for information and we here at the Vault are happy to oblige that noble quest. So, after carefully winnowing down the literally quadrillions of questions we received yesterday, here are the answers to the select few that made the cut. Don't worry, though, if your question isn't answered today, we'll probably cover it tomorrow, because this batch was so big we had to split it into two parts!

So are you ready to get your brain enlarged?


Following up the occasionally heated discussion of how women are portrayed in comics, can you identify your favorite villainous female character in comics (in spite of criticisms to the way said character may have been drawn)? And how might said appearance attract or detract from the character herself (or does it at all?)? -- Chesley

Wow, Chesley, that's a mouthful. But we'll give it a go. Strong female supervillains are about as rare -- or even rarer -- than strong female superheroes. When you think of the pantheon of great supervillains, pretty much none of them are women. For instance, when IGN did their NCAA bracket-style battle of the super-villains a few years ago, only six of the 64 contestants were women and of those six, most of them weren't necessarily villains per se. It's an interesting point to note: very few women in comics are really allowed to be full-on evil. Most female supervillains have a softer, more sympathetic side to go along with more ambiguous motivations. This often ends up with the villain becoming a hero or anti-hero or at least someone who the main heroes sometimes identify with or team-up with.

You're not going to see that happen a whole lot with, say, Joker or Dr. Doom, but it happens all the time with female supervillains. Probably the most famous female supervillain is Catwoman, but she's hardly a villain. Heck, she's Batman's main love interest. The six so-called villains who did show on on the IGN list also included Dark Phoenix (deranged alter-ego for X-Man Jean Grey, thus only sort of a villain), Elektra (Daredevil's girlfriend and not really a villain) and the White Queen (sometimes a villain, sometimes a member of the X-Men). The only true villains on the list were Harley Quinn and Poison Ivy, neither of whom are quite A-listers, though I guess Poison Ivy is fairly close. Other examples of this include some of the most prominent female villains at both Marvel and DC, such as the Enchantress (who teams up with Thor as often as she opposes him and is no longer considered a villain by most), Scarlet Witch (who was so popular and sympathetic when she debuted as a villain that Marvel quickly turned her into a hero) and Star Sapphire (usually Green Lantern's girlfriend, Carol Ferris).

So why aren't there more good (or, to be more precise, evil) female villains? I'm not entirely sure. I suspect it might have something to do with the traditionally male readership (and creator pool) and the assumptions and stereotypes that have come along with that. In some ways it's the flip side of the sexulization issue -- comics might have their heroines be overly sexed up, but they also don't want their women to be too mean, so many of the villains end up having softer, more sympathetic portrayals. In other words, the idea of femininity doesn't necessarily match well with being a supervillain. Perhaps because of this, relatively fewer female villains seem to be (consistently) depicted in an overtly sexual fashion compared to their heroic counterparts (Harley Quinn, Catwoman and Poison Ivy did get a mention in my essay, but Gotham Sirens treats them as protagonists rather than villains).

The only major female villain that comes to mind who has an overtly sexual nature is White Queen, but for her, I think it works because it fits in with her manipulative personality. She uses her sexuality as just another tool to control people, which makes it fitting, I think, for her to wear an altered dominatrix costume, because that's kind of her whole schtick; she just usually does it through telepathy and mind control rather than physically.

Anyway, I haven't technically answered your question because I'm not sure I have a favorite villainess in comics. There are some solid female villains who break some of the stereotypes I mentioned; DC's Cheetah is probably the best known of these, while Marvel also has Moonstone as an intelligent and mostly evil woman (though even she sometimes plays a good guy when it suits her). Another well done female villain was the Mist in James Robinson's Starman (more on Starman in a later answer). But a favorite? Hm. Well, Mystique would probably have been my choice back in the 80's when she was still a real villain, but nowadays she seems to just be Magneto's moll thanks to the X-Men films. Hela is great in Thor when they bother to use her, and Sin has been turned by Brubaker from a footnote into a legitimately evil and fun character. Giganta has promise. But my favorite female supervillain is probably Viper (aka Madame Hydra), in part because she is the one female supervillain that is crazier, deadlier and more downright evil than just about any other.


What about some Image coverage? How has the creation of that company and titles affected the big two and the industry in general if at all? -- Ben

Well, Ben, the answers to your questions actually go hand in hand. There isn't a lot of Image coverage on the Vault mainly because I don't like Image. I know that will come as a shock to some of you (as I know there are some ardent Image fans reading this) but it's true. That, in turn, means I don't know too much about what is going on in their books or with their characters. And one of the reasons I've never cared for Image is because I think the creation of the company had a negative impact on both the big two (especially Marvel) and comics in general.

