The Doom Patrol

The usual comparison with the Doom Patrol is the X-Men (leader in a wheel chair, outcasts fighting for the people, both appearing around the same time, villain group with the words "Brotherhood of Evil" in the name, etc.), what I've never heard before is the similarity to the Fantastic Four (four of them; genius leader, a girl, one who can fly, a tough strongman who complains about his body).
If DC & Marvel had teamed up in a crossover back then you could really see Robotman & the Thing having a big old Pity Party.

All Stories reprinted in Showcase Presents The Doom Patrol Volume One

Three Against The Earth! My Greatest Adventure #82
It's said that Negative Man is composed of radio energy & won't break a light beam.
It may be radio energy, but it does appear to be a dark mass which would indicate that it blocks some light.

NANJAO. In the first two Doom Patrol stories Cliff Steele was known as Automaton, not Robotman. This issue Cliff describes himself as "a robot man", even though he's not officially called that until issue 84.
Did they just realize what a stupid name Automaton was & found out the Robotman name was available? (The original Robotman was a DC character from 1942-1953.)

The Furies From 4,000 Miles Below My Greatest Adventure #85
Robotman is being lowered into shark-infested waters, but the sharks ignore him.
I guess this story was written before they realized that sharks will attack metal.

The Chief, Robotman & Negative-Man are using a drill to bore down into the earth. The artist drew a skeleton of a dinosaur & the skull of an elephant in the same strata.
Of course, in the DC universe there were dinosaurs that survived till the present day, so...

The Animal-Vegetable-Mineral Menace The Doom Patrol #89
This issue introduces us to Sven Larson who was a student of the Chief's at Stockholm University.
In issue 81 a picture of the Chief is printed in the paper with a question asking if anyone recognizes him. The Chief doesn't worry about his past being revealed. Issue 88 reveals that the Chief was a young genius who went into private research at 22 & after a run-in with General Immortus went into seclusion because he had knowledge Immortus wanted. Seems unlikely that he had time to be a teacher.

The Enemy Within The Doom Patrol The Doom Patrol #90
Page 18, Panel 2. The Chief is giving code words so they won't be fooled by the impostor. Robotman's is Dos, but 2 panels later it's Dog. Given the simplicity of the words Dos is probably the typo.

The Nightmare Fighters The Doom Patrol #94
A reference is made to issue 81, The Nightmare Maker, & the caption identifies the book as "The Doom Patrol no. 81".
The nit is that the book's title was still My Greatest Adventure back then, the book didn't become The Doom Patrol until issue 86.

The Chief "Stands" Alone
The Doom Patrol is inside a volcano that's building up to erupt, so Robotman punches holes in the rock to "relieve the pressure".
Wouldn't that be like using a pin to relieve the pressure of a balloon?

Changed Premise: In issue 90 it was stated that Elasti-Girl "must grow or diminish all of her", i.e. she changes size proportional, not making one part of herself bigger or smaller. That changes in this issue where she just grows her arm.

The Day The World Went Mad! The Doom Patrol #96
Balu Sutra's associates predicted that his speech would avert war in Asia.
This story was from 1965, hadn't there been a little war in Asia (i.e. Vietnam) that had been running since the 1950s?

The Cobra Syndicate has a funny way of inviting the Doom Patrol to help them. Knocking out Negative Man & Elasti-Girl then telling Robotman to come with them & they won't be hurt? True, it turns out the head of the three families was an impostor, but still, you'd think some member of the family would think that's a little extreme since they are a legal business syndicate.

Three of the Doom Patrol's enemies (General Immortus, Garguax, the Brotherhood of Evil) have joined together to conquer the world & they launch missiles from the moon at 13 population centers on the Earth.
Okay, at the time of writing the Doom Patrol was in it's own continuity, but years later it was established to be set on Earth One so where was the Justice League of America?

The War Against The Mind Slaves The Doom Patrol #97
The cover reads, "Starring the Original World's Strangest Heroes!"Obviously that's a reference to some other comic, or cartoon, using the term "World's Strangest Heroes", but I'm drawing a blank on what that other comic, or cartoon, could have been. Anyone have a guess? It would have been back in 1964 or '65.

Some time has passed since last issue, but Immortus, Garguax & the Brotherhood of Evil are still on the moon plotting against Earth, so why hasn't Superman or Green Lantern taken care of that moonbase?

The Fantastic Origin Of Beast Boy The Doom Patrol #99
Last issue Beast Boy was called "Gar" in his civilian identity, here he's called "Craig" (& it'll be back to Gar next issue.)
NNAN since, at this point, his full name has never been given. (I believe later his first name was said to be Garfield, but I don't know if Craig has been mentioned later, although I'd guess it was made a middle name.)

Oddly enough, in the flashback to his youth his parents never call him by name, preferring terms of endearment such as "the child", "boy", & "son".

Beast Boy's father (Mark) has invented a machine that can "reverse evolution". Later when "the boy" gets sick his father realizes that the illness can only be survived if his son were turned into a West African Green Monkey & uses the device to turn back evolution so his son becomes a green monkey.
Humans aren't descended from monkeys. Also I don't believe the real green monkey is as green as comics usually color Beast Boy. (Wikipedia describes the fur as golden-green.)

I, Kranus, Robot Emperor! The Doom Patrol #101
This story reveals that Garguax, Immortus & the Brotherhood of Evil still have their base on the dark side of the moon.
Is this the same one or a separate one they built after the Doom Patrol had to let them go in issue 97? (The villains had planted a bomb to destroy the Earth in case they had been captured, so the Patrol had been forced to let them go.)

NANJAO. This story ends with a guest appearance, and the start of a crossover with the Challengers Of The Unknown.

The Lonely Giant
Poor Mary calls Cliff "Robotman".
Problem is, this story is told after Cliff got his brain put in the robot body, but before he joined the Doom Patrol & his original code name was Automaton.

The Manhunter From Mars

Are there any long lasting starring series that work without having a supporting cast? I found myself thinking that one problem with the Martian Manhunter series was that lack of a good supporting cast. He had Captain Harding, who pretty much just gave him assignments & about whom we knew nothing. Policewoman Diane Meade, who started off as a love interest, then kind of was just there. Zook a combination sidekick/pet who could be useful or a hindrance depending on the story. Various stories would have one appearance friends show up & disappear, but the writers didn't seem too interested in fleshing out anyone enough to make them a memorable character to the readers.

All stories reprinted in Showcase Presents Martian Manhunter Volume 2

NNAN. Earlier Showcase Presents editions, such as Green Arrow's, included team-ups in The Brave And The Bold, such as issue 50 where GA teamed up with J'onn J'onzz. I guess they rethought that policy as they don't include Brave & Bold 50, or any other team-up story, in this collection.

Alias Scarface Scanlon Detective Comics #307
JJ thinks, "I must try something I've never tried before on Earth-- change my identity to some one other than detective John Jones".
You mean like in issue 233 where you changed yourself to the ghost of Gus Bartley or issue 249 where you took on the appearance of the governor or 276 where you took on a completely different appearance?

The Day John Jones Vanished! Detective Comics #308
The most interesting thing about this story is left unexplained. A medieval ring of the kingdom of Lavonia has the ability to fire electrical bursts. No attempt to explain or handwave this unique item is made.

The Man Who Saved Earth Detective Comics #309
NANJAO. I wonder if the Dr. Horace Reeves from this story is related to the Dr. Alvin Reeves from issue 301.

The Miniature Manhunter! Detective Comics #310
NANJAO. DC, assuming a turnover of readers around a year & half to two years, would occasionally recycle story ideas. This is a variant of The Midget Manhunter from issue 261. There's nothing that says the first story didn't happen except for a lack of references to it.

The villain grabs the miniaturized Martian Manhunter & JJ spins so fast the friction burns the bad guy's hand.
Uuuuuummmm... shouldn't the heat weaken JJ or is it just heat from oxidation that's his weakness?

The villain plans to steal a force field device to protect him from cop bullets. Just before he steals the device the two scientists working on it say that the model checks out, but it would need enormous power to make a full-size weapon work, the crook then steals the model.
Presumably the crook plans to use his device to enlarge it. However it strikes me that he must be very overconfident to think he can make the enlarged device work like a full-size machine would. Would enlarged batteries, for instance, produce more power then normal sized ones?

The Invaders From The Space Warp Detective Comics #312
Well, apparently the creators were getting desperate as they added a cute animal sidekick to the series.
Why? Whyyyyyyyyyyy?!? Do creators get some sick twisted pleasure out of inflicting these horribly annoying things on an audience?

After sending the 2 criminals & the lawman home through the closing space warp JJ & Diane discover that the zook was left behind & Diane comments that the Manhunter now has a pet.
Sadly, Zook didn't suffer the fate of JJ's last pet, the dog Jupiter, who disappeared without a trace.

For that matter, how unimaginative is JJ, calling the zook "Zook"? That's like having a pet dog named "Dog", or a cat named "Cat".

J'onn J'onzz' Pesky Partner Detective Comics #313
JJ is teaching Zook about the Earth. He mentions that it's very cold at the poles & Zook goes, "Brrrrrr..."
One of Zook's powers is to generate cold, he can also generate heat. So the whole "Brrrrr..." thing doesn't seem believable.

NANJAO. Zook seems like Cryll of the Space Ranger series.

The Man Of 1,000 Disguises Detective Comics #315
JJ discovers that Porto, the famous impersonator, is really a crook, so he captures the man & takes his place at the next show hoping the gang members will show up. At one point he impersonates a Plutonian Bird-Man which is one of Porto's disguises, but according to a thought of JJ's there really are Plutonian Bird-men & they move really fast & surprisingly they look just like Porto's disguise.
Unless there was an untold story where Plutonian Bird-men came to Earth & that's where Porto got his design from, that makes no sense.

The Challenge Of The Alien Robots Detective Comics #317
NANJAO. Finally, after 8 years the city the Martian Manhunter is based in is identified. I don't believe Middletown's belated naming is a record, though. As far as I can tell Green Arrow's Star City wasn't named until 1959 (although I've heard he was originally said to have been based in New York City, so...) For some reason comic writers would just go out of their way to avoid actually naming the cities some heroes were based in (wouldn't stop them from naming nearby towns & cities though).

The Hero Of 500 B.C. Detective Comics #325
Last issue JJ turned into a creature that breathed fire & because of that was unable to change back to his Martian form, this issue JJ turns into another type of fire-breathing beast, but has no problem changing back.

The Death Of John Jones, Detective Detective Comics #326
Pages 7 & 8. The life size model of a dinosaur sure seems to change position a lot for just being a model.

NANJAO. This is the last issue of Detective for JJ's run to be replaced by The Elongated Man. Also the last appearances (in his 1960s run) of his human identity of John Jones, & the supporting cast of Captain Harding & policewoman Diane Meade.

The Giant-Maker House Of Mystery #143
NANJAO. Since his human identity of John Jones was believed killed in Detective Comics # 326, the logo for his adventures has changed from John Jones Manhunter From Mars to J'onn J'onzz Manhunter From Mars.

The Man-Thing That Unearthed Secrets House Of Mystery #149
2 issues ago, Zook thought that maybe the Idol-Head of Diabolu hadn't released an evil menace on the full moon & JJ was the pessimist. This issue it's reversed.

"Driftwood" Dagan turns into a giant weasel to get into the Martian Manhunter's secret cave.
Problem is the only entrance to the Martian Manhunter's secret cave is a small slit for Zook, who can flatten himself. JJ doesn't need an entrance because he can turn intangible & move through solid rock.

Supernatural Masterpieces! House Of Mystery #150
NNAN, but where's Zook? It's not like Zook goes to school or teams up with the Teen Titans. No explanation is given.

The Doom From Two Worlds House Of Mystery #151
The aliens in the dimensional world have a freeze gun that produces blasts 25,000 degrees below zero.
Just a wee bit lower than Absolute Zero.

The Giants Who Slept 1,000,000 Years House Of Mystery #153
It's said that Zook is "ailing" which is why he doesn't appear in this story (& presumably the next 2 issues).
Gee... your alien sidekick from another dimension is sick & you're not worried that maybe he's caught some disease that his alien immune system can't cope with?

It's said that Professor Arnold Hugo escaped Bayville Prison, but later Hugo is terrorizing Mayville.
As Bayville only is mentioned once vs. multiple uses of Mayville, I'm guessing it's a typo.

Hugo uses an ancient map & legend to find a cave where three giant cavemen that "are the last of a race of evolutionary freaks that lived eons ago-- These few, being indestructible, ruled the earth once-- and were overcome only by the ice age... living in suspended animation since that time!"
Either Hugo intuited a lot from an old legend or that was one amazingly detailed legend.

The Giant Genie Of Gensu House Of Mystery #155
NNAN but presumably the last two stories took place within a week, because issue 153 said it would be a week till the full moon (which is when the Idol Head of Diabolu releases a new evil) & while 154 featured a magic mirror there is nothing that says it came from the Idol Head (then again nothing says it didn't either).

Page 2, Panel 3. "Mousy" Mulloy's dialogue is in a thought balloon, but probably should be in a speech bubble as he gives a command to a genie.

Duke Durgen sure goes from head of a gang to being subservient to Mousy rather easily.
I'd expect a real gang leader to either be plotting revenge or figuring out a way to use Mousy & his Genie.

Look What Happened To J'onn J'onzz! House Of Mystery #156
This month the Idol Head of Diabolu released a cobra-beast that causes trouble at the Central City fair.
So where's the Flash?

The Origin Of The Diabolu Idol-Head House Of Mystery #158
Page 3, Panel 1. The F is missing from the word fantastic in JJ's thought bubble.

The Devil Men Of Pluto House Of Mystery #159
The Jovians must have made some improvements in their spaceships. Here the Devil Men rob a Jovian cargo ship of gold from Mercury, but in Detective Comics #267 the Jovians told JJ that they could only make the trip between Jupiter & Earth when the planets were closest.

The Unmasking Of Marco Xavier! House Of Mystery #161
Page 2, Panel 5. The inker goofed up as you can see Marie's leg through Marco's shoulder.

The Doomed Captive! House Of Mystery #163
As Marco Xavier, the Martian Manhunter tells the head of the criminal organization Vulture that he saw a Mercurian with a disintegrator gun & the power that could give Vulture.
Thing is that the previous issue had a Vulture agent named Sulkar who had his own disintegrator gun. Now while it is possible that Sulkar kept that info from Vulture, JJ really doesn't know if Vulture has the capabilities to make disintegrator guns or not.

JJ tricks the crooks into thinking he's escaped by turning invisible, then when they ask how he escaped he tells them.
Dumb, dumb, dumb!

The Deadly Martian House Of Mystery #165
Okaaaaaaaaaaayyyyy... Professor Hugo has sprayed the Martian Manhunter with a radium spray making him radioactive, so he changes to Marco Xavier & is no longer radioactive.
Huh? That makes no sense.

Thantos-- The 3-In-1 Man! House Of Mystery #168
The radio reports Thantos is heading for Midvale so JJ & Zook go there to try & stop him. Oddly enough there is no sign of Supergirl.
I wonder if the writer meant Middletown instead of Midvale, because Midvale is where Supergirl is based.

The Martian Marauders House Of Mystery #171
JJ is facing a Martian mountain M'mannix which he describes as a "dumb beast".
This "dumb beast" is wearing shorts & boots. How many dumb beasts wear clothes?

Manhunter's Stolen Identity! House Of Mystery #172
Zook uses his ability to turn himself "10,000 degrees below zero".
Wouldn't that be below Absolute Zero?

So You're Faceless! House Of Mystery #173
Faceless says, "You have never failed me, Xavier".
What about issue 170 when Faceless said, "This is the first time you have failed me".

Faceless's secret identity is... Marco Xavier.
Errrr... wait a minute! Supposedly Faceless claims he knew all along that the Martian Manhunter was disguised as Xavier & he was just using him to bait him into a trap, but I don't think this plot twist was planned from the beginning at all. While I can see Faceless sacrificing some operations for a bigger scheme he sacrificed a lot & gained nothing by giving the fake Xavier various assignments.

Faceless mentions a man who pronounced the real Marco Xavier dead.
Uh, no one pronounced Marco Xavier dead. In issue 160 JJ was following Xavier when Xavier's car went off the road & exploded in flames. JJ figured the body would be destroyed & decided to take on Xavier's identity because it was his way to learn more about the criminal organization Vulture. The real Xavier may have had a man ready to pronounce Xavier 'dead', but JJ's impersonation kept that from happening.

You can really tell they had to wrap this up in a hurry. Besides the revelation of who Faceless was*, but Faceless fires a prototype raygun that destroys the whole base of Vulture's operation. ("Yeah, get Dial H For Hero & the Martian Manhunter out of here! The new editor is replacing them with some geezer named Cain! I give that approach six months." ;-)

* Never mind issue 162 where JJ unmasked Faceless only to discover that the real Faceless had Deputies who also wore the Faceless mask & JLA 52 where Hawkman uncovered a Faceless to discover that it was the Martian Manhunter who'd been given amnesia with a strange energy.

Bat Lash was a humorous western title featuring a dandyish rogue.

All stories reprinted in Showcase Presents Bat Lash

Bat Lash #1
A reference is made to a deceased Mexican governor called Don Sergio Aragones (an in-joke as Sergio was the creator of Bat Lash). However, was there really a Mexican governor named Sergio Aragones?

Bat Lash #2-4
All three stories have the same two Laurel & Hardy-esque coffin makers.
Given that Bat Lash usually escapes from towns, it seems unlikely there are all the same town (Welcome in the first story, unnamed in the next two) & it also seems unlikely that they would travel far & wide providing their services as coffins aren't that hard to build.

