Monday, February 14, 2011

Hawkman was doing "let's give everyone a damn power ring" before it was cool.

Some time ago, we saw Sinestro walk all over Hawkman in an old issue of The Secret Society of Super Villains. But we never saw Hawkman get him back...

...and we still haven't, since this was from a dream. Specifically, the Atom/Ray Palmer's dream of the frustrations of working within the system and fears of the JLA going bad, as manipulated by Dr. Destiny, in Justice League America #72, "Destiny's Hand, part I" Story and art by Dan Jurgens, finishes by Rick Burchett.

At the time in the regular continuity, Sinestro was dead, and Guy Gardner had only just taken the yellow power ring, which was still a novel idea. In the dream, the fascist League has "complete jurisdiction over meta-humans," as J'onn J'onzz demonstrates by incinerating Star Sapphire. (Hal shrugs it off.) Hawkman captures Sinestro, and takes him into custody...to have his arms amputated, which is even meaner than Hawkman usually is.

Of course, you can tell this is a dream, alternate reality, imaginary story; because Hawkman is actually effective here. Some of you may recall the old SuperFriends episode, "Secret Origins Of The Super Friends," where the Legion of Doom's plot of the week is to go back in time and mess with the origins of Superman, Green Lantern, and Wonder Woman so they never become those heroes and thwart their plans. (There's about a bazillion things wrong with this, but just go with it.) Superman and Hawkman are at a parade in Superman's honor when Supes is removed from the timeline, the parade suddenly becomes "Hawkman Day." (It's at about the ten minute mark on the video, after the break!)




"Hawkman Day" is about the most unlikely thing in the whole episode.

Anyway, I only have two chapters of "Destiny's Hand" at the time, but I don't think it was too bad, and I like Jurgen's art. That said, it may be a little telling that the adventures of the evil League were more interesting than the then-current membership, which included Black Condor, Agent Liberty, and both Wonder Woman and Guy Gardner at their most one-dimensional.

1 comment:

SallyP said...

Wait, Hawkman was effective? Had to be a dream...inDEED!