Now, to be honest, a lot of the problems that came up because of the founding of Image were caused by Marvel, so there's plenty of blame to go around. But essentially, the creation of Image (and the hype that guilt up around the Image founders prior to their defection from Marvel) was the height of the speculation era. Millions of copies of books by hot artists were flying off the shelves, being bought up by speculators who figured they could sit on the books for awhile and then turn them around for a big profit on the secondary market. Because of these artificial sales figures, both Marvel and the artists began believing in an art first idea, where the storytelling was secondary to the kewl pictures. This was exemplified by Marvel's decision to dump Chris Claremont off of X-Men after nearly 20 years on the title that he had taken from nothing into the biggest book on the market, all because Marvel wanted to placate their new hot artist Jim Lee by giving him creative control. The big problem here is that a) most of these sales were to speculators, not fans, and thus weren't a fair assessment of what was actually popular or artistically successful and b) those new fans that were being brought in by the hype were receiving sub-par products because all the good writers had been dumped in order to let the artists write everything.

Now, there are plenty of artists who are fine writers, but as Marvel and DC chased the golden goose and began having all of their artists ape the Image style at the expense of story and storytelling, fans began fleeing in droves. The product just sucked. For a few years there in the early 90's it did seem that the industry as a whole would still be okay, because a counter movement began, with self-published books booming like never before, to the point where they actually were commanding a pretty large part of the marketplace (something like 15-20% at the peak if I remember correctly). This actually kind of mirrors the rise of grunge and alternative rock as an antidote to the processed pop and hair metal being put out by the major labels during that same time period. But then Marvel decided to buy out all the major distribution companies, which in effect shut out all their smaller "competitors", with the result that the entire market crashed and burned, Marvel went bankrupt and comics have never recovered. With no indie alternatives to the mainstream rubbish being put out by Marvel, Image and DC, fans just left comics entirely.

Obviously, not all of that can be laid at the door of Image, but some of it can, and more importantly, I've never enjoyed any of their titles. I read Spawn for awhile but that was more out of habit and a feeling of obligation than out of real enjoyment. Plus, the company rarely seemed to live up to it's own premise; it was supposed to be a haven for artists to control their own properties, but it seemed instead to only be a haven for the select few big names that had the box office clout already to get into Image's exclusive club.

And then a lot of the creators ended up farming out their titles to freelance employees anyway, like McFarlane with Spawn, meaning they hadn't created a revolution at all, they had just built their own version of Marvel. Sort of like the Pilgrims coming to America for "religious freedom" and then persecuting the Quakers for worshiping differently. Here comes the new boss, same as the old boss.

To be honest, for me, Image ended as an entity years ago even though they still put out books. After all, some of the founders ended up taking their titles to other places (Jim Lee's Wildstorm went to DC, for instance) for reasons that still escape me, meaning that the Image imprint seems to be little more than a distribution plot; there's no cohesion to the line, it's just a bunch of random, unconnected studios putting out whatever they want and slapping the Image logo on it. Which makes it even more difficult to review, because you are in effect talking about a bunch of separate companies. While Invincible is supposed to be one of the best hero books on the market, is it really fair to lump it in with Youngblood?

Tell you what, though. If Image ever does anything I like or that is newsworthy, I'll discuss it here.


Are there any decent super heroes that don't wear spandex and why don't more heroes realize that a pair of jeans can go a long way as far as durability goes. For that matter who are their tailors? -- Ben

Good question, Ben. To answer the last part first, the creation of superhero costumes has been handled a number of different ways over the years. Marvel in particular has highlighted the ways their costumes come about, with various explanations. For instance, most costumes are made from unstable molecules, invented by Reed Richards, which allows them to stretch and get burnt and whatever without just falling apart like normal fabrics. As for the design, different costumes have different designers. Some people got new costumes, for example, during Secret Wars thanks to an alien costume generator. On the lower tech side of things, Spider-man and Kitty Pryde were both shown in their early days struggling to hand-make their own costumes, while the Wasp's alter-ego of Janet Van Dyne is a noted designer in the Marvel universe and not only made all of her own costumes but frequently designed costumes for other heroes.

But I think you were more curious about the jeans thing. Well, there have been some notable heroes who wore their jeans into battle. One of my favorite Golden Age heroes, Crimebuster, had perhaps the simplest and most utilitarian costume in comics history, as his "costume" was actually his high school hockey jersey, except with a cape. Over the course of time he eventually even dumped most of that; in order to impress a girl, in Boy Comics #50 Crimebuster ended up ditching the cape and his hockey pants, meaning that for the rest of his long career, he fought crime wearing jeans and his hockey shirt, something that a number of rappers would later more famously emulate.

