Random Happenstance

Over the years, I've blogged several issues of Thor from the stretch before Walt Simonson took over and revitalized the title with Thor #337. The book was facing cancellation, so Marvel, as it sometimes used to, took a chance and gave a creator a lot of leeway to turn it around. Now, between the end of the somewhat long and confused Celestial Saga in #300 and #337, those three years are considered a bit of a fallow period, a low point; although at least a few issues like #309 or #316 were solid superhero meat-and-potatoes reads. I liked them, anyway! Today's book is almost-but-not-quite in the same vein: it might be more running out the clock. From 1985, Action Comics #573, "The Sale of the Century!" Written by Craig Boldman, pencils by Kurt Schaffenberger, inks by Bob Oksner.

There's an ad for Crisis on Infinite Earths #7--that very cover!--this very issue! But that crying Superman feels far more modern, than this very Silver Age-style story. In fact, the villain--or 'villain,' more antagonist, or pain-in-the-ass--this month was originally from the Golden Age: con man J.Wilbur Wolfingham. He was a low-impact threat, more of a challenge: a non-violent grifter, although after years of normalized scams, swindles, and bold-faced lies I can't shake the feeling that Wolfingham should be beaten with a sack of oranges. (I always remember that from Jim Thompson's The Grifters, but it might be from the movie version!) Superman arrives mid-stream here, steamed that Wolfingham and his nephew/trainee Wormwood are the only people left on earth!

Trying to demonstrate the art of the confidence game, Wolfingham thinks he has an easy mark, in the form of a conveniently-appearing alien, who wears a costume reimescient of Colossal Boy's old outfit. (I maintain, that suit was dated when it came out!) Wolfingham pulls the old Brooklyn Bridge scam, and "sells" the alien the planet; but then the alien gives the human race the boot, digitizing them all into a storage cube, and evicting Wolfingham. The alien was going to flip Earth! God, I hate business. After Superman is brought up to speed, when the alien tries to pitch earth to a prospective tenant, Supes queers the deal with an ice cream rain and then a pepper storm: Wolfingham innocently explains, yeah, that sort of thing was always happening here. The alien doesn't buy it: who could live like that? But Wolfingham explains, it wasn't impossible, when you had your own 'genie,' Superman! (OK, the alien really should've recognized Supes there; he was universe-famous at that point!) The alien claims the 'genie,' as part of the larger purchase of earth; then takes off for another possible purchase to flip. Listening in, Superman realizes the alien travelled from world to world, victimizing con men: that way, if there was any blowback from local law, he could claim to be the injured party there.

Superman then stages danger--and stomach-churning rescues--for the alien; who returns to Wolfingham again, who plays it off as he was glad to be rid of the hazardous genie. The alien eventually wheedles Wolfingham into trading back, and takes off, suspecting he had been taken but just glad to be out of it. Everyone on earth is returned, none the wiser, and Superman explains, didn't Wolfingham wonder where the alien got the cash he paid him with? He had picked Wolfingham's pocket! (That seemed like a lot of cash to carry around, even for a grifter! Most people would notice a wheelbarrow full of cash being lifted off their person...) Still, Wolfingham ends up pretty much back where he started...except he still had the papers of ownership for earth.

Not a completely unfun little story, but it felt like it could've been on the racks ten, even twenty years prior to its publication date. And this was ten issues prior to the conclusion of Alan Moore's "Whatever Happened to the Man of Tomorrow?" in Action #583 and then the John Byrne-reboot era. We looked at Action #571 some years back; and "Sale of the Century!" feels like a better constructed story, which makes me worry this might've been the high point for around then? Also this issue: an insert for Mask, and back-up story "If I Were Superman..." which felt slightly more modern: a street vendor fantasizes about how he would use Superman's powers more creatively, which might put him on the path to selling a new product. (Written by Kevin Juaire and David Campiti, pencils by Alex Saviuk, inks by Eduardo Barreto.)