Two bucks a pop for reader-quality comics like I usually grab feels a bit steep, but I got a pretty good stack of some more-retro than usual books the other day. And of course grabbed one I already had,
Action #457! Rrr, fine, we'll try this classic cover instead: from 1975,
Action Comics #454, "Superman's Energy Crisis!" Written by Cary Bates, pencils by Curt Swan, inks by Tex Blaisdell.
The new, "1975-Toyman" makes a daring daytime bank robbery and owns Superman in his escape, using centrifugal force against him...which, I'm not 100% would work. If Supes can negate gravity's effect on him to fly, should he be able to move against that force? WGBS got pretty good footage of the fight, but it's not enough to keep anchor Clark Kent interested, as he nods off during the commericial break! He's also starving at a fundraiser dinner later, and falls asleep there too; which might indicate something was siphoning his juice. After saving a burger place from a falling tree, he has to gorge himself on burgers, needing millions of calories to support his powers! Wait...a Big Mac is
563-590 calories or so--say 600. So he'd need upwards of 1667 burgers for a million calories, which sounds like a lot. Tip your servers!
Toyman's next robbery doesn't go as well for him: he launches Superman into the stratosphere with bubbles, but instead of weakened, Supes finds his powers returning as he gets further away from earth. The actual answer and solution are both dumb and Toyman's not behind it, so whatever. Also, I'm not sure why burger place "MacTavish's" seems to have a Joker-looking clown mascot! Also this issue: the ivy at, um, Ivy University goes bad, in an Atom story, "The Campus That Swallowed Itself!" Somehow, Poison Ivy was not implicated. (Written by Martin Pasko, art by Jose Delbo.)
5 comments:
I'd have to say you're right; if he can defy gravity & the basic laws of physics (comics physics not so much depending on the story ammirite?) then powering out of centrifugal force should be easy as pie.
Definitely giving a whole new definition to the term "Super-size Me" isn't he?
And how in the hell did they possibly make all those burgers that fast? Superman would've LONG since past out & almost died in the amount of time it'd have taken them to make all food.
You're right, Pasko definitely missed out on a prime opportunity to use Poison Ivy here.
There have been enough stories where Supes has had to struggle with a similar force (without even being tied to the source) that I'm willing to give Cary a pass here. The real surprise is how the Nimball Toyman could withstand Superman's gravitational pull without being torn apart- must have a personal force field or something
(he was always batting above his level anyway).
The clown mascot thing is probably a Ronald McDonald thing. I don't think anybody'd drawn Joker like that for almost 10 years at that point, so he's not going to get offended and gas the board or anything.
I can see not using Poison Ivy in the Atom story. She hadn't appeared too much and didn't have her plant powers yet anyway. Plus, Atom's already got a plant-based villain to blame, the Floronic Man.
Good point about Ivy but just how often was Woodrue really being used all that much back then?
I mean, honestly, considering how much the burger clown logo looks too much like the 70’s version of the Joker, I’m surprised he never caught that & went to Metropolis sooner to exact his revenge for using his likeness. He’d definitely be crazy & vain enough to think the restaurant was stealing his look.
Ray doesn't have a particularly big rogues gallery, so they tend to reuse them a good deal in his solo stories. Even Bug-Eyed Bandit got a decent showing!
I think Joker was more in his super-long face era art-wise, so crazy and vain would work against that at that point. He'd probably be more like, 'And they call me crazy?! Looks more like that poseur Bullseye (the Green Arrow villain, not the Daredevil one) than me!' Plus, he already tried the Joker Toxin on cows and it (ironically) didn't work.
The Batman TAS 'Joker's Wild' episode comes to mind here, doesn't it? The one where the Joker gets mad at the casino owner using his image.
BUT! The clown also has the name 'Ronald' so maybe Joker was beaten to the punch by the only clown more evil than him, Ronald Mc Donald, who got to kill the owners and everyone in the restaurant first.
Post a Comment