Bat Lash #5
NANJAO. Sergio Aragones appears as a Mexican bandito.

Page 20, Panel 6. Bat Lash says, "Never doubte brother!"
I think that was supposed to read 'Never doubted it brother!', but a printing error caused part of it to disappear.

Bat Lash #6
Apparently, in an effort to get more readers, the humor angle is dropped & Bat Lash is given a Tragic Backstory^OMT.
Seems out of sorts with what we know of Bat from the earlier tales. At no point prior did we get a hint that he was looking for his parents' killers or that he was planning to one day go back & marry Bitsy Gannon.

Bat Lash #7
Bat Lash is re-united with Don Pasqual, a friend of his father's. Pasqual says that he saw the evil men burn, loot & kill the Lash farmhouse.
Problem is last issue the Lashes had been tricked into selling their farmhouse. It was the shack where they were living & that his sister had said that the shack had been torched by Rickets. (Admittedly, it's not impossible for Rickets to have torched the shack while other men were looting & killing, but Rickets was more of a subtle villain.)

Pasqual says that he saved Bat Lash's younger brother & in panic they fled across the border into Mexico.
The Lash farm was in Louisiana. Pasqual would have had to pass through Texas before crossing into Mexico.

Bat refers to his little brother as Billy, but last issue his brother was named Tom.

DC Special Series #16
Bat Lash gives his name as "Barton A. Lash", but it was "Batton A. Lash" in Bat Lash #3 & the Batton name popped up again in Bat Lash #6.

Jonah Hex #51
Bat recounts what happened to him in Jonah Hex #49, but the editor's caption says, "As recounted in detail last issue".
Issue 49 was 2 issues ago.

Jonah Hex #52
Page 1, Panel 3. Repeats the last panel of the previous issue, but this time the prostitute knows Bat Lash's name. Artistically the scene is drawn differently as well.

Okayyyyyyy... Lavender's uncle hid a million dollars in Confederate gold in the Bourbon Street Social Club. Toward the end of the story a table gets knocked over & Bat Lash & Lavender discover the gold had been molded into the furnishings & painted over.
Sooooooo... in all this time nobody had ever knocked over a table, or scratched the paint & discovered the hidden gold beneath?

Back Cover
"Bartholomew Alouysius Lash".
No story in the collection calls him by that name. Bat Lash #3 calls him "Batton A. Lash", Bat Lash #6 calls him "Batton Lash" & DC Special Series #16 calls him Barton A. Lash. Not a Bartholomew or an Alouysius in the batch.

Tommy Tomorrow
Journey To 1960 World's Finest Comics #113
This story has Tommy travel back in time a hundred years & be helped by a kid named Tommy Tomorrow & back in the future Tommy & Brent muse that maybe that Tommy was Tommy's ancestor.
Problem is Action Comics #255 established that Tommy had been an orphan adopted by Professor & Mrs. Tomorrow, while it's not impossible for him to have been a descendant of 1960's Tommy, it seems unlikely.

Eclipso was a villain who emerged from Dr. Bruce Gordon when an eclipse happened, but Dr Gordon tried to find ways to stop or contain him.

All stories reprinted in Showcase Presents Eclipso

General nits.
Eclipso seems to know everything that Bruce Gordon knows, but Bruce doesn't know anything that Eclipso knows.

It's odd the number of times that it's indicated that Eclipso had appeared between stories. As if natural eclipses weren't rare enough (they can only occur when there is a New Moon) & artificial eclipses only cause short-term appearances.

The Genius Who Fought Himself House Of Secrets #61
With later stories of Eclipso I got the impression that Dr. Bruce Gordon had to be present at the eclipse, but here, in the first story, the eclipse happens over the South Pacific while Bruce is in Solar City (presumably in the USA).

Eclipso hides his uniform & black diamond in the atomic pile because radiation doesn't affect him.
Maybe not, but you'd think it would leave his body & other physical properties radioactive. Must be magic.

Page 7, Panel 7. Part of the W of "now" didn't print making it look like 'Nov'.

Eclipso's Amazing Ally! House Of Secrets #63
NANJAO. This story has the first artificial eclipse that affects him, but here it only temporarily causes Gordon to become Eclipso.

In the first 2 stories, both drawn by Lee Elias, Eclipso looks like Bruce Gordon with an eclipsed face. Alex Toth who drew this issue changed that, making Eclipso have uglier features, wild hair & pointy ears.
No explanation was given for the change in appearance.

Two nations are about to go to war over which one owns "mazatlan ore". One nation says the ore is in it's country the other claims it originates in it's country, but "underground volcanic activity" moves it.
So what's the problem? Isn't the usual rule of mining that if you can mine it on your own land you own it?

Even more ridiculous, to settle the dispute Dr. Gordon is asked to test the ore.
Really, if the one country thinks the ore originates on their land they should just mine for it on their land. Yeesh!

Page 4, Panel 1. Bruce shows the scar given him when Mophir scratched him with the black diamond. It's diamond-shaped & on his right arm.
1. I'd expect a scar to not be so evenly shaped.
2. The original story indicates that it was his left arm that was scratched.

Hideout On Fear Island House Of Secrets #64
NNAN. This story starts off with Mona knowing that Bruce is Eclipso & an editor's box explains that the story of how she found out will be explained next issue. So for some reason they chose to print these stories out of sequence.

The first two stories indicated that an eclipse anywhere on Earth would change Bruce to Eclipso, this story indicates that he must be in the area of the eclipse.

Somehow the last time Eclipso had been 'out' he knew Gordon would go to another country so he hid his Eclipso uniform in the luggage.

This story ends with Bruce wearing half the Eclipso uniform (the other half appears to have been left in Dr. Kluge's lab & probably destroyed when Fear Island was blown up). The next issue is set prior to this issue, but issue 66 has Eclipso retrieving his uniform from the atomic pile where he usually hides it.
So did Eclipso have to make himself a new uniform after this story or was the uniform he hid in the luggage a copy?

The Man Who Destroyed Eclipso House Of Secrets #65
Judson Randall's 'cure' splits or creates a separate Eclipso from Bruce, wearing the Eclipso uniform, which is odd since Eclipso usually hides his uniform when he gets the chance.

At the end Eclipso is believed destroyed, but Bruce says that Eclipso was just a "split freak" given life by Judson's experiment & that the real Eclipso is still inside him
Uhhhhh... riiiiiiight... how exactly Bruce knows this is not explained.

Challenge Of The Split-Man! House Of Secrets #67
Diablo Island is now called Eclipso Island.

The scratch from Mophir's diamond is on Bruce's left arm, whereas issue 63 had it on his right arm.

NANJAO. An experiment to make Eclipso good results in Eclipso becoming a separate entity under an eclipse.

Eclipso's Deadly Doubles!! House Of Secrets #68
Jack Sparling, who takes over drawing the series (unfortunately) seems to take inspiration from Two-Face by giving the eclipsed side of Eclipso's face a mouth that won't close & unnaturally wide-open eye.
No explanation was given for the change in appearance.

NNANJAO. Bruce manages to temporarily exile Eclipso into a dimension he calls Dimension Zero.
Makes a change from all the Dimension X's that keep popping up, but oddly enough, another writer used the name Dimension Zero for a two-part Green Arrow story years earlier. Too many differences for it to be the same dimension.

Bruce Gordon, Eclipso's Ally! House Of Secrets #70
Are there panthers in South America?

Eclipso makes a train car levitate.
The only time Eclipso had the power to levitate things was because of Judson Randall's experiment in issue 65, something he hasn't been shown to do since. (Well, there was the repelling power he gained in issue 66, but he seemed to lose that by the end of the story.)

Bruce Gordon lost his memory banging his head, but it's restored by a bullet creasing his head.
Ah, the percussive treatment of amnesia...

Eclipso Must Die! House Of Secrets #75
A criminal syndicate has decided to kill Eclipso because his operations cut into their own. In order to develop weapons to stop him they end up creating a robot with Eclipso's powers.
1. Isn't it amazing how easily anyone in comics can build a robot?
2. So a criminal syndicate now has the ability to duplicate Eclipso's powers??? You'd think that alone would be valuable to crooks, but I don't think it's turned up in any later stories.

The Moon Creatures House Of Secrets #77
Eclipso wears a fake mask of Bruce to trick Mona & the Professor.
Why a mask? He was able to fake being Bruce with some makeup in issue 62. (Then again artist Jack Sparling tends to go overboard on the difference between Bruce & Eclipso whereas Lee Elias had them looking more alike.)

The guards at an observatory are commenting about the astronomers looking at the moon.
Problem is the way the telescope is drawn & the position of the moon in the sky, indicates the telescope is focused on something else. Then again, what do guards know? ;-)

Monster Eclipso House Of Secrets #78
Cover. Bruce says, "This secret solar eclipse has transformed Eclipso into a monster!"
In the story it's a second eclipse, not a secret eclipse.

Not sure if this is a nit or not. An Eskimo is shown looking up at the eclipse, which had me wondering how high up in the Arctic sky would a solar eclipse be?

Page 7, Panel 5. Only minutes left until an eclipse, but a shot of the sky only shows the sun, no moon

London Bobbies using machine guns???

House Of Secrets #79
NAN, but if you've got a dark sense of humor the cover hyping the second crossover of Eclipso & Prince Ra-Man with the phrase "You asked for it!" is rather amusing when you consider this was the next to last issue. (Okay, it was revived around three years later, but that was as a horror comic, not as a showcase for these two characters.)

The New Gods was part of Jack Kirby's Fourth World mythos & mostly focused on Orion, a New God of New Genesis, & his fight against Darkseid of Apokolips.

All stories reprinted in Jack Kirby's New Gods

Orion Fights For Earth! New Gods #1
NANJAO. Having never read the original stories before I assumed that this "Anti-Life" that Darkseid was seeking was some unknown & unknowable mumble-jumble. Here it's explained that the "Anti-Life equation" is "outside control of all living thought!"
That's it? Mind-control? Really?

This issue ends with a Prologue.
As Prologues precede stories & Epilogues end them did Jack make a mistake or was he just being clever?

O'Ryan Gang And The Deep Six New Gods #4
This nit could have gone in issue 3, but I considered the possibility that not enough time may have elapsed from issue 1. (How much time passes between issues is never stated.)
Anyway in issue 1 Orion rescued 4 people (Dave Lincoln, Victor Lanza, Claudia Shane & Harvey Lockman) from Apokolips. Issue 2 they arrive at private investigator Dave Lincoln's apartment. Issue 3 one, or more, of them have been out to pick up some Earth clothes to wear, then Orion & Lincoln go out to track down some of Darseid's minions. This issue has Orion & Lincoln discovering the body of another New God then returning to the apartment where the others are apparently waiting.
Don't they have jobs & homes to get to? Lanza is an insurance investigator with a wife & kids. Claudia is a secretary. Harvey is a teenager. The impression, however is that they are spending all their time at this apartment.

Spawn New Gods #5
This issue establishes the Earth city Orion came to & stays in as being in Metropolis, which does bring up the question of where the heck is Superman during some of these incidents?

The Pact! New Gods #7
Page 22, Panel 4. Him is misspelled as Hhm.

The Death Wish Of Terrible Turpin! New Gods #8
You'd think while Kalibak is destroying part of Metropolis someone might have asked where Superman was?

Beat The Black Racer!!
Page 1, Panel 2. "Youngesak" should read Young Esak.

The Doom Patrol

All stories reprinted in Showcase Presents The Doom Patrol Volume 2

8 Against Eternity Doom Patrol #102
This is actually the second part of a crossover with Challengers Of The Unknown #48 which is not reprinted in this collection (and, as far as I know, hasn't been reprinted period.) Although it's not necessary to have read the Challs issue to understand the story here, it would have been nice had they reprinted it.

Page 4, Panel 1. Rita (Elasti-Girl) is in a swimsuit while Steve (Mento) Dayton mentally holds her up, so she stretches her arm & slaps him.
Oddly enough when she stretches her arm her hand gains a glove not seen in the previous panels.

Why would a legend about Atlantis tell of a civilization pushed into the sea by a volcano, when the civilization is set in the Pacific Ocean (north of Australia, between New Guinea & the Celebes)?

NANJAO. Beast Boy is identified as Gar Logan in this issue.
So, what about the name Craig that was used in issue 100?

Gar is hungry, his cheapskate guardian has put a lock & chain on the fridge, fortunately Gar had previously moved the nameplate & drilled a hole into the fridge that he can sneak through as a caterpillar.
Wouldn't the hole allow warm air to get in as well?

Multi-Man turns into a school of fish.
How does one person turn into unconnected multiples?

The Challenger-Haters dug down into this Atlantean (?) civilization, preserved in a vacuum under a lava dome & Kra using the knowledge of his alien planet is able to revive the dead people (uh... yeah, sure, why not?) At the end of the story when the lava dome collapses & destroys the city all the revived soldiers invading Japorta turn to dust.
Huh? They were revived by an alien "science" not some magic inherent in their city. Their deaths should be independent of the city's destruction not tied in to it.

The Meteor Man Doom Patrol #103
Professor Ormsby gets transformed by cosmic rays (that sounds familiar) into the Meteor Man and burns a hole through the side of the spaceship to get out causing all the air to rush out so Robotman plugs the hole with himself.
Uh-huh? Amazingly to get a good air-tight seal just took Elasti-Girl to pound him into the hole. I suppose one could ant-nit it by saying that since the Meteor Man was later said to be 4000 degrees it's possible the metal edges of the hole were soft enough to form an air-tight seal, but still...
Of course, since Mento was along for the ride you'd think he could have used his telekinesis to plug the hole, he did later use his telekinetic shield to hold Meteor Man, after all, but maybe he didn't think of it.
I did also remember a Heinlien story (Gentlemen, Please Be Seated) where it was mentioned that the human skin is strong enough to provide a seal & given that Elasti-Girl can expand any part of her body like... her hand (what did you think I was going to suggest?) to block the hole, although if the edges of the hole are still near the 4000 degrees it took to burn through, that could be painful.

The coming attraction for the next issue says, "Mento asks Rita for her elastic hand!"
He did that last issue (she said no) what's the big deal? Heck, his whole reason for becoming a superhero was to woo Rita.

No Home For A Robot
Man this Davis Experimental Industries is something. A simple walk through the building showed them working on an experimental super-rocket bomber, a flying war tank, a laser cannon shown cutting through 3 feet of steel, thermal rays that are bringing down a plane (presumably a model), a device that absorbs light & a personal rocket pack.
You know, most businesses tend to focus on a specific type of thing & even when they do expand to other areas they don't usually build and/or test everything in the same area. Boeing, which through the years has worked on things besides airplanes, usually has various facilities for building different things as well as areas for testing.

Despite all that fancy-schmancy tech the company is working on, security is an old man who personally checks clearance passes, except for when someone distracts him by telling him his coffee pot is boiling over.
*rolls eyes*

Also on the security front (or rather lack of) crooks are threatening to harm Randy Steele's wife (Randy is Robotman's kid brother), so he gets them security clearance & brings them into the factory where he gives them some jet packs & they fly out of the building with them.
... uhhhh... yeahhhhhh... riiiight... surrrrrrrrre...

The Bride Of The Doom Patrol Doom Patrol #104
NANJAO. Page 9, Panel 1. A drunk, who looks suspiciously like Tony "Iron Man" Stark, appears.
Amusing since this issue is from 1966 & Tony Stark wouldn't be shown to be an alcoholic until the late '70s or early '80s.

The Justice League are guests at Elasti-Girl & Mento's wedding.
Interesting since I believe the only member to have met the Doom Patrol before was Flash in The Brave And The Bold #65.

Superman wonders aloud where Clark Kent is as Kent had been assigned to cover this wedding.
Interesting as the wedding takes place three hours after Rita accepts Steve's proposal.

Wonder Girl, Kid Flash & Robin are there, drawn like they are little kids instead of teenagers.

Super-Hip from DC's Adventures Of Bob Hope series is at the wedding.

Oddly enough, the Challengers Of The Unknown, whom the Doom Patrol actually had a crossover with can't be seen amongst the wedding guests.

Honeymoon Of Terror Doom Patrol #105
Beast Boy turns into a swarm of fireflies.
Arnold Drake seems to love the ridiculous idea of a single individual becoming multiple things at once. He did it with the Animal-Vegetable-Mineral Man, Multi-Man & now Beast Boy.

Blood Brothers Doom Patrol #106
Galtry says to a fat man that he hired him to do a job, but that he bungled it & the editor's box says it happened in issue 103, except that no one resembling the fat man was in that issue. It does appear to be Mr. Z from issue 101 however, but he still didn't bungle the job, Galtry warned him that he was being watched so he didn't do it.

Kid Disaster Doom Patrol #108
Page 14, Panel 1. Editor's note "*An android is an artificial being in human form -- like Elvis Presley, for example!"
*snicker*

Mento refers to Monsieur Mallah, as Sam Simian, (I assume as some kind of insult or belittling technique).
IIRC that's the name of the Ape from Angel And The Ape.

Trial By Terror Doom Patrol #110
Earlier this issue the judge ruled in favor of Gar staying with Galtry, which should have resulted in a closed case, so how did Steve & Rita's lawyer reopen the case to present new evidence?

Zarox-13, Emperor Of The Cosmos Doom Patrol #111
Opening caption reads, "Man's first meeting with a being from another planet could be the beginning of an incredible interplanetary alliance!"
First meeting? One of the Doom Patrol's recurring foes is the alien Garguax. When they teamed up with the Challengers Of The Unknown they fought Kra, an alien robot, and at Elasti-Girl & Mento's wedding Superman was one of the guests. I think it's safe to say that the ship has sailed on man's "first meeting" with an alien being.