Another case of a hero duking it out in his denims is, of course, Luke Cage. It's not entirely clear in some of his early appearances whether his pants are jeans or spandex... or fleece... but that's mostly due to the presence of his giant buccaneer boots. These days, there's no doubt that Cage is wearing his jeans into battle; this cover from New Avengers #49, for instance, apparently shows Cage just as he's about to go out on patrol with his group of fellow gigolos.

But probably the best example of what you are looking for would be Jack Knight in Starman. Knight was the younger son of the original Golden Age Starman and was a bit of a black sheep. Rebelling against his father's superhero ways, and dismissing all that superhero stuff as juvenile nonsense, Jack was understandably out of place when he was suddenly forced by circumstance to become the new Starman. So he decided to keep true to his style and, rather than adopt the classic Starman red spandex, he got a pair of vintage flight goggles to shield his eyes when flying, threw on a leather jacket for warmth and protection against body blows, and fought crime just like that. His outfit was suitable for either crime fighting or catching the Smashing Pumpkins down at the local civic center. Fittingly, Jack ended up retiring for good after being active only a few short years, deciding to live a normal life rather than deal with the craziness of the superhero world. His protege, Stargirl, fights crime the old fashioned way: in colored pajamas. (By the way, Starman also was arguably the best superhero title of the 90's and is more than worth the time to read).


Tomorrow: The next batch of questions and answers. Aquaman! Mary Jane! What If?! And Brother Power the Geek! Be there!

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Tales From the Vault: WONDER WOMAN #215

What can even two super-heroes do against the awesome might of Mars, the God of War?! Your answer to that question will depend entirely on whether or not you consider Aquaman to be a super-hero. Let's find out the answer... together!


Details: This issue comes to us with a cover date of January, 1975, with a story credited to writer Cary “Nord” Bates and the art team of John Rosenberger and Vince Colletta. Of course, merely by typing the name “Vince Colletta” I have made myself the target of a thousand infuriated internet art policemen, but so be it. Plus, I wanted to reiterate how much I loved John Rosenberger on Cheers.

I’d also like to mention the cover, which is classic mid-70’s DC, complete with an ineffectual Aquaman watching the action helplessly in the background. Hey Aquaman, how’s your son these days? Oh, right. And, of course, this cover is vastly more fun if you read the “Super-heroine Number One!” blurb with an offensively racist caricature of a Chinese accent. I can’t wait to read the actual story.

Especially because that story is titled “Amazon Attack against Atlantis!” Yes, folks, it’s another Amazon Attacks! Or, rather, the original Amazon Attacks. Place your bets on how many infants will be murdered before Batman uses the Books of Magic or something to defeat, I dunno, Hera. Vegas has the over/under at eleven.

Synopsis: The action starts off with a bang, as Wonder Woman is just finishing what appears to be a spirited verbal beatdown of the god of war, Mars, who… uh, is on the JLA satellite for some reason. Hanging out, tossing back a few beers with his buds I guess. Actually, it turns out he’s being tried by a jury that consists of Aquaman, Black Canary, Green Arrow, Elongated Man and Batman. What, were the Inferior Five busy that day? Strangely, Mars seems perfectly at ease with being put on trial by this collection of ragamuffins, and merely states that it is Diana’s word against his. It’s a stalemate.

Except, Mars hasn’t factored in the testimony of Aquaman! Seriously, a supervillain forgot to take Aquaman into account? That’s almost impossible to believe. But, sure enough, Aquaman jumps up and exposits that they’re right in the middle of a series of trials designed to prove that Wonder Woman is still worthy of membership in the league, and as part of this he has been following her around, watching her every move. Pre-code this is what would have been referred to as “stalking”. Good cover story, Arthur! Of course, given the total creampuff lineup the JLA is sporting in this issue, the idea that they would have to spend more than one second debating Wonder Woman’s merits is pretty hard to believe, but whatever.

(Yes, fine, Wonder Woman requested these tests herself. It is kind of ironic that the tests takes the form of a series of trials that seems directly patterned on the legend of Hercules, though, given Diana’s history with him).

Anyhoo, back to the story, which goes like so. Aquaman is flopping around uselessly in the East River one day when he sees Wonder Woman flying overhead. Suddenly, a big arm made of water reaches up and smacks her down. Aquaman briefly panics, apparently assuming Wonder Woman can’t swim, but she’s fine: using her magic lasso, she, uh… throws it up in the air and then climbs it like a reverse “Indian rope trick!” Say what? That’s… crazy… wtf. Oh, wait, I can fanwank my way out of this; she must have lassoed the end of her invisible plane. Sure. Of course, she seemed to be flying under her own power here, but… you know what, let’s just move on.

