Monday, November 17, 2008

That Connivin' Lois!






















Take a gander at the cover of Superman's Girl Friend, Lois Lane #59, dated August 1965. Given Smallville's latest few angles, this cover scene may well take place on the CW in a couple of weeks!
















But look in the lower right-hand corner for the Extra! In another Let's-Make-Lois-Crazy story (we all know she DESERVES IT), Superman and Batman get together to put another knot in the tail of that lil' ol' curious kitty named Lois Lane.




Check out the fine Curt Swan art. Note how Bruce (Batman) Wayne has a squarer jaw than Clark (Superman) Kent. Also see how Swan's renderings of Lois are less cartoonish and more true-to-life than the Schaffenberger art on the cover.



It starts out innocently (!) enough. Superman, on an outer-space mission, gives Batman an anti-gravity belt and asks the Caped Crusader to don a DIFFERENT cape (and a Superman face mask) to keep an eye on Lois. So Batman-playing-Superman rescues Lois, as shown in the story's Splash Page.


Bruce doesn't know that Lois revived quickly enough to ID him as Gotham's favorite playboy. Get a load of her gloating daydream, figuring out how to wrap Bruce-Superman around her little wedding-ring finger.


Soon Lois's plan works! Bruce falls in love with her, while Lois reads his every action as confirmation of his super-powers. As you can read in page 8 of the story, Lois just HAS to brag to her sister Lucy about her plot. And, just returned from outer space, a nosy Super-Someone with super-hearing happens to be eavesdropping, and decides on a little twist to Lois's plot.



Just think! if only Lois could have kept her yap shut, she might have found herself Mrs. Bruce (Batman) Wayne. Not too much of a disappointment, you think?

Just wait until the Best Man flies in!


So, on page 9 of the tale, we see Lois break it off while Bruce bravely tries to carry on with a broken *sniff* heart. Now, while the last panel may sound cruel and full of male asininity, think over Lois's behavior in this story.









Lois has plotted and schemed and dissembled, all because she (mistakenly) thought she was going, through trickery, to marry Superman in his Secret Identity. At least, judging by THIS story, she DID deserve to have a knot jerked in her (pretty little) tail, don't you agree?


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