Larry is giving the scientists a running commentary on Negative Man's progress as he flies away from Earth.
Thing is since Negative Man flies at the speed of light he probably should have zipped past all those things before Larry could mention them.

Neg Man's Last Road!
At the end of this story (set just before the formation of the Doom Patrol) the Chief is making his proposition to Negative Man while Elasti-Girl & Robotman are in the room. Which contradicts issue 105 which showed Negative Man helping the Chief to get Robotman into the group.

Brothers In Blood! Doom Patrol #112
The scene on the cover does not happen in the story.

NNAN. Last issue Rita went off on a mission with the Doom Patrol leaving Mento & Beast Boy at the Dayton mansion. This issue has Mento & Beast Boy at DP HQ. Now it's possible they could have gone to DP HQ while DP was fighting Zarox-13, but their suddenly appearing at the HQ is a little jarring.

Zarox-13, working on the final stages of a plan begun 12 centuries earlier by Zarox-1, is to send Earth into the sun & this will somehow destabilize his own solar system throwing out the worlds he does not control.
Huh? How would the destruction of Earth have any effect on another solar system? Also how did Zarox-1 know what planets would be under his descendant's control?

Waif Of The Wilderness
Some changes in dialogue from the previous telling of Beast Boy's origin in issue 100.

Gar changes into a mongoose, Page 5, Panel 5, show him still wearing his shorts & shoes, the fight with a black mamba shows him as a mongoose without clothes, then on Page 6, Panel 2, he changes back to Gar & he's got his shirt on.

Beast Boy's future guardian is called Simon Galtry.
It was Nicholas Galtry previously.

Who Dares To Challenge The Arsenal Doom Patrol #113
Page 2, Panel 5. In the foreground Robotman is talking to the Chief about the portable TV transmitter Robotman wears, in the background we see Negative Man, followed by Elasti-Girl running into a passageway. In panel 6, the Chief continues the conversation & we see on his monitor Elasti-Girl, followed by Negative Man, running at the camera down a corridor.

Why is Mento wearing his helmet at home while playing chess with Beast Boy?

This issue it's revealed that last issue when Robotman was at the Brotherhood of Evil's HQ, the Chief had him plant a TV device.
1. Looking at the previous issue there doesn't seem to have been time for the Chief to have told Robotman this.
2. Robotman is not the most stealthy guy around so how did he plant the camera in Madame Rouge's room.
3. You'd think the Brain would have been expecting something like that.

In addition to this camera, the Chief somehow has a device planted in a painting in Madame Rouge's room (we see it in the camera shot so it must be a separate device) designed to overcome the treatments that the Brain gave her to make her evil.
Given that he only found out about those treatments after Robotman left for the Brotherhood of Evil's HQ that shows remarkable foresight.

The Diamonds Of Destiny
Part 2 of the flashback to Beast Boy's youth now has him talking like Superbaby instead of like he was talking in last issue's flashback. ("Bad mens want to kill Gar" as opposed to last issue's "A mongoose could kill that snake!")

The farewell to his parents has different dialogue.

The natives have a rather fancy set-up for hiding their idol & gems, the metal gears are especially interesting.

Page 5, Panel 2. Earlier the witch doctor said his tribe would burn men who tried to steal diamonds, but here we see the skeletons of the previous thieves & some of them are chained to the wall of the passageway, as if they were left to starve & decompose rather than be burned to death.

The Mutant Master Doom Patrol #115
Ur, Ar & Ir are three human beings who were born near the first atomic experiments in 1945 & the radiation made them freaks.
They all have three fingers. Ur has a giant eyeball instead of a head. Ar has no head, his face is on his chest. Ir has one eyeball in each hand & no eyes, nose or mouth on his head. You'd think such strange looking kids might have made the news.

Astronomers spot Halley's Comet off course & headed toward Earth.
Could astronomers even see Halley's comet in 1967? Isn't the main way astronomers determine which comet is which by studying the path it is following? If it's off course they would probably think it is another comet.

As Halley's comet approaches Earth it's gravitational influence causes disasters.
I don't think Halley's comet is big enough to do that.

Larry says that Negative Man can never carry his body.
He did two issues ago.

Madame Rouge's schizophrenia causes her body to split in two.
Surprisingly there is no evidence of ripping in two, even her clothes duplicated themselves.

Page 13, Panel 4. Misprinted panel. Only some outlines appear & no text.

Two To Get Ready... And Three To Die! Doom Patrol #116
Page 10, Panel 5. Larry says, "Look who's here! Madame Tarantula herself!"
I'd have expected this comment from Rita, or Beast Boy, both of whom are in the room, but Larry knew the Chief had managed to awaken the good in Madame Rouge & even used Negative Man to pick her up in Paris & carried her & Robotman around the world.

The government launched a series of atom bomb missiles to destroy Halley's comet. The comet swerves to avoid the first missile & the explanation is, "The comet has no precise path-- since it's been yanked from its orbit! They'll have to get lucky to hit it!" The next panel shows the comet avoiding more missiles & the explanation is, "It's the law of chance! The odds against a handful of rockets hitting it must be a billion to one!"
1. It does have a precise path... now! It's been drawn toward the Earth. While a missile fired from Earth might veer off & miss a small object, that wouldn't explain the comet veering away from the missiles.
2. The gravity of the comet is causing earthquakes & tidal waves on Earth, therefore the missiles should be drawn to it as they get closer. Missing seems highly unlikely.

Negative Man, being in a hurry, drops off Rita & Robotman short of the peak of the Andes mountains.
Negative Man, who can fly at the speed of light, even when carrying someone, couldn't spare the extra millisecond?

How many species of abominable snowmen are there on Earth-1? Superman #143 gave them one appearance, The Brave And The Bold #35 revealed they were descendent of aliens & had a more cavemen-like appearance. Here an abominable snowman has horns.

Halley's Comet is destroyed before reaching Earth.
Guess any DC Comic that features Halley's Comet after this is a nit.

Wonder where Superman, or Green Lantern, was when Halley's Comet was threatening Earth?

The Rage Of The Wrecker Doom Patrol #120
It's called a satellite, but the artist drew a lunar lander.

Page 1 we can see the lunar orbiter behind the lander, but when a missile destroys the "satellite" (lander) the orbiter is nowhere to be seen.

You'd think that with almost every Russian & American satellite being destroyed the Russians & Americans would have sent up some rockets to see what was going on rather than just letting two members of the Doom Patrol check it out.

Robotman & Negative Man discover that a whole bunch of space junk has been brought together into a conglomeration they refer to as a Sargasso Of Space.
As big as that thing would have to be, you'd think astronomers might have spotted it.

Robotman breaks a hole into one of the spaceships as the Chief is warning, "If there's air in that building".
It's a spaceship, not a building, Chief.

The rush of air sends them flying & Robotman says, "Figure how we're gonna break out of this explosive wave before we're driven halfway to Mars! Our mini-rockets aren't strong enough!"
Page 1 showed them flying into space from Earth, so their mini-rockets are strong enough to leave Earth's gravity, but aren't strong enough to break out of a breeze caused by explosive decompression?

Page 8. NANJAO. The shattered body of Robotman is the same picture that is used on the cover. Some parts are missing, but it looks like they just used a photocopy, or something, for that part of the cover.

Apparently the Chief rebuilt RA-2, the robot that saved his life, because it's in a museum of early robots that the Chief had manufactured. However when he told the Doom Patrol about how he met General Immortus he mentioned that he had destroyed RA-2.

The Death Of The Doom Patrol? Doom Patrol #121
NAN here, but when the Brotherhood Of Evil's HQ is blown up we see the Brain's case split open, so one wonders how the later writer who revealed that the Brain was still alive got around that, (if he ever bothered to explain it).

After, I don't remember how many, attacks on Doom Patrol HQ the concept of the collateral damage to the surrounding city & people finally comes up.

Robotman calls one of the villains they've defeated "Mr. 104".
While he did add an additional element to his makeup in his last encounter with the DP, nobody called him Mr. 104 in that story.

The government thinks they can protect the Doom Patrol from the now evil again Madame Rouge & if the DP doesn't go voluntarily the government will start deportation proceedings.
The US can legally deport a native US Citizen? I thought that was only for people who were born elsewhere.

Elasti-Girl is expanding & Captain Zahl fires a steel net over her & she says she hasn't the strength to break out of the net.
1. Given that her strength increases as she grows that must be one strong net.
2. Why not shrink, get out of the net & grow again?

Firestorm was a fusing together of Ronnie Raymond & Prof. Martin Stein to become the Nuclear Man

The Secret Origin Of Firestorm The Fury Of Firestorm #22
These nits probably go in the original version of the origin, but I didn't have that issue, so...

Professor Stein's former assistant claims that Stein stole his ideas & the Nuclear Regulations Council decides to prevent Stein from putting the plant online until they can investigate the claims.
1. A fired employee claims his boss stole the employee's plans & the authorities choose to believe the employee? (NNAN, but certainly questionable.)
2. Why prevent the plant from going online? If the Council finds the plans were stolen the money that the plant makes, as well as partial or total ownership would just go to the person the plans were stolen from.
3. Shutting down the plant apparently consisted of handing Stein a legal document & leaving. I guess the Nuclear Regulations Council believes in the honor system.
4. Later the fired assistant sneaks into the plant to make copies of Stein's plans to back up his claim of theft. Guess the NRC does believe in the honor system since this indicates that all the evidence he gave the NRC was... his word.

Criminals plan to blow up the facility & they are able to get in because, "with the plant officially shut down, there are no security guards!"
Wait, what???? Just because the plant is shut down is no reason to dismiss the guards. 1. the plant is under an investigation, so guards to prevent tampering would make sense (well, unless you're a member of the NRC). 2. There is both valuable & deadly material in the plant, so you would want guards to prevent theft and/or exposure to radioactive materials.

Through The Gauntlet The Fury Of Firestorm #64
At this point in time writer John Ostrander turned Firestorm into his puppet for espousing his naive view of nuclear weapons & because of his actions Firestorm was declared to be an international outlaw. Ronnie is arguing with his father over his recent actions as Firestorm & ends the argument by saying he didn't agree to give governments the power to destroy the world.
Yeahhhhhhhh... there's a compelling argument... *rolls eyes* Either Ronnie's father is just as stupid as his son to buy it, or he realized that his son is bat guano insane & further arguing is pointless.

Ronnie, Prof. Stein & his family are wondering what to do next, now that Firestorm is a wanted outlaw.
Actually, it's pretty simple. Don't become Firestorm again. Heck Prof. Stein has brain cancer & is close to dying anyway (he dies* in the Firestorm Annual which was the next & final part of this storyline) and, as far as they know, with Stein dead Ronnie can never be Firestorm again.

* Well, at least for a while...

The Suicide Squad was ordered to bring Firestorm in. Colonel Flag, who leads the squad, figures that the public will just assume the villains had just decided to attack Firestorm on their own.
Problem is Colonel Flag can be seen flying the vehicle that the villains came off of & I don't believe Flag has a criminal record.

At the end of the issue, Doreen Day tells the police who Firestorm really is.
You know, how exactly could you prove one man was really a nuclear amalgamation of two people? As long as Ronnie & Prof. Stein deny it, it's just Doreen's word against theirs.

Dial H For Hero is about teenager Robby Reed who discovers a mysterious, alien dial that when the letters corresponding to H-E-R-O are dialed turns him into a superhero, although he's never sure what hero & what powers he will gain when he dials.

I've also heard that the series was similar to Showcase in the sense that they would use the premise as a way of testing out if a certain hero was popular, but I'm not sure how much truth there is to that, although they did have the character become Plastic Man prior to reviving the character in his own book.

All stories reprinted in Showcase Presents Dial H For Hero

Dial H For Hero House Of Mystery #156
The cover reads, "The most original character in comic history!"
So, of all the original characters he's "most original"? What standards do you use to determine this? Was a panel of experts convened to make the judgment?

And for that matter, just how original is he?
A young, intelligent man who uses powers to fight crime? Been done.
A powerless boy who magically becomes a hero? Captain Marvel did it first.
One person who gains different powers to fight crime? Say hi to Jimmy Olsen, for me!

Robby tells grampa he's going to be in his lab & gramps says, "we don't want anymore of these explosions around here!"
Explosions? What kind of experiments is Robby engaged in? ("Laugh at me for saying, "Sockamagee" will they? Muhahaha!")

Robby discovers a strange dial & after several hours, "I've got enough clues to figure out these signs... they seem to be letters of an alphabet-- but of no known language in our civilization! This gadget must have somehow come from another world-- a mysterious dimension!"
Well that's quite a leap. There are undeciphered languages on Earth, so the possibility that this was some remnant of a forgotten human civilization is not out of the question, but the boy genius doesn't even consider the possibility.

For a device in an alien language, why do the heroes he becomes have English letter logos? (GB for Giantboy, C for Cometeer, & M for The Mole.)
Even odder, the names he uses match the letters, but the writing makes it seem like he's come up with these names himself.

NNAN. Robby thinks, "Better take my Dial H with me".
Rather clumsy way to refer to it, you'd think he might go with something like Dial, Hero Dial, or the later H-Dial, instead.

NNAN. As the Mole, Robby buries most of the Thunderbolt gang under dirt. At least 2 villains have their legs sticking straight up out of the dirt, indicating that their heads are probably buried.
Finally, a Silver Age hero who isn't afraid of killing some nameless mooks in the name of justice! ;-)

The Marauders From Thunderbolt Island House Of Mystery #157
I'm not familiar with the workings of computers from the 1960s, but I found it amusing that the criminal gang Thunderbolt chose to steal the "cosmic computer" by using a magnetic ray to bring it to them. Wouldn't see crooks trying that with a modern-day computer.

The Thunderbolt gang uses the fake island atop their submarine to blend in with the shoreline.
1. The island is smaller than the width of the sub.
2. They do this right next to a street & buildings. You'd think the people would notice the new addition.

When he first becomes Super-Charge the energy he radiates starts melting the bridge he's on, but later when he's captured in a magnetic ray by Thunderbolt, why doesn't he start radiating more energy to get out of imprisonment?

Robby remembers that it takes time to use the dial to become a new hero, so he has to wait a while.
1. When did he discover this?
2. Last issue it only seemed like a few minutes had passed between the time he was Cometeer & when he became the Mole.

Dial "V" For Villain House Of Mystery #158
The cover shows both the villain & Robby with a dial device.
In the actual story they use the same device.

Robby, as Quakemaster, gets knocked out & crook Daffy Dagan finds the dial, & randomly dials V-I-L-L-A-I-N & gains superpowers.
1. What about the time limit mentioned last issue? Or is that just for dialing H-E-R-O?
2. What are the odds he would just happen to spell a word given he doesn't know the language?
3. Close-ups of the dial show ten holes, 9 of which correspond to H, E, R, O, V, I, L, A, N.

Quakemaster uses a gun to fire a vibration disc at Daffy's car so he can track the crook to his lair.
Previous panels showed no holster on Quakemaster where he could hold that gun.

The Clay-Creep Clan House Of Mystery #159
Robby, as Hypno-Man, has commanded some crooks to not move until the police arrive. Then he examines the hideout for clues.
Why didn't he just command some of the crooks to tell him what they know about the Clay Clan?

About using the H Dial Robby thinks, "Sometimes I have to wait awhile to change again after I return to normal!"
So now it's a plot convenient waiting period?

The Wizard Of Light House Of Mystery #160
Robby's cousin has pictures of some of the new superheroes up on his wall, including Hypno-Man & Mighty Moppet.
Last issue Robby became Hypno-Man just before invading a crook's hideout, learned the general location of the Clay King's hideout & stopped being him while confronting the Clay King. It's possible he could have met with police and had his picture snapped between those events, it's just that the writing implies he went straight from one hideout to looking for the other hideout.
He became Mighty Moppet at the Clay King's hideout & met with police when turning the gang over to them. Guess the police must have brought an unseen photographer with them.

Robby turns into Giantboy again, oddly enough the H Dial must have grown along with him as it still fits in his hand.

To stop a flood from wiping out a farm community, Giantboy tosses blocks of granite from a nearby quarry to form a perfectly, straight wall in front of the flood waters causing the flood waters to split.
Yeahhhhhhh... riiiiiight... suuuuuuuuuuure...

Robby becomes a hero & thinks to himself that he is King Kandy. The Wizard Of Light calls him King Kandy, even though he has no way of knowing this is his name. Suzy also calls him King Kandy, although she might have just heard the Wizard say it.

NANJAO. When Robby becomes Plastic Man he recognizes him as the hero from years ago.

Because the Wizard Of Light is immune to the anti-gravity light, Robby realizes that he must really be Dr. Drago who was immune to a poison gas from earlier in the story.
Huh?

The Mummy With Six Heads House Of Mystery #161
Robby is pouring chemicals while his attention is focused on the TV.
Yeahhhhhhh... that's a safe lab procedure... Grandpa's comment about explosions in the first story comes to mind...

Littleville is hosting a premiere of a new movie that the biggest names in show business are paying $100 dollars a ticket to see???
So much for being a small, rural community. (Then again issue 168 says that Zenith City is the big city neighboring Littleville, so maybe the writer meant this to take place in Zenith, but forgot to write the name into the story?)

NANJAO. Robby becomes... Magneto... no, no, not the X-Men villain.

As Magneto, Robby lacks the power to fly.
Don't most magnetic heroes manipulate the magnetic field of the Earth to fly?