She then corrals the waterspout with her lasso and spins it counter clockwise, causing the water to disperse harmlessly and ending the threat. Aquaman is duly impressed, then jumps onto the shore and resumes his aggressive stalking, using a “land-pack” that consists of a suit stuffed into a sack. Diana, for her part, is doing the same thing, except she’s using her lasso to switch costumes because “Diana’s costume has been treated with a special solution that transforms it under the vibrations of the magic lasso!” Why doesn’t it surprise me that the Amazons have mastered the art of vibration based powers?

Rushing to her job in the U. N. Crisis Bureau… wait, holy sh*t! The U.N. is responsible for Crisis?! Let me guess, the Monitor is actually Kofi Annan? Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is being sanctioned because he’s secretly developing the anti-life equation? Darfur was caused by Wen Jaibao punching the walls of reality? I have to say, this actually makes world politics a whole lot easier to understand.

Also helping to understand the inner workings of the U.N. is Aquaman, who manages to secretly eavesdrop on these classified briefings by having a tank full of goldfish telepathically relay the info to him. Then he trails behind Diana and her boss as they wander around to find a cheap lunch in Manhattan. Now, that seriously is a job for the Justice League. Suddenly, though, a guy walks by with a bunch of dogs that abruptly transform into huge wolf things and attack Diana right in the street! Oh noes!

Luckily, Diana remembers her I-Ching training and karate chops the crap out of them, including one wolf which still looks a lot like a huge, fanged poodle (which is… awesome). Then we get a half page of U.N. personnel trying to figure out if Diana is actually Wonder Woman, and… wow, I couldn’t care less about all that secret identity bullhockey. Even when this issue came out it was tedious and hackneyed.

Also not caring about it is Aquaman, who is too busy explaining plot elements as part of his deposition to the JLA. See, while this is going on, a horde of telepathic fish is trying to contact him, but they can’t because this mysterious figure who has been causing the attacks on Diana zaps them all senseless. Or, as senseless as a pile of fish can ever be, I guess. At the same time, Wonder Woman realizes that the Amazons aren’t answering their “mental radio set” or the “omni-viewer”, so she starts becoming concerned and decides to fly to Paradise Island to check on them using her “robot plane”. Quotes courtesy of Jack Kirby.

Interestingly, Aquaman isn’t sure what to at this point:

Aquaman: Paradise Island’s location is a secret that no man is supposed to know! If Wonder Woman flies there by air – I can swim fast enough to trail her by sea – but should I?

Leaving aside for a moment the idea that Aquaman can swim as fast as a jet, I find this bit of soul searching to be interesting, especially in light of the fact that just two issues earlier, in Wonder Woman #213, Flash follows her to Paradise Island without a second thought, even following her onto the island (getting by the “no man shall set foot on the island” thing by hovering in place an inch off the ground, which is a serious cop out on his part). In this comparison, Aquaman comes off a lot better than Flash, who seems a bit disrespectful if not outright disdainful of their customs. Have some respect, Barry, you knob.

Before he can decide what to do, though, Aquaman realizes he’s been out of the water for an hour and needs to get wet or else he’ll die from “air-aches”. Um. Okay, whatever. Rushing over to a nearby fountain, he reaches in to restore himself when it suddenly turns into a giant gusher of pure crude oil. And not only does this prevent him from getting his fix of h2o, the gusher hits Diana’s plane flying overhead and then magically turns to solid coal, trapping it in place.

Wow. I don’t know if Mars is behind this, but the least he could do if he’s going to kill the JLA is do it in a more Earth friendly way. Oil, coal… how about using solar power or wind turbines next time, huh? Taking over the world won’t do much good if the world dies from carbon emissions, dude.

Diana, though, has other things to worry about. She flies up into mid air and using… a cloud?... as leverage, she lifts her plane and the coal pile right up into the air, smashes the coal all to hell and jumps in her plane and flies off. Man, someone is going to be surprised when they go out to their car in the morning and find it buried under a half ton of coal. Luckily for Aquaman, the coal doesn’t land on him, but he’s got other things to worry about, namely the “air fever” that is about to claim his life. Lying on the ground, he’s about to kack when a bunch of kids rush up and stare at him. Like they’ve never seen a guy passed out on a New York sidewalk before, sure; Mars, I’ll believe, but this is pushing the limits of fantasy. Anyway, Aquaman is too weak to say anything, but he does have enough energy to suddenly do a huge karate kick and clobbers a kid’s can of TAB, dousing him with soda and restoring his energy. That’s just gross.