To get to the city quickly Robby focuses his power on a tall metal spire in the city which pulls him through the air, but later he stops a metal sand sled with his magnetic powers.
The first makes sense because the spire, presumably, outweighs Robby as Magneto. The second doesn't because the "sled" is the size of a car and has a rocket motor.

The villain uses his powers to dislodge boulders from the moon & rain them down on Magneto.
Shouldn't that take longer than a few seconds?

A ship is carried by what the writer describes as an arm of water, but the artist draws it as a wave.

Baron Bug And His Insect Army House Of Mystery #163
Several times in the story Castor & Pollux seem to be missing the wings on their boots.

Dr. Cyclops - The Villain With The Doomsday Stare House Of Mystery #164
Page 2, Panel 1. Says the story is set in "Senith City", but it's Zenith City for the rest of the story.

Robby thinks, "A super nova is a very brilliant star with tremendous energy..."
Actually a supernova is an exploding star.

Dr. Cyclops eclipse lenses blackout the whole city & Robby as Super Nova can't see anything.
You'd think a character with the energy of a star could create light.

Dr. Cyclops uses diminishing lenses to reduce paintings he steals from a museum & they can only be restored by gazing on them with reverso lenses. However, at the end Robby smashes Dr. Cyclops lenses so shouldn't the paintings still be shrunk?

Dr. Cyclops actually is a cyclops with one eye where normal people have two.
Other than being the basis for his name it has no bearing on the plot & nobody reacts unusually to his appearance.

The Freak Super-Heroes House Of Mystery #165
The cover says there is a double-page pin-up of the Robby Reed heroes, but unfortunately the Showcase Presents volume does not reproduce it.

NANJAO. This story states that Central City is near Littleville.
One wonders why the Flash hasn't dropped by to meet all these superheroes who keep popping up?

On the other hand this makes the fourth city that's near Littleville: Whale Harbor (across the bay), Granite City (close enough that Littleville prowl cars were called in to help with a problem), Zenith City (downstream) & now Central City.
At what point do you have so many cities around that you stop using the phrase near or nearby?

A news report says, "A fantastic criminal named Super-Hood has just appeared near the Central City bank... stand by for later reports..."
When Super-Hood was shown to the Central City gangsters they had never heard of him so how did the radio announcer know?

I find it amusing that they are reporting that he is simply near the bank & not actually doing anything criminal.
Slow news day?

I wonder when banks started using security cameras? Robby as Whozis goes into the bank vault & is trapped, the crooks leave, & Robby turns back to normal & leaves the vault. If there were security cameras police might realize this boy is a superhero.

A whole adventure in Central City & no sign of the Flash?

The Fantastic Rainbow Raider House Of Mystery #167
Wasn't there a Flash villain of the same name? (This one is Doc Quin not Roy G. Biv.)

Sometimes the line marking the Rainbow Raiders collar isn't there making him look like he's bare-chested. Not sure if this was in the original issues or a result of the color-bleaching publishers sometimes do when they don't have the original artwork.

Another nearby city, Montvale is only a few miles away.

The Rainbow Raider planned to commit 7 robberies in 7 towns, presumably each one taking place as he is a different color & has a different power, except that he turned orange between his first & second crime, so it seems like he only committed 6 crimes.

The Rainbow Raider shrinks down a 4,000 pound statue so he can pick it up and carry it away.
Yeahhhhhhhh...

Robby becomes the Radar-Sonar Man, who is blind, but has a radar-vision. He's just about to capture the Rainbow Raider when he "disappears", actually he becomes ultra-violet which is invisible to human eyes.
Wait a minute! Robby has no eyes in this form, he "sees" with radar which he later uses to find the Rainbow Raider. So why the heck did the Rainbow Raider seem to disappear to Robby earlier?

The Marauding Moon Man House Of Mystery #168
The writer can't seem to decide if Robby is the Hoopster or Hoop-Master.

The Monsters From The H-Dial! House Of Mystery #172
Robby refers to Miss Millie as aunt Millie.
Bit of a change from the idea that she was just the housekeeper.

The H Dial Character Tote Bag
Astro, Man Of Space (#169) - mental powers, clairvoyance, teleportation, galactic punch
Balloon Boy (#167) - can make himself light & fly
Baron Buzz-Saw (#170) - buzzing saws that make Robby sleepy, can also fly & throw buzz-saws
Castor & Pollux (#163) - twins, winged boots, stardust sky signal, meteor missiles, sunbeams, cosmic ray bombs, supernova star grenades
Chief Mighty Arrow (#166 & 172) - winged injun pony, flame arrow, explosion arrow, jet-propelled bonnet feathers, expanding tomahawk, lasso
Cometeer (#156) - flight, heat trail
Daffy The Great (#158) - Dial V for Villain, force beams, heat rays, force shield
Don Juan (#170) - has a magic sword that let's him fly & makes him irresistible to women
Future-Man (#162) - great brain power: illusions, levitation
Gem Girl (#169) - Dial H For Heroine (Suzy, not Robby), fly with gem encrusted spurs, ruby earrings produce a buzzsaw, emerald releases green rings that knock people out, necklace has a blue freeze beam
Giantboy (#156 & 160) - giant, super-strength, flight, superspeed, may have been fatally poisoned
Gill Man (#173) - needs to breathe water, can swim over 200 miles per hour
Hoopster (#168) - gimmick hoops: razzle dazzle hoops, static hoop, anchor hoop, hoop-a-jet, boxing glove hoops, energy rings, super-hurricane hoop
Hornet-Man (#161) - wings to fly with & a stinger on his finger to knock people out
Howzis (#165) - pinball machine body, balls produce different effects like a blinding ray, acetylene torch, diminish ray, concussion & sleep gas, flight
The Human Bullet (#157) - flight, tracer vision, smashes through stuff
Human Icicle (#173) - flight, ice pellets
Human Starfish (#159) - four tentacle arms with suction cups
Hypno-Man (#159) - hypnotic disc on chest, disc smashed by a bullet
King Coil (#163) - mass of coiled steel
King Kandy (#160) - lollipop bombs, licorice lasso, gumdrops to cover windshield & a taffy twist to tie up crooks
King Viking (#171) - flight, Viking weapons
Magneto (#161) - repel & attract things magnetically
Mighty Moppet (#159) - a little kid with baby bottles that can shrink & enlarge people
Mr. Echo (#162) - can absorb & reflect force
The Mole - (#156) - drill underground pick up vibrations
Mole-Cometeer (#168) - combined form of The Mole & Cometeer
Muscle Man (#167) - super-strength, can project muscle energy
Plastic Man (#160) - stretch & bounce
Quake-Master (#158) - produces vibrations
Radar-Sonar Man (#157 & 167) - blind, but sees with radar, flight, sends out sonar waves, picks up radio signals
Robby Go-Go (#171) - fights using super-powered dance moves from a discotheque
Robby Robot (#164) - flight, can convert his molecules to wood, splinter spears, electronic sniffer, stretchable arms
Shadow-Man (#161) - thin, shadowy, blends in with the shadows
Solar Mirror (#172) - flight, convert & magnify sun's rays
Sphinx-Man (#170) - rocky body & wings, can fly, asks a riddle & if people can't answer are destroyed
The Squid (#158) - helmet gun that shoots liquid mixtures that can produce flying sleds, fireworks, sounds & lightning
Strata Man (#173) - body composed of different stratas of rock with different abilities, flight, power blast
Super-Charge (#157) - radiates energy
Super Nova (#164) - flight, superspeed, heat
Velocity Kid (#169) - master of speed thanks to a special siren
Whatsis (#165) - looks & flies like a boomerang
Whirl-i-gig (#171) - razor-like arms & legs spinning like mad, breathes fire
Whoozis (#165) - bounce at superspeed
Yankee Doodle Kid (#166) - flight, super-skyrocket blasts, cherry bombs, sparkler missiles, flying pinwheels, fireworks picture display, firecracker fence
Zip Tide (#164) - human wave of water
unnamed (#172) - pendulum shaped & spins
unnamed (#172) - monster made of cosmic dust
unnamed (#172) - flying octopus with literal suction cups
unnamed (#172) - flying manta ray with claw-like tail

Deadman was top circus aerialist Boston Brand until he was murdered during a performance. The spirit Rama Kushna let him continue as an intangible ghost (permanently in his circus outfit) who can possess the living by touch, leaving them with no memory of their time under possession. His ostensible purpose is to discover who killed him, but every lead involves him in an unrelated crime where he plays the hero.

All stories reprinted in Deadman: Book One (2011); originally published in Strange Adventures October 1967--August 1968.

"Who Has Been Lying in My Grave?"

Boston fired Heldrich from the circus just before the show started, so he thought he would be a good suspect for his murder. Heldrich is revealed to be a drug smuggler, using the circus to get heroin from Mexico, at which point Boston decided he wasn't the killer. But wouldn't both sides of Heldrich's supply chain have a vested interest in keeping him working, and be the people most likely (far more likely than Heldrich) to be able to arrange for someone to shoot Brand in the middle of his performance?

NNAN: Boston sees a lawman who has been hanging around the circus buying some heroin from Heldrich and thinks "I'll bet he's a phony cop!". Actually, since this is the cop who was on the scene at Boston's murder---which would clearly have required additional law enforcement presence and additional reports---he would almost certainly have been caught if he were fake. But Boston might not remember that that cop was there, as he was busy dying at the time.

"An Eye for an Eye!"

The story begins with a three-page recapitulation of the origin story, which was originally published the month before in the same magazine, and goes into more detail than is necessary to get readers up to speed for this story. Almost every detail is different, from dialog to Toby the clown's reaction as the first person to reach Boston's body to how Boston discovers he is intangible.

Jeff, ne'er do well brother (and apparently silent partner) of the owner of Deadman's circus shows up demanding money---he conveniently had insured Boston's life for $250,000. Boston decides to investigate Jeff by possessing him. Poor plan; he's an invisible ghost, but instead of following Jeff and listening he puts himself in the position of living Jeff's life---it's only through repeated coincidences that Boston's investigation goes anywhere. He has to look in Jeff's wallet just to find out where Jeff lives. . . (Granted, I think it might have been another five months before Deadman was shown floating instead of walking around on his intangible feet; maybe he was worried he would have had to shank it in pursuit of Jeff's motorcycle.)

The woman in Jeff's apartment see's "Jeff" examining his rifle and says "Jeff, that gun! I knew hanging out with Morty would lead you to this! I'm leaving! I never want to see you again!" This is a .22 rifle "Jeff" is holding within his own apartment, not a sub-machine gun or a bloody knife; it's pretty innocuous to get that kind of response.

The cops, tipped off to potential murder suspect's Jeff return to Dayton, try to catch "Jeff" at the Dayton airport. Their efforts are way over-the-top; they fire a hail of bullets after him, including when he's standing by random porter or riding atop a cab in traffic.

Morty hired Jeff to do a gangland hit on someone in Dayton (at the same time Boston was being killed elsewhere). Morty is blackmailing Jeff on the basis of a picture he took of Jeff pointing a rifle out a window. Maybe the picture could be matched to the location of the murder, but the picture doesn't show the date or the victime--and if Jeff was arrested he could roll on Morty, since he has no motive other than the subcontracted killing. That picture places Morty at the scene, too.

Boston clears Jeff of the murder; Morty really did it. But Morty only did the killing because the sights on Jeff's rifle were so far off; Jeff really did shoot with intent to murder, but Boston seems to be fine with him walking (which the last panel shows him doing). Wouldn't Morty tell the cops the truth anyway?

"What Makes a Corpse Cry?"

When Boston possesses a living person that person has an aura visible only to Boston and the reader. On page 12, the aura that surrounds the possessed Paul is uncolored (it is otherwise yellow or green). On page 13 it is missing in the third and sixth panels.

Rocky's hand was operated on the day before Boston was shot. We know from the last story that Boston was shot on a Sunday; Saturday is odd for surgery, but maybe it was an emergency. But this can't have been more than a few weeks ago, and Rocky's hand looks healed.

On page 13 Rocky holds his gun in his left hand (which makes sense, since he is missing most of two fingers on his right hand). He puts his gun away but when he pulls it again on page 15 and shoots he uses his right hand. This may be plausible, as he just lost those fingers so when in a hurry he might have instinctively used his right hand. That would also explain how he barely nicked "Paul" from six feet away.

"How Many Times Can a Guy Die?"

Boston thinks about the rival aerialist the Eagle as a suspect: "Eagle wasn't dumb enough to do his dirty work in a place where he was known--He probably hired a steel-clawed gunman to rub me out!". At the end of the story, he learns that the Eagle committed a crime on the west coast on September 10. "B-but that's the day I was killed! Then--then--it wasn't the Eagle who did it!!" Um, if the Eagle hired a hitman he could have been anywhere when Boston was murdered. . .

The Eagle wanders around the circus in normal clothes, but then commits an upper-story burglary in his distinctive aerialist costume. Maybe he wears it because he's used to wearing it while doing aerial stunts? But then, just before dawn, when he finally hits the hay he's still wearing it to bed!

Kudos to the creators: over three different issues it is established that Boston was killed in 1967, on a Sunday, and on September 10. September 10, 1967, was indeed a Sunday.

Rip Hunter Time Master invented the Time Sphere which allows him and his companions to travel in time.

All stories reprinted in Showcase Presents Rip Hunter Time Master Volume 1

General Nits
How many times the destination is a round number (100 million BC, 2000 BC, 500 BC, etc.) or how they go back to a time where the last two digits is the same as the year the story was written (1660, 1360, 960, etc.)

Not dressing to blend in with the time period.
Heck, sometimes they announce the fact that they are from the future.

Not doing the logical thing with a time machine.
Admittedly some peoples logical thing might differ from others.
I recall a webcomic stating that if people had a time machine they would do one of two things: see what color the dinosaurs were or drink rum with pirates. ;-)
On the other hand a Clifford Simak novel had a guy with access to time travel being offered money to not take anyone back to the time of Christ because the group feared people trying to disprove his existence.
Now while they do film dinosaurs in their first adventure after that it's more along the lines of just waiting for some new mystery to be solved with a time machine while old mysteries seem to be ignored.
They don't visit the Roanoke colony, they don't try to discover what Greek fire really is, etc., etc.
Admittedly one problem with that type of story is that the author doesn't really know the truth so any explanation would be a guess & probably incorrect at that, but still as nitpickers we're supposed to ignore the reality that it's just a story.


Back Cover
It identifies Jeff as Jeff Smith & Bonnie as Bonnie Baxter.
What I'm wondering is when did those get established as their last names? Challengers Of The Unknown #85 in 1977 stated that Jeff was Jeff Johnson & Bonnie was Bonnie Baxter, although a last name for either of them does not appear in the stories in this collection. Possibly it might have come up in issues 16-29, but those stories are not in the collection.

"struggle with angry Roman gods"
Greek gods. That story is set in Second century BC Greece after all and they're not really that angry. Okay Zeus gets mad at the end of the story, but he settles down quickly.


Prisoners Of 100 Million B.C. Showcase #20

The story starts and Rip has just finished working on the Time Sphere II.
II? This would imply that Time Sphere I had some flaw or was lost, but there it is in the lab and as we find out, it works just as well as Time Sphere II.

The way Rip talks about Time Sphere II you get the feeling that Time Sphere I hadn't traveled in time, but later it does go back in time, so why wasn't the first time travel test done with it?

The Time Selector Dial is interesting. On the left side of the dial we see dates 600, 700, 1000, 1700, 1800 & 1900. The setting for the Mesozoic has no marking & is halfway down the right side. If you've ever seen, or tried to make, a time chart of Earth history those settings are way off.

The first test is to go back 100 million years.
Okay, I can understand wanting to see dinosaurs, but shouldn't your first time travel test be a shorter period of time, just in case something goes wrong?

Page 3, Panel 2. Rip says, "we've bridged a gap off 100 million years!"
Of not off.

Okay, technical nit here. The title establishes the time as 100 million BC, Rip says 100 million years. The title would mean they are 100,001,959 years in the past, Rip's statement would mean they are in the year 99,998,041 BC. Although maybe Rip's just rounding off the years traveled?

Criminals come into Rip's top secret lab *snicker* and in response to Bonnie's wondering what they want, Keegan answers, "You're cooperation, Bonnie! You and your kid brother are gonna do just as we say!" Bonnie says, "How do you know our names?"
Since when is "kid brother" a name? ;-)

Criminals force Bonnie & Corky to take them back in time to collect rare & precious gems. When everyone returns to the future the gems are missing from the bag with the statement that they couldn't take anything from the past.
Huh?
Didn't they breathe the ancient air and probably eat or drink something while they were in the past? Shouldn't that stay there as well and all the time travelers suddenly be gasping for breath, thirsty & hungry?

NANJAO. In some ways, the four main characters are kinda like the later Fantastic Four. The inventor hero (Rip/Reed), the best friend (Jeff/Ben), the girlfriend (Bonnie/Sue) the girlfriend's kid brother (Corky/Johnny).


The Secret Of The Lost Continent Showcase #21

Rip Hunter has a stone tablet recently dug up by archeologists.
Wait, what? Why are archeologists giving Rip Hunter valuable archeological treasures? Is the fact he has a working time machine known amongst archeologists? (Well, okay, last issue two crooks kidnapped Bonnie & Corky & used the Time Sphere I to go 100 million years in the past & Rip & Jeff filmed dinosaurs, so it's possible that the idea he has a time machine is known.)

Solon Chios wrote that he had found the "Lost Continent of Atlantis".
Why he is so sure he found a sunken continent is unrevealed. Outside of sending divers down or using long ropes to try to hook objects from the bottom of the sea, I can't imagine any way someone could be certain where a lost continent went down.

Rip is so amazingly casual about the safety of Bonny & Corky. He invites them to go meet Alexander the Great & then when he finds out that Alexander is currently doing battle with King Darius, he just whisks them all off and parks the Time Sphere between the two armies.

Here they are with Alexander the Great and there are all kinds of questions one could ask if they were to meet him, but all Rip & company seem interested in is seeing this stone tablet he owned.
Yeahhhhhhh...

Bonny asks where the tablet originally came from and Alexander says, "Oh, I can't tell you that! The tablet was reputed to have come from the island of Aeaea-- and brought to the mainland of Greece!"
I think that "can't" was supposed to be a 'can'.

NAN at the time, but since Rip Hunter was made a part of the same universe as Superman & the other heroes...
Here Circe is a woman who makes people think she's a sorceress using trickery, although there was a Superman story that revealed Circe was a Kryptonian & the Supergirl & Wonder Woman stories had Circe as an actual sorceress.
Possible anti-nit. Maybe there was an actual sorceress named Circe, but this was another woman named Circe who pretended to use sorcery?

The fake centaurs are drawn with horse front legs which look too thin to hide the humans real legs.

On the island of Aeaea around 1231 BC, Rip & company find the original stone the tablet was carved from and the map to Atlantis is carved just below the inscription.
Problem is the later tablet in 331 BC had a large blank area under the text. No evidence of carved lines, just smooth.

The date of Atlantis sinking is listed.
How exactly can Rip translate the date to match up with the dating system he's familiar with? Wouldn't it be something like "In the 47th year of the reign of King whomever" rather than something easy like, "13,997 BC"? Okay, the reader wasn't shown the actual date Solon engraved, but Rip & company go to 14,000 BC which they believe is a few years before it sunk.
Although, as it turns out the date shown was a few years too late anyway. Rip & company arrive a few hours before it sinks.

In Atlantis they see a giant lens designed to catch sunlight and Rip figures "the device converts the sun's rays into light and heat".
Well, technically speaking, the sun's rays are already light and they can produce heat without any device's help. ;-)

Rip tells R'del Atlantis will sink in a few years because of violent quakes. R'del checks a sensitive instrument and discovers Atlantis will actually sink in a few hours.
You would think that they would have an automatic system of checking seismic stability?

When R'del mentions Atlantis only has a few hours Jeff accuses Solon off being off in his datemaking.
Uh, yeahhhhhhhh... because it's not possible for Rip to have miscalculated the date when he was converting it to the modern calendar... *rolls eyes*

NANJAO. R'del trying to convince D'zar of Atlantis' impending destruction & not being believed feels a little like a certain Kryptonian scientist warning his leaders about their planet's destruction. ;-)

Atlantis is populated by aliens. It was supposed to be temporary while their leaders tried to find a new homeworld, but the temporary leader D'zar decided he liked power and has refused to give the order to leave for New Jexjera. Later when trying to convince D'zar that Atlantis is about to sink chief scientist R'del says he will take this information to the Government Council.
Errr... wait. If the Government Council can override D'zar, why didn't they do so when word of a new homeworld came three years ago?

NNAN. There's a globe in D'zar's chambers. It has some similarities to Earth continents, but also some differences that couldn't be explained by 16,000 years of global drift. So it's probably a globe of Jexjera. Although the continents and islands are different every panel.


Captives Of The Medieval Sorcerer Showcase #25

Opening caption. "In his remote mountain lab"
While it makes sense you'd want a secret lab in a remote location, but if it is remote how come Bonnie & her kid brother are always hanging around? Do they live in the area?

An old friend (old is right, should have said teacher) asks Rip to take another professor back in time.
Well, I guess some people, at least, do know of Rip's time machine.

Bonnie's awfully worried about being sent to the Valley of Monsters, but how does she know what's really there. For all she knows the monsters could be ordinary animals not real monsters.

Rip takes advantage of the low sun and the monster porcupine's near-sightedness to cast his shadow on the rockface so the monster throws it's quills into the shadow giving Rip & company things to climb and get out of the Valley of Monsters.
1. They're in a valley. If the sun is low they should be in shade.
2. Rip is facing the monster, his shadow is directly behind him. Why isn't the monster porcupine casting a shadow as well? (Should have had the shadow at an angle to Rip & the monster.)
3. Oddly enough, once the monster has thrown his quills he just disappears from the story. Guess he got bored. ;-)

In the present, Dr. Senn saw a drawing of King Gamina that was an exact likeness of Dr. Senn. Surprisingly, despite art not always being exact, Senn looked enough like Gamina to pull off the deception.

The flashback shows Senn holding Professor Blakeslee at gunpoint and telling him to tell Rip to take him to Ritannia.
Except Blakeslee didn't say that, Rip didn't know the destination until Senn got to his lab & told him.

So how did Senn prevent Blakeslee from phoning up Rip after Senn left?


The Aliens From 2000 BC Showcase #26

An ancient Egyptian carving has been dated to 2000 BC.
Awfully accurate. IIRC the most accurate testing methods of the time could only get within a 100 years, but this one turns out to be correct.

You know, previous stories have shown the viewscreen of the Time Sphere picking up images of scenes when they travel through time. You'd think that would be a helpful device in locating an exact time, but apparently they just happen to show up at the right time.

NANJAO. I am really sick to death of the trope where humans just happen to pick up what the aliens mental telepathy is communicating amongst themselves.


The Thousand-Year-Old Curse Rip Hunter Time Master #1

Page 2 of this story is missing with Page 2 of issue 14 in it's place.

The premise/puzzle behind this story was so familiar I'm sure I've read something similar. Basically there's a family curse and the hero examines it and finds that it's a combination of coincidence and hoax. Seems like the sort of thing Dr. Thirteen would handle, but I couldn't find it in my Phantom Stranger collection.

At the end they take Karatan's diary with the invisible pages and as they travel through time the ink becomes visible.
1. The first story established that you couldn't take an object from the past.
2. Why would the book experience the passing of years when it's in the time machine? Rip & company don't get noticeably older or younger when they travel.


The Alien Beasts From 500 B.C. Rip Hunter Time Master #2

Archeologist Jim Bradley, in the present day, picks up a coin from a recently opened cave and says, "It's a newly minted coin commemorating the Olympiad of 500 B.C.!"
Okayyyyyy... it might be a coin that saw little wear since being minted, but since it's in a cave for almost 2,500 years calling it newly minted is certainly a nit.

Okayyyyyy... time is of the essence (a fantastic beast has been unleashed on a small island off the southeast coast of Greece and they worry what happens when it gets to the resort town), so Rip, Bonnie & Corky take "a swift plane trip to their secret mountain lab".
1. I think the fastest plane ride of the day (1961) would have taken, at least, 6 hours.
2. Wouldn't they have stopped at an airport first & then taken a car to the lab?
3. It might have made more sense to contact Jeff and have him use the Time Sphere to come pick them up, then Jeff could use the sphere's time travel abilities to appear on the island near instantaneously.

Rip sees an alien and assumes the disc he's wearing "looks like a speech disc".
How does he know it's not just jewelry?

Page 7, Panel 4. Jeff's word balloon is pointing to Rip.
This is no time to show off your ventriloquism tricks, Jeff! ;-)

The gang find the Dred melting an old ship with its heat beam.
errrr... this is 500 BC. I wasn't aware they had metal ships then and the boat looks wooden anyway.


The Throne Of Doom Rip Hunter Time Master #3

Not only is Rip Hunter known as a time traveler, even his companions are known. A Professor Peters found an old coin & the face appears to be Corky's.
Now had this been a previously named professor or a reference made to being a friend then I could see him recognizing Corky's face.

Page 14, Panel 2. Rip is whispering to Jeff, but it was placed in a thought balloon.


The Bird-Men Of 2,000 BC Rip Hunter Time Master #4
NANJAO. Cover. Rip says, "Strange flying people attacking us with ancient Babylonian weapons!"
Sounds like Hawkman & Hawkgirl. ;-)

Despite the title Rip & company go to 1986 BC, not 2000 BC.

NNAN. Previously the Time Sphere would only travel with four people, but here it has five people on board.

NANJAO. Holy continuity, Batman! Rip references a tactic they used in his second appearance two years earlier.


The Secret Of The Saxon Traitor Rip Hunter Time Master #5

Professor Sayers found a note written by Hengist in the fifth century in a strange air tight container. The note is written in modern English.

Hengist was executed as a traitor, but the note shows Hengist was tricking the Jutes & the professor wants Rip to help him change history.
For some reason Rip agrees.


The Secret Of The Ancient Seer Rip Hunter Time Master #6

How likely is it that a giant lever operated robot could have been constructed in year 798?

Rip & company have gone back to April 5, 798 because Abassid had written of things like America being discovered in 1492 and one of the predictions is of an island being destroyed in a few days time, but didn't say what island. When asked Abassid says the book with the predictions he translated did not contain any predictions of the 20th century.
How likely is it that a man from 798 would use the term 20th century?

Abassid says the pages he received were written by the seer Sejanus of Herculaneum dated January 1, 79.
I seriously doubt the year would be listed as 79 since that calendar system wouldn't exist for a few centuries.

NNAN. Despite the January 1st date Rip decides to go to August 79.

Sejanus tells Rip, "In the first month of the year"
1. Wasn't the first month of the year at this point in time April?
2. Since the predictions Sejanus wrote down were dated January 1 wouldn't it be more likely the other time traveler was captured in December?

The other time traveler tells Sejanus he is from the year 2025 & Sejanus believes it when a coin from the guy's pocket reads 2025.
Bit of a coincidence that since coins can stay in circulation for years. Sure you just might happen to have one of the current year, but you could also have one from 5 or 10 years earlier.

Also wouldn't a year numbered 2025 be considered a trifle high back then? Weren't years usually counted in years of someone's rule?

You'd think when traveling back to the past you might have a list of dates to be careful of going to blindly. Rip seems surprised to realize that August 25, 79 is when Mount Vesuvious erupted.

Despite having a time machine Rip & company arrive back in 1961 a few hours before the island is to be destroyed.

The island to be destroyed contains the dangerous chemical X (insert Powerpuff Girls joke here), when the meteorite hits the explosion will destroy the island and part of the mainland, but they don't have time to unload the explosive from the island. Rip sees a floating log go under the island and donning wetsuits they swim underneath to discover that the island is like a mushroom with a connecting stem and the tips sticking out. So Rip has all the chemical X moved to one end of the island then uses explosives to break off the tip of the island and tow it away.
1. Why would a floating log go under the island?
2. Once separated from the rest of the island shouldn't the broken off part start to sink rather than continue floating?

Towing the island away the meteorite hits and some remaining Chemical X causes a big ol' 'splosion, which frankly should have swamped, and sunk, the floating part of the island that the Time Sphere is towing away.


The Lost Wanderers In Time Rip Hunter Time Master #7

Chief Ongu mentions the first of their people to be saved by wormwood herb was the son of Chief Amya Yun. Rip immediately remembers that there was a famous Asian chieftain of that name 4,000 years ago.
He can remember Asian chieftains & when they lived but he couldn't remember the day Mount Vesuvious erupted until moments before it happened???

NNAN. The Alyta Indians have been struck by a genetic malady from time to time throughout their recorded history.
Oddly enough, despite this they still managed to lose the process of how to make the cure for it.

Page 10, Panel 5. The Time Sphere has been malfunctioning, so Rip identifies the era by a bird, a Teratornis.
Shame artist Alex Toth didn't have any reference for a Teratornis. They tend to look more like vultures/condors rather than pterosaurs.

Jeff calls a saber-toothed cat a "saber-toothed tiger".

According to the story the only animals Rip & the gang have seen so far are animals of one million years ago.
Unfortunately the artist drew some dinosaurlike creatures.

Rip and the gang accidentally open a buried mountain cave and unleash a Tyrannosaurus rex which Rip figures must have been in some kind of deep freeze for 75 million years.
1. Would have been more dramatic if the artist hadn't drawn other dinos around the area.
2. Given that in the DC universe dinosaurs found all sorts of ways to survive their "extinction" this T. rex might not be that old. ;-)

Page 19, Panel 1. Caption reads, "Once more the fabulous Time Sphere spans millions of years"
Huh? They were just "one million years ago" & now they are "4,000 years ago". That's less than a million years, not more.

Okayyyyyy... one million years ago Rip saw a mammoth suffering the green death go into Forbidden Valley and come out it's normal color. 4,000 years ago Rip meets Akku, who is trying to find a cure for the green death, but he has to boil the roots and leaves separately for it to work.
So how did the mammoth get cured? Did it boil some leaves and roots separately? (Smart mammoth.)


The Thieves Who Stole A Genie Rip Hunter Time Master #8

The first story to indicate they have "speech converters" so they can communicate with people of different eras.

Another DC Aladdin. This one actually found a lamp with a genie though.

Page 7, Panel 2. The T in Time Sphere is missing from Wade's word balloon.

Page 17, Panel 4. In the caption the letters o-m-m-a-n are missing from the word command.

You'd think Rip & company would tie up Wade & Reeves when they go off to help defend Baghdad, but nooooooo...
I'm sure one of Aladdin's genies could have whipped up some handy restraints.

Wade & Reeves grabbed Bonnie & Corky and took the Time Sphere back in time. Rip & Jeff followed them and hid the Time Sphere the crooks took. At the end of the story Rip reveals that they just moved the stolen Time Sphere further back into the cave along with their Time Sphere.
Now had Rip used a flashlight to show the Time Spheres hidden in the dark, fine, but now he just points and it's suddenly light enough to see both Time Spheres.


The Alien King Of 1,000 B.C. Rip Hunter Time Master #9

Rip decides to go to Xenor's home planet of Zark. Because they've never taken the Time Sphere into space Jeff is worried what might happen if it gets stranded in space. Rip decides it's a chance he has to take and he wants Jeff & Bonnie to stay on Earth and help Xenor.
Soooooo... if there's a chance the Time Sphere might run into trouble shouldn't Rip take the man who helped him build the Time Sphere rather than Bonnie's kid brother Corky?

Actually Rip's been spending a lot of time with Corky & Bonnie's been spending time with Jeff in these stories lately...

Xenor picks up a "firing tower" to carry the soldiers on top to safety.
Yes, the stone and mortar brickwork of 1,000 BC is amazingly sturdy and doesn't collapse being handled this way. ;-)


The Secret Of Mount Olympus Rip Hunter Time Master #11

A projection is being shown on the wall and Rip says, "That's the outline of a mythological griffin!"
Problem is the picture shows a paw, not the whole creature.

NNAN. Professor Blake says, "Statues don't possess claws that can leave scratches, Rip!"
Well, I suppose that would depend on the sculptor. ;-)

Page 2, Panel 2. Rip says, "Professor-- I hope you're not trying to tell me you really believe that mythological creatures actually existed at one time!"
Excuse me? Given all the things Rip has seen why scoff at the possibility of a griffin? I mean he's been to Atlantis (Showcase #21), met aliens (Showcase #21, 26, Rip Hunter #2, 5, 9), seen magic (Showcase #25, Rip Hunter #3, 8), encountered unearthly creatures (Showcase #25, Rip Hunter #2, 4, 5, 9), fought robots (Showcase #26, Rip Hunter #6), and met two genies (Rip Hunter #8), so why is a griffin an unthinkable possibility?

Professor Blake dated the artifacts to the second century BC and Rip goes there.
Errrr... there's a hundred years to choose from, how did he decide what year to go to? Start in the year 150 BC & if he doesn't find anything go forward or backward 25 years?

Jeff freaks out when they see real centaurs.
Okay, the last time they saw centaurs they were fakes, but still Jeff's seen quite a bit, so why's he freaking out?

I get the feeling this story was written with Circe meant to be the villainess, but since they already established Circe as a fake they substituted Calypso instead.

After Jeff is turned into a griffin, Rip asks on the mainland what they can do and the person they ask tells them they have to get the help of Zeus, who's on Mt. Olympus. Bonnie says, "There can't be a-- a Mount Olympus!"
Actually there is a Mt. Olympus, what Bonnie should be questioning is the existence of Zeus.

The Gods turn out to be... (drumroll)... aliens from the planet Olympus testing their world's first spaceship and they crash-landed on Earth where they were mistaken to be gods.
How long they were on Earth wasn't said, but I'm fairly certain that Zeus was used as a name for gods prior to the Second century BC. So either it's quite a coincidence or they are quite long-lived.

NANJAO. As I was adding the planet Olympus to my list of DC planets I noticed that there was also Olympia from Mystery In Space #58 where the Roman gods came from and Olimpus from Flash #113 which had godlike beings (both of which were two years earlier than this story).
Of course, once Rip Hunter was made a part of the regular DC continuity in 1977 that added to the situation and that's not even bothering with the fact that Wonder Woman had the actual Greek/Roman gods as characters, sooooooo yeahhhhhh....


The 2,200-Year-Doom Rip Hunter Time Master #12

[as Groucho] And that's the fast-acting version. [rimshot]

Okayyyyyy... a strange meteorite is burning a hill into a Stonehenge-like structure. Professor Blake says the from the meteorites growth they estimate it landed in 100 BC.
Meteorites growing??? Especially strange since the meteorite is burning and putting out fumes so how can it grow? Not to mention how long have they been studying it to see a consistent growth. Plus ignoring the possibility of the meteorite landing at some later point in time when it was larger.

They tried smothering the meteorite, but "the chemicals melted!"
Melted? Wouldn't burned have been a better word to use?

Rip goes into the past to change time.
You'd think he might realize it might not work?