But things are going from bad to worse: Diana arrives at Paradise Island to discover that it’s missing! And Aquaman gets a telepathic message from a panicked minnow in the sewers, who gives Aqauaman terrible news. No, it’s not about being flushed by some kid’s mom, it’s about Atlantis being attacked… by AMAZONS!!! Yes, the missing Paradise Island is now parked directly above Atlantis; apparently the island moved when Ben turned the magic wheel under the hatch or something. But however it got there, the war is about to begin.

Turns out that Hippolyta and all the ladies have been ensorcelled by Mars, which we discover when Mars shows up and tells Wonder Woman his plan. I think this sort of thing is how Batman got his rep as such a great detective; it helps when villains tell you what they are doing and why. Essentially, it turns out that Mars is bored of war and because of this, he is no longer gaining as much energy from warfare as he used to. He needs some new, exciting type of war to recharge his batteries, so he came up with this plan.

Of course, telling the details to Diana might have been a tactical flaw, but what do you want? I mean, he’s only the god of war, tactics aren’t his strong po… oh, wait. And sure enough, Wonder Woman figures out a plan right away which she immediately communicates to Aquaman using sign language. Do they teach ASL in Atlantis and on Paradise Island? Regardless, the plan is like so: a horde of whales swim up out of nowhere and prevent the Amazons and the Atlanteans from getting at each other. While this is going on, Wonder Woman attacks Mars. He easily deflects her attacks, slapping her around…

…but suddenly, he shrinks down to regular ol’ human size, instead of being god-tall, and Diana socks him in the gut with a karate chop. Turns out, the energy of setting everything in motion drained all his remaining power, so by preventing the sides from warring, the whales also prevented Mars from replenishing his energy, making him easy prey for Diana.

And that’s that. Aquaman finishes his story (by the way, his testimony is backed up by a "lung fish", which can "not only mimic human speech -- but repeat word for word what it has heard". That's right folks, someone has finally found a pet more annoying than a parrot) and the rest of the Justice League (if you can call them that) render their verdict: they’ve found him guilty and are going to send him to the “top-security interplanetary prison”.

Whoa, what? On who’s authority? Is this one of those Dr. Light brainwashing moments, where the JLA arbitrarily decide to take one of Earth’s elder gods and throw him in the space clink? Don’t the other gods have an issue with this? And wouldn’t this provide exposure to exactly the kind of exotic warfare he needs to replenish his bored batteries? I dunno, y’all, this seems like a really shady deal all around. But,

THE END!!!


Extras: One thing that caught my eyes was a page advertising DC subscriptions. The top half is trying to sell you on The Amazing World of DC Comics, which was an in-house magazine with interviews and behind the scenes look at DC. I used to actually own a bunch of these and like a fool I sold them; now I wish I had them back, because I’m sure they’re fascinating. I doubt they can match the kind of whacked out, adult themed discussions Marvel was printing over in FOOM but if I get the chance to land some of these cheap I’ll definitely be looking into it.

The bottom half of the subscription page is for actual comics. It includes a long note trying to explain the pricing, since some titles are bi-monthly “100-Page Super Spectaculars” and others are monthly, regular size comics that may sometimes have 60 page specials mixed in. DC swears that “the subscription price is never more than the cost of buying sinlge copies at your local retailer”, but since the price for a subscription is $3, and the cover price of the monthly titles is 20 cents, you can see that a year should only cost $2.40. Man would I not have wanted to be in the subscription department to try and figure out the exact mix of 20 cent and 60 cent issues they had to send – or had already sent – to give someone the correct number of comics for their money. Add to this the fact that the price went up to 25 cents just a couple months later and this is a disaster waiting to happen. Plus, the titles listed appear to be a completely random cross section of comics DC was publishing at the time – even though this ad is in Wonder Woman, for instance, Wonder Woman itself isn’t listed as one of the options, though you can of course order a sub to titles such as Shazam!, The Witching Hour, Young Romance and Tarzan.

I have a feeling this ad wasn’t real successful.


My Grades: Um. This comic had its moments. It’s interesting in that it’s not as campy as a lot of the fun, campy stuff DC was putting out at the time, but nor is it as serious as some of the more serious stuff they were producing either. It felt like Bates was trying to write a solid superhero adventure but got bogged down by some of the trappings of the genre that DC was forcing him to include, like the secret identity stuff, which was already outdated when this appeared. It’s hard to dock someone points for being alive in the wrong time period, though, so I’ll give this a B for the 1970’s, even though it’s only a C+ at best for me reading it now.

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