The mystery of Stonehenge is solved! It was a mountain burned into it's famous shape by a meteorite.
Just ignore all that archeological evidence, not to mention, I don't know how many DC Universe stories with alternate explanations. ;-)

For some reason, Rip and company don't seem that curious about why the meteorite they are to launch off Earth (when it was smaller) is in a different location in 100 BC than it was in the present day.

Page 9, Panel 4. Professor Blake is now Professor Blair.

For the first time the Time Sphere goes into the future.
Well, unless you count returning from the past to the present to be going to the future. ;-)

For some reason they go into the future to the time when the meteorite has completely poisoned the atmosphere.
I'd have tried an earlier future time to see if they found a solution.

Fortunately the people of the future have a time viewer that Rip can use to see when the meteorite actually landed.
Why not just use the viewer in the Time Sphere? Okay, it only seems to work when the Sphere is time traveling, but since when is going back into the past a problem?


The Menace Of The Mongol Magician Rip Hunter Time Master #13

Rip says, "Professor-- I can't understand your interest in black magic! How can you believe it really existed?"
Rip has seen magic in Showcase #25, Rip Hunter #3 & 8, why is he scoffing someone believing in it?


The Captive Time-Travelers Rip Hunter Time Master #14

NNAN. Professor Firenzo wants Rip to ask Leonardo Da Vinci about a mysterious, invulnerable capsule he signed, but he asks Rip to take his assistant, Jervis, to take notes.
Wait, what? A chance to go back in time & meet Leonardo & this scientist would rather stay in the present while his assistant goes? I know some people hate travel & meeting new people, but man...

Okayyyyy... in the first story Time Sphere II was the main time travel device. Here the main transformer in the sphere they plan to use blows out so they take the spare, which the caption identifies as the "number 2 Time Sphere".
Wait, shouldn't that be Time Sphere I?

Okay at the start of the story no one knows what's inside Leonardo's mystery capsule. Rip finds out in 1502 and Jervis steals the Time Sphere. Jeff, who had been repairing the regular Time Sphere arrives to pick them up after Professor Firenzo discovers that Jervis had planned to steal Leonardo's bomb.
So how did Jervis know what was in the case before Rip talked to Leonardo?

After losing one Time Sphere Rip takes the remote control unit.
1. First time this has been mentioned. (NANJAO.)
2. You'd think he would have started carrying this after issue 13 when Professor Deering almost got away with the Time Sphere.

In the year 2550 scientists still cannot open the capsule?
You'd think science might have advanced a bit when it comes to opening things. Especially since they do have a metal-destroying ray at this time.

Rip has been arrested and locked up... but they left him his belt radio...

The prison of the future still has ordinary barred windows that can be yanked out by someone with a flyer and a cable.
Yeahhhhhhhh...

The Arms House has explosive guard beams that destroy anything that gets too close so they destroy the main control, which appears to be inside, by dropping a Time Sphere on it.
Wha...? If you can get past the guard beams by dropping down from above, why not just parachute in?

In 1502 Venusian scientists "had traced the cosmic orbit of a large runaway moon!"
Traced?
Would a runaway moon have an orbit? Path would seem more appropriate.

Venusian scientists determined that in 2550 the runaway moon would collide with and destroy Earth so they gave a Stroyo-missile to Leonardo Da Vinci which could be used to destroy the runaway moon and prevent Earth's destruction.
Seems a trifle early to be giving a primitive planet explosives that won't be used for so long?

Oddly enough in 2550 Earth didn't seem to realize that Earth was in danger until it was almost too late.
What happened to Earth's astronomers? Doesn't Earth have spacecraft in 2550? Hasn't Earth built really powerful explosives by this time?


The Earthlings Of 5,000,000 B.C. Rip Hunter Time Master #15

Opening caption. "Backward... backward... further back than the time travelers have ever delved into the past"
The first story had them go to 100,000,000 B.C.

The title mentions the year 5,000,000 BC, but Rip & company go back 5,000,000 years which is 4,998,037 BC.

The scanner in the Time Sphere shows them over an ocean. Rip says, "The entire surface of Earth was an ocean in this era, Bonnie! You're looking at the Great Flood!"
Holy Noah!
While various parts of the Earth were underwater at various times in Earth's history I don't believe there is any evidence that the whole surface was underwater at once, at least not since life crawled out of the ocean and started living on land way back in the Devonian period. Some portions had to be above sea level for land animals & plants to continue living.

In the past they encounter some strange creatures and one charges them. Rip takes a package of cigarettes from Jeff and tosses them at the creatures which start eating them because they like tobacco.
1. How did Rip know this?
2. I don't recall ever seeing Jeff smoke in this comic before.
3. Amazing that creatures from 5,000,000 million years ago have a taste for processed tobacco.

Captured by the first earthlings Rip & company are believed to be primitive beings and are placed in a cage and it's not until later that the first earthlings find out Rip & company are intelligent when they speak.
Except that Bonnie cried out, "Oh, no!" when they were captured.

To escape from the captors Rip asks Jeff for another pack of cigarettes.
Goodness gracious, Jeff! How much do you smoke???

NANJAO. 5,000,000 years ago the first earthlings destroy the planet Xerxon. In an amazing bit of authorial restraint none of the future earthlings comments that Xerxon became the asteroid belt.

A fleet of Xerxonian ships that survived Xerxons destruction bombard Earth and blows it up.
What?!? Methinks the artist went a little overboard.

Rip says, "No life on Earth will be possible for at least 1,000 years!"
Never mind all the fossil evidence to the contrary.

Rip leads the survivors of Earth to colonize Mars.
1. What about the survivors of Xerxon? They're still alive in spaceships.
2. Since both Earth & Xerxon had spaceships why wasn't Mars colonized earlier?

Federal Men starred Steve Carson as an ace G-Man.

Untitled Adventure Comics #39

Steve says, "Marihuana, the drug that causes the smoker to lose all moral restraint".
I don't know, some people I know who smoke it, lost their moral restraint before they ever lit up. Also this story has the smokers wildly active and committing violent crimes whereas most pot smokers I've known become less active and tend to zone out and become mellow.

The smokers in this story robbed a gas station, shot the attendant and ran over a man. Interrogating them Steve says, "Marihuana cigarettes were to blame".
And later the marihuana cigarettes were executed in the electric chair. Witnesses afterwards were very hungry with the munchies. ;-)

The boy refuses to blab who sold him the marihuana because "If I talked my life wouldn't be worth a dime!"
Dude, you were involved in a murder & hit & run and you are probably facing the death penalty. Your life is already not worth a dime.

Johnnie Law

Untitled More Fun Comics #25

A boy shoots a woman then says that the snakes are chasing him and an examination shows that he was using marijuana.
Never heard of any pot smoker imagining being chased by snakes before.

Steve says, "Marihuana, the drug that causes the smoker to lose all moral restraint".
I don't know, some people I know who smoke it, lost their moral restraint before they ever lit up. Also this story has the smokers wildly active and committing violent crimes whereas most pot smokers I've known become less active and tend to zone out and become mellow.

A boy shoots a woman then says that the snakes are chasing him and an examination shows that he was using marijuana.
Never heard of any pot smoker imagining being chased by snakes before.

How dare you cast doubt on the government's legitimate anti-pot propaganda!?

All stories reprinted in Showcase Presents Strange Adventures Volume 2

The Invisible Invader From Dimension X Strange Adventures #74

Okayyyy... the invaders from Dimension X in our world, and Fred Garrett in Dimension X, are invisible and intangible*, but capable of picking things up and carrying them without a problem.
No explanation is given for intangible beings carrying objects situation, not even a simple "If I concentrated I could..."

* Well, invisible except to Fred while he wears a pair of glasses.

Why people, and what they are wearing, from the one dimension are invisible to people in the other dimension are invisible, but the objects from each dimension stay visible is not explained.

Fred says he spent several days in Dimension X learning their language and figuring things out, but never mentions what he ate, drank, where he slept, etc.
Good thing the alien food and drink wasn't poisonous.

The Metal Spy From Space!

NANJAO. The hero of this story is science fiction writer Edmond Hamilford, the World-Saver. Obviously a reference to Edmond Hamilton, who oddly enough, was working for DC at this time, including producing stories for Strange Adventures.
Wonder what he thought when he saw this story by Gardner Fox?


Secret Of The Man-Ape! Strange Adventures #75

A planet 100,000 light years from Earth needs to conquer our world to replenish their stock of radioactive materials.
Isn't there any closer planets with radioactive rock?

Using their telescopes the humanoid aliens see that 100,000 years ago Earth had a gorilla civilization ruling the planet and turn one of their own into a gorilla to blend in.
Wouldn't it have made more sense writing it to have gorilla aliens rather than have human aliens?

The 2nd Deluge of Earth!

At the end it's revealed that the martians are blind.
Earlier it was stated that "Our time is based on light-year differentials!" If Martians are blind then how would they calculate light-years?


The Tallest Man On Earth! Strange Adventures #76

People see an unnmoving giant standing in the street & start worrying about it instead of assuming it's a prank or advertising stunt.

Army instead of police examine giant to determine if it's alive.

The giant, Odes-Ar, is a member of the race called the Keepers Of Peace, who travel through space by teleportation, but the one radiation that can affect them is cosmic rays.
Good thing there's hardly any cosmic rays in space. *rolls eyes*

Aliens are attacking Earth & when bullets don't work they start using A-bombs.
Errrr... aren't there conventional weapons between bullets & A-bombs they can use first?

Despite using A-bombs, soldiers still get within visual distance of the alien ship.
Radiation? We don' need to worry about no radiation!

The Flying Saucers That Saved The World!

David Baker proved flying saucers don't exist.
Whew! Glad that's over with. ;-) Funnily enough, the writer had the line "Despite all the publicity, it is not easy to shatter a nine-year-old myth..." *snicker*


The World That Slipped Out Of Space! Strange Adventures #77

Thousands of years ago a world between Earth & Mars slipped into a warp in space and ended up in another dimension. At the end of this story it's back in our dimension.
Obvious nit. This planet and it's gravity's interaction with other objects would tend to be a bad thing.
Not so obvious nit. Unlike most Strange Adventures stories of this time, this is not a one-shot story set in its own reality, this is part of the Darwin Jones series and Darwin Jones was later made a part of DC's superhero universe which means this planet is in the dimension of Earth-One.

How exactly an anti-matter explosion on Earth can reopen a space warp and bring a planet out of another dimension boggles my mind.

The Incredible Eyes Of Arthur Gail!

A chemical explosion affects Arthur Gail's eyes so that he can only see organic material, inorganic material he sees through, which makes for some nice visuals as the artists draws people while not drawing other things, but aren't oil and grease organic? Shouldn't the artists be drawing those while having the cars invisible?

The Paul Revere Of Time!

Page 3, Panel 3. "and smash costal cities!"
Coastal.

The mystery voice recommends destroying icebergs with atomic bombs.
Being that the voice is from the future it should know the dangers of radiation (unlike, apparently, the writer in 1956).

The Mental Star-Rover!

This story reveals that there is no uranium ore in the whole Andromeda galaxy. Well, technically there had to be some as the Dorthians need it for their super weapons, but now none can be found.
Frankly, the idea that out of an entire 80,000 light year wide galaxy there is no more uranium just seems a trifle hard to swallow.

The main character in this story is a writer who can send his mind out and view the adventures of Jakkon in the Andromeda Galaxy, whose adventures he writes up. It's interesting the stories of Jakkon are very popular on Earth, but later it's shown that Jakkon is a conqueror.


The Secret Of The Tom Thumb Spacemen! Strange Adventures #78

Spaceman need Bruce Walker's help, for their king to stay king he must draw a sword in a ceremony otherwise the king's uncle will overthrow him.
Let's see...
1. The story is about keeping a king on the thrown, despite America fighting a war of independence against a king?
2. No proof is offered that shows the king is good or the uncle evil, yet Bruce goes along with it.
3. The sword ceremony is an annual ritual, so you'd think the issue of kings being temporarily sick might have come up before
4. Despite the claims that the uncle is evil, the "hero" is keeping the king on the throne through deception.

The Life Battery!

Not sure if this was known to be a nit at the time (1956) or not, but the museum reconstruction of a T-rex gives it larger three-clawed arms than than we now know it had.
Oddly enough, later panels seem to show T-rex's with just two claws.

Opening caption. "Long before man became the dominant life form on Earth, other creatures had their "day" as masters of our planet -- dinosaurs, pterodactyls, mastodons, saber-toothed tigers."
1. Dinosaurs & pterodactyls existed at the same time, so how could they both have been masters?
2. Mastodons & saber-toothed tigers existed at the same time, so how could they both have been masters?
3. The "saber-toothed tiger" was not a tiger, the proper term is saber-toothed cat.

Page 1, panel 3. Sterling Marsh says, "After the reptiles came the archaeopteryx birds"
Well, technically birds came along while reptiles were still around & dominant.

NANJAO. Kind of an interesting story in retrospect. At the time of publication it was known that there were extinctions, but it wasn't until, I think, the '80s that computers showed that there was a Great Extinction event every 26 million years (the next one is around 13 million years from now, plan accordingly).

Page 2, Panel 4. Sterling says, "My theory is something from outer space has repeatedly caused the rise and fall of life on Earth - meteor showers!"
1. I believe that would be an untested hypothesis, not a theory.
2. This was long before the Alvarez's had their "crazy" idea of an asteroid wiping out the dinosaurs. (It took a lot of testing before scientists accepted the asteroid idea.)

Sterling refers to meteoroids as meteors.

Examining meteoroids Sterling isolates "a strange, radiating metal" that has a radiation that sustains all life on Earth.

Oddly enough Sterling has a machine that can decrease or increase the amount of radiation the meteorite generates.
Wonder if that works on atomic bombs? ;-)

Page 3, Panels 3 & 4. The first panel shows a T-rex dropping dead as Sterling hypothesizes that life dies when the radiation dies, the next panel has the caption "Later, as more meteor showers fell on Earth, life sprang up again, but this time it was the flying reptile bird that became supreme!" and the panel shows pterosaurs.
1. Dinosaurs & pterosaurs were mostly around at the same time & both died off at the end of the Cretaceous.
2. At the time, birds & reptiles were considered two separate things. It was either a flying reptile or it was a bird, not a "flying reptile bird".

Aliens come to Earth and start stealing meteoroids.
What a coincidence.

Amazing that the aliens know of the radiation and can build spaceships capable of traveling faster than light through space, but are unable to create the life radiation themselves.

Page 5, Panel 2. Sterling says, "If my theory is correct, only those planets within the orbit of meteor showers have life on them."
1. Hypothesis, not theory.
2. Are there planets that haven't been hit with meteors?

Sterling supercharges his meteoroid so it will cause a chain reaction that will overpower the aliens.
Bwa?
1. How would he know this would even work?
2. How come the super-charged meteor doesn't knock him out?

Page 6, Panel 3. The caption refers to an "army air force base".
Wasn't the Air Force a separate branch by that time? Was the term still in use in 1956?

"Hours later" he gets on a bomber, flies up to the spaceship, gets off the plane and onto the ship...
Wait a minute! How exactly he did that is not shown nor explained.

While on the hull of the ship (with magnetized boots) he uses his machine the return the meteoroids radiation to normal.
Shouldn't that cause the aliens to wake up?


Invaders From The Ice World! Strange Adventures #79

Energy beings from Pluto try to invade our world.
Never mind all those "rocks" between Earth & Pluto.

A shot of them in their spaceship shows it to have switches.
The Plutonians are spherical energy beings, so why switches?

The Plutonians are killing plants to increase the carbon dioxide levels of the planet and cause an ice age.
Guess Al Gore DIDN'T read this story as a child. ;-)

Page 5, Panel 2. "Amazingly, they survive the exploding shell of an atomic cannon!"
An atomic cannon?
Also what about the radiation?

The Plutonians are defeated with a ray "that arrests the movement of atoms!"
Guess this story was set in the future as I don't think we have any such device today.

Around The Universe In 1 Billion Years!

Men on a spaceship are brought out of suspended animation to discover that instead of 500 years it took a billion years to circumnavigate the universe.
So what's the point of being on the ship if you're just going to be asleep the whole time?

Approaching Earth they show a continent that doesn't look modern, but it is modern day Earth.

So, a billion years ago there was a human civilization on Earth.
Yeahhhhhhhhh...

A Switch In Time!

In order for Jon XX-44 to travel from the far, far future back to the present he needs Mark Robins to switch places to "maintain the status quo of natural mass balance".
Now if it's just a matter of mass then you don't really need another person, do you? Just something of the same mass.

Not so much a nit in the story itself, but when the story ends Mark discovers he's switched places with the last man on Earth.
However the time viewer/communicator still works so he could pull the stunt that was pulled on him on someone else.

If Martians are blind then how would they calculate light-years?

A scientifically literate civilization would know about electromagnetic radiation, even if they could not sense it by themselves. Btw, a Martian light-year would be about twice as long as ours, because the Martian year is about twice the length of an Earth year.

This story reveals that there is no uranium ore in the whole Andromeda galaxy. Well, technically there had to be some as the Dorthians need it for their super weapons, but now none can be found. Frankly, the idea that out of an entire 80,000 light year wide galaxy there is no more uraniumjust seems a trifle hard to swallow.}

Andromeda is known today to be more like 120000 light years across. It should also contain plenty of uranium because that metal is produced in supernovea explosions and Andromeda has just as many of those as any other galaxies.

Being that the voice is from the future it should know the dangers of radiation (unlike, apparently, the writer in 1956).

But if it comes from the future, it must know that using atomic bombs in that way would cause no long lasting damage. Unless they are trying to change their own past?

A scientifically literate civilization would know about electromagnetic radiation, even if they could not sense it by themselves.

Trying to figure out how boggled my mind (& I'm not sure it's actually unboggled), but presumably the fact that the day would have warming periods & cooling periods and probably encountering other sources of heat the Martians might have developed devices to detect heat sources & then expand outward to discover things besides infra-red on the electro-magnetic spectrum.

Speaking of which, what are "light-year differentials" & why use it for the basis of time?

a Martian light-year would be about twice as long as ours
I was so focused on the blind people knowing of light I never even considered that.

While my mind was boggling I did wonder if all electro-magnetic radiation travels at the same speed?

But if it comes from the future, it must know that using atomic bombs in that way would cause no long lasting damage. Unless they are trying to change their own past?
Yep. The people of 2957 know of a great disaster in 1957 and Vor-Dex is sent back in time to warn people and does prevent the mass-destruction & death that came in the original timeline (unless they all died of radiation poisoning instead).

...the Martians might have developed devices to detect heat sources & then expand outward to discover things besides infra-red on the electro-magnetic spectrum.

Certainly. And early work with electricity would have revealed radio waves to them, which is how we discovered those. It could have taken them a while, but they would eventually have put all of it together and figured out the whole electromagnetic spectrum.

Speaking of which, what are "light-year differentials" & why use it for the basis of time?

I have no idea. I suspect it's some technobabble the author though sounded cool.

While my mind was boggling I did wonder if all electro-magnetic radiation travels at the same speed?

Yes they do, exactly. There was an hypothesis that very high energy gamma rays could be moving a little slower because their very short wavelengths would "feel" the quantum graininess of space, but experiments have detected no such effect so far.

I have no idea. I suspect it's some technobabble the author though sounded cool.

Probably. You'd think most, if not all, species would start with a day as a basic unit of time and work outward from that (chopping it up into smaller chunks, adding it together for longer, etc.).

Yes they do, exactly.

Thanks. Figured it was most likely, but couldn't recall reading anything that specified it.

Hot In The City Harley Quinn Halloween Fest Special Edition #1

Where the heck did she get the talking groundhog or is this a sign that she's still psychotic?

Okayyyyy... Harley inherits a building.
I'm assuming she must be legally out of prison, but nothing in the story says that. If she's not out legally, then one wonders why superheroes or law enforcement aren't knocking on her door.

Harley applies for a job using her psychiatrist degree.
She would still have that after going crazy and becoming a criminal?

All stories reprinted in Showcase Presents Strange Adventures Volume 2

Mind Robbers Of Venus! Strange Adventures #80

Well, technically it's just one robber.

Oddly enough Venusian minds can have a thought completely stolen, or the robber can send it to another mind with no trace that it had been there. The possible nit is the implication that when the Venusian took back the stolen formula it was completely gone from the Earthman's mind. True they don't mention if it is or isn't gone from his mind, nor do they not say he hadn't written it down after receiving it, but still you'd think if an Earthling had the formula for a Venusian super-bomb, it might have been worth mentioning.


The Worlds That Switched Places!

The planet Vyrga switched places with Earth so they could try and stop a "space doom", a force that would send the solar system flying apart... a vacuum bubble in space.
But wait, they actually lampshade the vacuum bubble idea, (with handy posters illustrating it no less) space is only a vacuum compare to Earth's atmosphere, but this is an "absolute vacuum, completely cutting off gravity!" an once it cuts off the sun's gravity our solar system flies apart.
Okay, sure, fine, whatever...
However... what clever way to they have of ending the threat? They seed the bubble with hydrogen atoms turning it into normal space.
Errrr... wait a minute... 1. Wouldn't it normally encounter matter as it travels through space thereby ceasing to be a vacuum? 2. I assumed that it would envelope the sun cutting off the gravity again rendering it not a vacuum. 3. To find the location of the bubble earlier they used a spray of deuterium atoms (which combined with regular hydrogen to form triterium & glowed) and when they found an area of no glow they knew they found the bubble, but shouldn't that spray have entered the bubble rendering it not a vacuum?


The Anti-Invasion Machine

A Plutonian comes to Earth to warn them of an invasion from his race, he creates a weapon to defend Earth... a sonic device that will disintegrate matter and sending the sonic beams a 1,000 miles into space.
Amazingly only, apparently, one man on Earth realizes that this is a trick because sonics don't work in space.

At the end the scientist says they should keep trying to find a way to turn on the machine, because in tests it did work at short range and they can "use it for the benefit of mankind!"
Uhhh... okay, I suppose there are uses for a disintegrater that would be beneficial, but I was reminded of the line from The Simpsons about the ray gun that only had destructive purposes. ;-)


The Man Who Inherited Mars! Strange Adventures #82

Hal Jackson is surprised to learn his adoptive parents were the last two survivors of Mars (a cosmic blight killed the rest). He finds a map to where their ship is hidden and flies there.
Obvious nits. Human Martians, thin, but breathable atmosphere, Martian cities, and, of course, the obligatory canals.

He plans to turn the spaceship over to the government so they can refuel it and return to Mars for the valuable Atomium metal that the Martians used to power their civilization, but the ship crashes and he says, "Mars will have to wait until Earth invents its own spaceships!"
Uhhh, his parents' ship wasn't destroyed just damaged. The government could easily reverse engineer it.


Secret Of The Silent Spacemen!

NANJAO. The story starts with writer Owen Bently trying to sell a story to his editor.
The story is credited to Otto Binder, the editor looks like Julius Schwartz, and the covers of Strange Adventures can be seen on the walls. Hmmm... ;-)

Oddly enough the story exactly matches the story problem Julie assigned Otto, I mean, Owen, which I find way too coincidental.


Assignment In Eternity! Strange Adventures #83

Professor Colby is remembering odd things about his life, like lecturing his science class about neutrinos before they had been discovered or teaching that there are 101 elements when only 100 were known. The name of the 101st element? Scientium.

Okayyyyy... Professor Colby had been sent from 2062 to get some nitrogen-fixing bacteria which had been killed off by radioactive dust from Halley's Comet's tail. He arrives in 1952 and loses his memory, but somehow becomes a college professor.
Just how bad were teaching standards in the 1950s?


The Future Mind Of Roger Davis!

To save Roger Davis' life aliens "had to activate an unused portion of your brain".
The old cliche of unused portions of the brain.


Prisoners Of The Atom Universe! Strange Adventures #84

NANJAO. Some private astronauts are the first to go into space and are affected by a space radiation.
This story is from 1957, a few years before a slightly more famous comic with the same set-up. ;-)

Page 4, Panel 1. Caption reads, "Horror-stricken, Warwick receives a message from the ship..."
Warwick? His name is Jay Jenkins.

Okay... the ship returns and both the ship and the men aboard it are shrinking. Jenkins worries that if the men and ship disappear into nothingness he'll "be accused of doing away with them -- charged with manslaughter!" So his big solution is to stick them in his safe deposit box and... do nothing?
What??? How will this prevent the charges? Sense it makes none.

Shrinking down the men end up on the sub-atomic world of Grent, where eons ago Atlanteans trying to escape Earth were hit with the same radiation and likewise shrunk.
What are the odds that they would end up on the same sub-atomic world?

NANJAO. The idea of survivors of Atlantis ending up on a sub-atomic world was later recycled in The Atom #5.

Using a "pro-tomic ray machine" some Atlantide scientists grow the astronauts, the ship and themselves to "normal" size, ending up in some kind of park "in a large eastern city".
Shouldn't they have increased in size in the safe deposit box in the bank? Sub-atomic worlds ain't that big. Even a block away should be the sub-atomic equivalent of mega-light years to us.


The Radioactive Invasion of Earth!

Titan is said to be the largest of the NINE moons of Saturn.
Well, we've discovered a few more since then... ;-)

Okayyyyyy... a military invasion of Earth would have cost Titan too many lives, so instead they make toys out of the metal styranium, which, when kept at a constant temperature of 65 to 80 degrees for ten days will start the radioactive decay process and in six months all life on Earth will be dead and the Titans just wait for the radiation to die out.
So if human life was unimportant to them, why not just use an orbital bombardment instead of their original plan of landing troops?

The Titans know of no way to stop the metal's decay once started, but fortunately... rock and roll music will turn the styranium to lead.
Yeahhhhhhhh... *rolls eyes*

The story ends with a big rock & roll party to turn all the metal to lead which feels like a cheat. We don't even get a panel with the Titans wondering how their plan could have failed.


The Toy That Saved The World!

Okayyyyyyy... rays from a "contracting star" are causing the continents to shrink.
Bwha...???

But hey, spray some SnOW (tin tungstenate) into the atmosphere & the continents return to their normal size.
Uhhhh... yeahhhhhh...


The Riddle Of Spaceman X! Strange Adventures #85

A spaceship lands on Earth where he needs to make repairs and it will take a week to equalize the pressure to avoid decompression when he leaves the ship.
1. Why a week? What kind of pressure is the inside of his ship like?
2. When his appearance is revealed he's a mass of intelligent energy. Why would energy need to worry about decompression?


The Weather War Of 1977 Strange Adventures #86

In the far off future of 1977, anti-nuclear devices have rendered nuclear war obsolete, but mankind controls the weather and fights battles with forces more powerful than nuclear weapons.
*snicker*

Oddly enough the actual war isn't really dealt with. I mean yeah, we see part of it, but we don't know who the enemy is or why it's ended when the weather attacks appear to stop.


New Faces For Old! Strange Adventures #87

Okayyyyyyy... two humanoid aliens from another world have come to Earth to find the element d'r'sato so they can overthrow the tyrant.
Sure, fine, no problem... So what is d'r'sator? Carbon.
D'oh!
There are times when the uncommon elsewhere common here trope works and times when it feels like hitting my head against a brick wall. Apparently no life on their planet is carbon-based, but they can survive on Earth no problem. Sigh.


Mystery Language From Space!

Aliens from Apollo Secundus orbiting Sirius are trying to warn Earth of a threat just like the one that destroyed their original home planet, Apollo which exploded to become the asteroid belt, are beaming telepathic messages to a man who's asleep but he writes the messages in their language, not English.

Not a bad story, but why would their planets have Roman names?

One nice touch was the comment that they couldn't land on Earth because its gravity would crush them.
Clearly a reference to the fact that there's not enough material in the asteroid belt to make up a decent-sized planet.

However, even though they couldn't land, couldn't they drop warnings on Earth? It would seem a lot faster and easier then the method that was used.


Meteor Menace Of Mars!

Neptunians have tripled the specific gravity of Mars making it equal to Earth & Neptune.
1. I've only ever hear the term specific gravity referring to the weight of gemstones not planets.
2. Was there ever a time when the gravity of Neptune was assume to be the same as Earth?

Dan is flying a Neptunian ship when he destroys the cause of the increased gravity and the Neptunian ships don't work right under normal Martian gravity.
Huh? They flew through space which has much less gravity...


The Gorilla War Against Earth! Strange Adventures #88

A gorilla starts talking about how gorillas will take over the Earth. Darwin Jones suggests giving the gorilla a lie detector test to see if he's telling the truth.
Ignoring for the moment the less than accurate results of lie detectors isn't the reason they 'work' because they are keyed to HUMAN responses?

Then they put a man who is really an alien in disguise in the lie detector and it also functioned properly.
*rolls eyes*

Of course Jones knew "Browning" was behind the talking gorilla because he saw the man using a ventriloquism trick. Later the alien explains he had a device to make the gorilla's lips move.
Sooooooo... they couldn't just invent a device to make it seem more realistic that the gorilla was talking?

The whole ruse was to get an atomic bomb because for all their technology, they've never been able to split the atom...
*rolls eyes*
So how do they power their faster than light spaceships? Super-powered coal???


The Warning Out Of Time!

Larry Lloyd finds a painting signed by Leonardo Da Vinci (well, actually just "Da Vinci).
1. I wasn't aware he signed his paintings.
2. Da Vinci wasn't actually his name, his mother was unmarried so he had no last name, Da Vinci simply means "of Vinci" the city he was from.

Okayyyyyyy... in 1482 Leonardo accidentally mixes up a batch of paint which sends him forward in time to 1958 where he learns of future inventions and disasters.
Oh, that wacky time-traveling paint problem. I believe they invented acrylics to avoid that problem. ;-)

In 1958 Leonardo is invisible and intangible... except somehow he can turn the pages of books.

Leonardo wants to warn the future of a disaster he saw just before he went back in time, so he paints a map of the world and marks places where famous disasters occurred, then paints another picture over it because he knows that they use x-rays to authenticate paintings.
Not so much a nit, but man it sure was lucky this painting wasn't 1. destroyed or 2. remained un-x-rayed until after the disaster.

The disaster is a geyser of radioactive gases erupts, the solution is blow up a cliffside to bury the geyser.
1. Won't the pressure just keep building until another eruption happens?
2. Wouldn't there be some gas leakage?
3. What about the gases already released?


Bodyguard From Space!

An alien meets Jim Carson, a news cameraman, and tells him that he has vital information to save his world from destruction and Jim tells him to beat it.
Okay, assuming this might be a practical joke makes sense, but since Jim is in the news game wouldn't it make more sense to play along? Either wait till the practical joker slips up or the guy proves he's an alien. The news value of interviewing an alien would seem to be worth it.

Klysistron's sun is dying having consumed the vital element F-345-TX and they began a search for this element, which they couldn't find in a three billion light year radius, but hey, there's a vein of it on Earth.
1. You'd think they might consider moving to another solar system.
2. Stars are huge, a vein of this stuff, which fits within the guy's spaceship is tiny, and yet it's expected to keep their sun burning for thousands of years.

At no point does Jim get an interview with this alien.

At the end of the story Jim is asking about Star Sun 2374, the astronomer says it's been growing dimmer and dimmer, Jim suggests he check it and now it's blazing brightly.
Klysistron's sun was 3 billion light years from Earth! The light the astronomer is seeing should be 3 billion years old, not recent!


Earth For Sale Strange Adventures #89

Invaders from Saturn come to Earth and, claiming superior weapons, tells Earth they can resist and be destroyed or surrender. The Saturnians then set-up a giant hour glass which they fill with sand, by hand in buckets.
Oh, that super-advanced Saturn technology...

At the end of the story the Saturnians are glad to give Earth back and leave, but there is one dangling plot thread. Putting the Saturnian sand on a duck hawk egg caused the egg to grow to giant-size and the hatchling came out a giant and could fly at super-speed. The invaders from Saturn are gone but what about this giant, super-fast predatory bird that's now roaming Earth?


Prisoner Of The Rainbow!

Page 1, Panel 1. Mark Holton thinks, "Another incredible color-change! This time a patch of white snow has turned yellow!"
Not that incredible, actually... ;-)

Sadly this was a story which was designed to be printed in color rather than B&W.

Okayyyyyy... Professor Jason created a prism out of super-refractive glass, but when he tested it in sunlight the super-spectrum cast him into the ultra-violet zone, where he was invisible and intangible.
Okay, for the story to work I can accept this, but... when Mark went looking for the professor he went into the professor's lab and the prism was still in the window and later he went in and removed the prism from the window. So why didn't Mark get forced into the ultra-violet zone?

At the end the professor destroys the prism.
Okay, I can understand that he might be angry at being trapped, but still, that prism had some amazing properties and now that you know the danger and the solution further tests can be done.


Detour In Time

John Lucas is flying a jet when he hits a freak electrical storm (don't you just hate it when that happens?), he lands near a futuristic city and asks a guy how far away Texas is and the man says, "Texas? If you mean the state of Texas, it has not existed for the past five thousand years!"
Now what are the odds that he should meet a guy who knows of a place that hasn't existed for 5,000 years? Heck, for that matter, how's the guy understand him? I mean if someone from the year 6015 BC showed up and started asking directions even understanding what he's saying let alone knowing where he means would be amazing.

Lucas explains his story to the apparent leaders in the future and they accept he's from the past brought forward by a scientific phenomenon. Lucas assumes they must have time-travel by now, but the apparent leader says, "No one has yet invented a time-travel machine -- or ever will! If time-travel were possible, why has no one visited your time era, or mine?"
Soooooooo, on the one hand he accepts that Lucas was brought forward through time proving time-travel is possible, but he dismisses a time machine being built on the frivolous grounds that he doesn't know of any visiting time travelers. *sigh*
BTW at the end of the story we jump to the year 100,000 where a guy from the future helpfully infodumps that time travelers become invisible when they go to the past.


Mystery Of The Unknown Invention!

Hal Weston reports that his neighbor Mr. Jalik has disappeared and that he was working on an invention that would save the world. Hal says, "If the Earth is really in danger, we must use his invention! Unless of course he was only a crackpot..." and the policeman responds, "We can't take that chance! We'll not only try to trace Jalik, but relay this information to the government!"
Somehow I can't imagine any police officer ever saying such a thing.

Hal is questioned by "the baffled science council" and really that's probably the best description of any body of government scientists. ;-)
The most amusing thing about the scene is the scientists sitting at a table with their names and specialties on nameplates like they're the Legion of Super-Heroes.
Well, this story was written by Legion creator Otto Binder, although I think this story was written and appeared first.

Anyway the baffled science council explains their guesses of what the possible danger could be and what the machine could do.
Dr. Ira Otis, Glaciologist - Sudden ice age striking overnight - Super-heat ray
T. Shaw, Geologist - A gigantic world-consuming eruption - Freeze ray
Dr. T. James, cosmologist - A vast radioactive cloud in space - Super-blaster
Prof. C. Miller, astronomer - Sun turning into a super-hot nova - Nuclear quencher ray
Dr. Y. Dale, geophysicist - Cosmic forces speed up Earth's rotation - Anchor ray
Of course, none of them have any evidence to back up their crackpot ideas, but we don't hold lack of proof against government scientists these days, so...


The Day I Became A Martian! Strange Adventures #90

Rhett Mason, a science fiction writer, turns into a Martian, looking just like the Martian in a color TV play he wrote.
Okay, I can accept him getting a mental image of what real Martians looked like and describing that. What I can't accept is the make-up people making an actor look so much like real Martians without having seen them themselves. Even Mason's description is vague, "scaly blue skin... hairless head and birdlike tuft... huge eye... pointed ears". Give that description to half a dozen artists and you'll have half a dozen different looks.

When he first turns into a Martian his eyes see things upside-down, but when he looks at a hand mirror, only his image in the mirror is upside-down.

They are turning him into a Martian to test the affects of being on Earth will be when they invade. The final test is of their sixth sense, knowing what will happen in one hour's time.
If the Martians can know what will happen in an hour's time then they should know the results an hour ahead of Mason actually doing them. It must be very disheartening for Martians "Okay, we're going to conduct a tes... Oh. It failed! Well, better do the test or I won't know that it's a failure like I learned a moment ago."


The 100,000 Year-old Weapon!

Darrow brings a doctor to help a man, who happens to be invisible, unless you wear a special pair of glasses, and looks alien, but the doctor examining him treats him as an otherwise normal human with his diagnosis.
While presumably one could argue that Jan 356 is just a future human (the closest the story comes is to call him a "future-man") being hairless & having a flattened nose could match some predictions of future humans, but only having two fingers and a thumb seems like an abnormal change in just 100,000 years.

A future dictator has seized all weapons to prevent a revolt and banned scientific experiments. The resistance has stolen a time machine to... go back 100,000 years to get an idea for a new weapon from science fiction novels.
Excuse me??? All the possible ways to use a time machine and THAT is what they go with?
Okay, changing time might not be possible, but they could go back before Evar Tor took over and get some weapons and bring them forward in time, or put them in a secure location to be retrieved in their present. I'm sure other people could come up with creative ideas as well.

Okayyyyyy... when Jan travels to a period before he is born he is rendered invisible, except to infra-red film or those future glasses. The solution to dealing with the dictator & his lackeys is to bend light around them, making them both invisible and blind.
Soooo... Shouldn't Jan be blind in our time? Or at least only able to see, and READ, in the infra-red spectrum? Can you read a book by infra-red light?



The Midget Earthman Of Jupiter Strange Adventures #91

Funny how people tend to think a giant planet like Jupiter would have giant creatures, but with the greater gravity smaller creatures would be more scientifically plausible.

A giant from Jupiter named Kimor landed his mile long ship, strode into the city, takes Ray Carter and leaves.
1. Where the heck is the American military?
2. Shouldn't Kimor be bouncing due to Earth's lesser gravity?

The Jovians sent dream messages at Earth to learn who would stand the best chance of succeeding in a mission they needed done. Ray feels he can trust the Jovians.
Apparently the brainwashing kept him from putting 2 & 2 together. ;-)
Okay, the story presents them as matching Ray's assessment, but still, if this had been a longer story that would have made a nice twist.

Ray has no problem with the greater gravity of Jupiter.
Man, he IS a well-trained athlete. ;-)

For helping the democratic government of Jupiter out they offer him a reward, which he turns down because he's training for the Olympics and a reward could compromise his amateur standing.
1. Man, that dates this story. A reader these days might be confused by it because now professionals can compete in the Olympics.
2. Gee, you've got a highly advanced, space-faring world grateful to you and you don't think that establishing diplomatic and trade relations between Jupiter and Earth might be a good idea?


The Amazing Tree Of Knowledge

A doctor says, "My theory is that some chemical in the fruit vitalized the unused nine-tenths of the human brain!"
Errrrrrg... that old canard.

In a flashback Jonver thinks "I could appear to the authorities and reveal the fact that I'm from another world! They'd build a spaceship for me, I'm sure!"
1. Rather trusting for a man who's a pathological conman.
2. Most writers these days would have Jonver worried about being dissected by the government. ;-)

Jonver decides he's going to set up a hoax and con the government into building him a spaceship and fly off in it. When the space warp that brought him to Earth sends him crashing back, Jonver is captured and given life imprisonment.
Exactly what crimes did he commit that carry a life sentence? The only crimes I can see him possibly being charged with would be:
1. Illegal alien (bah-dum-bump) - although a smart lawyer could point out he had no control over the spacecraft & could not have known about immigration laws until after he was in the country.
2. Creating a false identity
3. Fraud
4. Theft (of the spaceship)
None of which would seem to justify life imprisonment. Heck, thanks to him the government now has the ability to build their own spaceships, which could be considered payment for whatever fines he had incurred.

NANJAO. It's funny, but Jonver trying again and again to re-enter the space warp and return to his home planet really felt like the Silver Surfer trying to leave Earth. Of course this story is from 1958.


The Amazing Ray Of Knowledge! Strange Adventures #92

Okayyyyyy... young Ted Sand is accidentally exposed to a Knowledge Ray & somehow knows that a cosmic disaster is imminent. Having other kids exposed to the ray they figure out that Pluto brushing through a giant comet's tail will somehow cause the disaster. It's not until they get to Pluto and examine the atmosphere of Pluto that he even gets a clue to what the disaster is & how to prevent it.
I don't care how smart the ray made Ted, it's the whole knowing disaster is coming without any evidence to back it up that bugs me. If it was a Psychic Powers Ray then you could, at least, claim clairvoyance, but no somehow just having his mathematical knowledge increased allowed him to know disaster was coming.

Ted is exposed to the ray a day before the other kids, but when the ray wears off for Ted it wears off for the other kids at the same time.

The danger to the solar system? The tail of the comet will ignite explosive gases in Pluto's upper atmosphere causing the whole planet to explode, throwing off the balance of the solar system, causing all of the planets to fly out of their orbits.
Riiiiiiiight... in 1958 Pluto was the ninth planet out & was believed to be bigger than Mercury, at best it's explosion might have barely affected Neptune's orbit over a period of hundreds to thousands of years... maybe.

The ending is kind of amusing. Dr. Bork is going on about how flash knowledge can never replace earned knowledge. A nice speech made stronger by being delivered while on a spaceship designed by the kids & their flash knowledge. ;-)


Heart Of The Solar System Strange Adventures #93

Page 3, Panel 5. Author's note refers to a "medicnal plant".
That should be medicinal.

Page 9, Panel 2. The letterer misspelled nobody as "Noboby"


The Wizard of A!

A thousand years in the future time travel has been invented, but the people are afraid to use it for fear of messing up the timeline, so they send an encyclopedia, covering the As, back in time to see if Joe Bentley, with this limited knowledge of the future, will mess things up.
Yee gods & little fishies, what kind of idiot would think this is a sane test?


Space-Rescue By Proxy!

Krylxt of the planet Alpha of the star-sun Rigel, says he traveled 540 light years to warn Earth.
Presumably Alpha's year must be longer than Earth's since my astronomy books list Rigel as 900 light years away.
(Of course, in reality, the stories tried to use actual scientific facts, or what was believed to be facts, because they were trying to be educational. So I can only imagine that whatever reference book writer Garner Fox or editor Julie Schwartz was using must have listed it as 540 light years away, not 900.)

2. Was there ever a time when the gravity of Neptune was assume to be the same as Earth?

Neptune's surface gravity is actually just about equal to Earth's, being 1.14 g. Yes, the planet is a lot more massive, but it's also quite a bit larger. The two factors almost cancel each other out.

but when he tested it in sunlight the super-spectrum cast him into the ultra-violet zone

I hope he wasn't too sunburned in the end

So why didn't Mark get forced into the ultra-violet zone?

Maybe the effect depends on the exact angle of the light striking it. Or something.

Can you read a book by infra-red light?

Probably. Ink and paper absorb and reflect infrared differently, so the text should still be legible.

So I can only imagine that whatever reference book writer Garner Fox or editor Julie Schwartz was using must have listed it as 540 light years away, not 900.

Quite possible. Star distances have only recently been pinned down to any real accuracy. Btw, Rigel being a blue supergiant, an habitable planet orbiting it would have a VASTLY longer year than Earth's. Krylxt would have talked of a one or two light year journey at most.

Neptune's surface gravity is actually just about equal to Earth's, being 1.14 g. Yes, the planet is a lot more massive, but it's also quite a bit larger. The two factors almost cancel each other out.

Huh? Interesting.

Maybe the effect depends on the exact angle of the light striking it. Or something.

Maybe.

Captain Carrot

All stories reprinted in Showcase Presents Captain Carrot & His Amazing Zoo Crew!

This Bunny Unbound! New Teen Titans #16

Superman is heading to Pluto to find the source of a beam causing people to act like animals. Trying to leave Earth he encounters a barrier that's weakening him. A meteorite passes through the barrier, so he grabs it & throws it back while hanging onto it. (I wonder if he got this idea from a Thor comic book? ;-) Passing through the barrier the meteor explodes and he's dazed and temporarily blinded so he goes back down to Earth to change back into Clark Kent.
Wait, what? All that trouble to get through the barrier, but rather than wait a few minutes in space to recover & check out what's going on at Pluto, you're going to go back to Earth & take a sick day?

NANJAO. It was kinda funny seeing all the drawings of individual members of the Just'a Lotta Animals, then I remembered the original plan was to do a Just'a Lotta Animals book, but DC was uncertain of how that might affect the rights & trademarks they had on the non-funny animal versions so a new group of characters was created while making the JLA a comic book Roger (Captain Carrot) Rabbit wrote & drew.

NANJ in case you were wondering IIRC work on the movie Who Framed Roger Rabbit (based on the earlier novel Who Censored Roger Rabbit) started around the same time as this comic series so the Roger Rabbit name was a coincidence. As the series progressed the comic gave Roger the middle name of Rodney & later started calling him R. Rodney Rabbit before finally just calling him Rodney Rabbit. So if I sometimes call him Roger & other times Rodney it's still the same Rabbit. ;-)


The Pluto Syndrome! Captain Carrot And His Amazing Zoo Crew! #1

Superman says, "It's that strange ray from space that hit us before"
Uh... neither Superman nor Captain Carrot were hit by the devolution ray.

At no point did they even explain HOW Starro defeated Superman. At one point he's teleported away, then later we see him prisoner in green kryptonite chains (well, the cover shows them to be green, in black & white they just look like ordinary chains.)
Yeah, because Starro has green k you don't need a lot of explanation, but where did Starro get the green & gold k? Starro's flashback states that in a previous story he was blown up & one tentacle drifted through a dimensional hole that led to the Earth-C universe & that tentacle regenerated into a new Starro. So was it just coincidence that some green & gold k just happened to drift through a dimensional barrier & ended up somewhere that Starro could get it? Did this universe have a Krypton? Yeah, in the Earth-C-Minus universe there is Chipton where Super Squirrel comes from, but would green & gold chiptonite affect Superman?
Also, since Starro, claims he has a gun that fires gold kryptonite, why didn't he use that on Supes immediately?


Fly The Fiendly Skies! Captain Carrot And His Amazing Zoo Crew! #3

Despite the fact that Captain Carrot can't fly but just makes super hops, he manages to stay up in the air after exiting the plane & meeting Jailhouse Roc.


The Bunny From Beyond Captain Carrot And His Amazing Zoo Crew! #6

Previously (issue 3) the nation's capital was Wartington, this issue it's Waspington.

Last issue Von Vermin was said to be from San Salvador, but this issue he's from San Salamander.
Okay, I suppose technically, the mistake was last issue since Earth-C place names tend to be animalized versions of real world place names, then again Oklahoma Bones first name comes from the state of Oklahoma, so it's possible that some names were the same.

Page 2, Panel 5. Captain Carrot says, "That must be the ratzi your dad took the space eggs from, Okie!"
Uh, well, it is the same ratzi, but Oklahoma senior did not take multiple space eggs from him. The ratzis escaped with all but one of the eggs which Okie, Sr. took back to Gnu York.

Last issue Von Vermin referred to Verminy as the Faterland, but here he calls it the Fodderland.


Digger O'Doom!

The Wombat building is shaking & one of the people says, "I thought they only had e-earthquakes in C-California!"
That should be Califurnia, not California. ;-)


The Coming Of Bow-Zar The Barkbarian! Captain Carrot And His Amazing Zoo Crew! #7

Splash Page. Pig Iron asks, "So how cum I ain't met no Follywood Starlets yet?"
Did he forget meeting Fara Foxette in issue 4?

Page 2, Panel 1. Captain Carrot says, "Not like a couple we could mention, en, Yankee Poodle?"
I think the letterer wrote an N when he should have written an H & that should read "eh, Yankee Poodle?"


Time Varmints! Captain Carrot And His Amazing Zoo Crew! #9

Page 4, Panel 7. Identifies the jive-jumping emperor Nero Fox's country as Rome, but on Page 5, Panel 7, it's referred to as Roam.


The Wuz-Wolf's Night To Howl! Captain Carrot And His Amazing Zoo Crew! #11

Page 16, Panel 1. Pig Iron says, "I never though you did, Pal."
Thought, not though.


Captain Carrot And His Amazing Zoo Crew! #16

The Next Issue promo reads, "He's back! The ten-ton toad! Frogzilla's Big Croak-Up!"
Except the next issue features three shorts about half the team, Frogzilla returns in issue 19.


House Of Frankenswine Captain Carrot And His Amazing Zoo Crew! #17

The caption states that the setting is Ringtailkadt (in West Erminey), but a railway sign reads "Ringtailkat"

NANJAO. This issue also ends with hyping the return of Frogzilla, but at least it properly credits issue 19 (while ignoring the stories in issue 18).


Here Comes The Sun! Captain Carrot And His Amazing Zoo Crew! #18

Okayyyy... when he changed to Solar Bear everyboy watching TV was blinded by the flash of light. Fastback deals with this temporary blindness by putting on a pair of sunglasses & at the end of the story reccomends everyone who is still blinded put on some sunglasses so they can see.
I don't believe wearing sunglasses AFTER you've been temporarily blinded helps you see.


You Scream Ice Cream!

NAN just some amusing in-jokes. We meet Fred Basset & Grayson Robin of the Basset & Robin ice cream chain.
Fred Basset is also the name of a long-running comic strip. DC has another more famous Robin whose real name is Grayson. ;-)


Frogzilla's Big Croak-Up! Captain Carrot And His Amazing Zoo Crew! #19

In issue 10 the Earth-C counterpart to the Pacific Ocean was the Specific Ocean, but here it's the Pandafic Ocean.


Gillikins' Highland The Oz-Wonderland War #1

Oooooooh... didn't realize the title was a pun until I typed it out. Cute, very cute! :-D

Okayyyyy... the Chesire Cat has showed up in Rodney Rabbit's drawing room & Rodney says "I've often seen a cat without a grin, but I seldom see a cat without pants!"
What's ironic is Rodney is not wearing pants and rarely do the artists draw male furries wearing pants. (And I doubt they're using the Sabrina Online gag of pants that look like a furry's legs.) Now had Rodney said 'without clothes' then it would have worked since shirts are recognized as clothing in this universe.

NANJAO. In issue 20 they had Gorilla Grodd mentally contact a Roquat in another dimension that Grodd had helped back on his throne after his people overthrew him. I assumed that this refered to some Flash story I hadn't read or forgotten about. Imagine my surprise when it's revealed here that Roquat is the Nome King & his land is Oz.
Just how long had they been planning this story? (Three years had elapsed since Captain Carrot And His Amazing Zoo Crew! had been cancelled.)

NANJAO. In some respects this story is kind of held back by being too respectful of the source material. Clearly the writers are fans of Carol & Baum, so there's a sense of someone carefully playing with someone else's toys so they can wrap them up and put them back in their boxes without any scratches or dents.
Not that I want to see death & destruction raining down upon Oz & Wonderland with beloved characters' bodies littering the landscape, but, at least in the literary originals there was a sense of danger, that if the characters weren't careful... *duh duh duhhhhhhh!*


Roquat's Dread Glare! The Oz-Wonderland War #2

Hoping to capture Captain Carrot, Roquat casts a spell to bring rabbits from all neighboring dimensions to a cavern in Nomeland.
Would one cavern be enough to hold them all? Even a furry universe with multiple species should have, at least, a million rabbits, let alone multiple dimensions worth.

Lt. Diana (Wonder Wabbit) Prance says, "We're not in Kansas anymore..."
Shouldn't that be Kornsas given the similarity of place names between Earth-C & Earth-C-Minus?

NONJAO:

I read a story in a House Of Mystery issue that delt with a sculpture who had tenancy to murder his female models.

He gets his comeuppance when he gets a new model, who insists on keeping her face covered. When asked her name, she says it's "Semuda".

Well, I guess one can see where this went. The murderous sculpture keeps insisting that Semuda show him her face. In the end, she does and.. Well, the sculpture never took the time to realize that Semuda is an anagram of Medusa.

His crime spree is ended. Hard to kill people when you're a statue.

What did you write this on? There are a lot of weird typos.

Just wrote it too fast. Sorry.

Anyway, I've corrected the typos (one of the perks of being a Roving Mod).

Still there. Some nitpicky corrections

delt => dealt
sculpture => sculptor

What is it with sculptors who murder their models? It seems to come up over and over again in fiction.

If the butler didn't do it, it must have been the sculptor. ;-)

Well, at least this sculptor is permanently out of circulation. Thanks to "Semuda".