Buying No More Superman Comics

http://www.comicsalliance.com/2011/04/27/superman-renounces-us-citizenship/

Well, you might not have know this but I have been buying comics even nowadays, basically the DC-Superman lines.

Action Comics #900 is the last comic book I plan on buying for a while.  Because Superman renouncing his US citizenship is something I don't like.  That is, I don't like the editorial policy reflected here.  That's the "Blame America First" policy, if you didn't know.

The basic values of Truth, Justice, and the America Way are the best goals of any country.  While there is a heck of a lot wrong with some of the things around here, the only worse country is ALL THE REST OF THEM.

Superman, as a comics/cultural character, will always be American, in the best sense.  It's a shame that his creators seem to be focusing on America's failures and not using Superman as a tool to point them out, while believing that we can be better if we only LIVE UP to our ideals, like fair play and personal responsibility.

Saying, "I'm going to take my cape and run away" is NOT the Superman who, like Abraham Lincoln, "belongs to the ages."

Strange Critters

Here we have a small assortment of books dealing with Alien Animals.

Clark & Coleman have produced a couple of books.  Usually they lead around to a theory that these critters aren't run-of-the-mill flesh and blood animals that are always here.  The beasties are examples of bleedover from another realm whose manifestations here, on OUR plane, have a supernatural appearance.

In this book, Holiday likes to find older antecedents comparable to today's reports.

Warren Smith, a pseudonymous author, jumps right into the mystical realms, asking breathlessly "Coud it be???" that so-and-so could be true.

This other book by Holiday, specifically about Nessie, says that she really exists, but is also a "magickal" creature from the Goblin Realms.

Goin' Fission! - a new compilation

With great power comes great responsibility. With atomic power comes greater responsibility. No one can predict an earthquake and tsunami is going to wipe out your reactors. And if such a thing happens, then there are plenty of doom-sayers who are going to crow, "I told you something bad was going to happen."



Well, some of these people are crooning in tune, and you can listen to them here in this latest compilation of mine.




Here are the songs:

1 Jesus Is the First Line of Defense Pilgrim Travellers 1951
2 Atomic Kisses Earney Vandagriff 1955
3 Hydrogen Bomb The Laurels 1961
4 The War Drags On Mick Softley 1965
5 Atom and Evil General Electric 1966
6 Please Don't Drop That H-Bomb on Me Country Joe & The Fish 1967
7 Wooden Ships Jefferson Airplane 1969
8 Political Science Randy Newman 1972
9 Nuclear Babies Oingo Boingo 1980
10 Let's All Make a Bomb Heaven 17 1981
11 Run Like a Villain Iggy Pop 1982
12 World Suicide Defuser 1983
13 Uranium Rock The Cramps 1983
14 Surfin' USSR Ray Stevens 1988
15 The Bomb Lifesavers Underground 1992
16 Atomic Power Uncle Tupelo 1994
17 The Bomb Inside the Bomb We Are Scientists 2002
18 Nuclear Blues Frances Plante-Scott 2004
19 Bomb.Repeat.Bomb.1954 Ted Leo and the Pharmacists 2007
20 Atomic Bomb Brian Butler 2008
21 Atom and Evil song Heaven and Hell 2009
22 Atom Bomb Blues The Naptown Jug Busters 2009







And here is the link:  http://www.megaupload.com/?d=T131NP70

Such Secrets Have Never Been Told

... until now.

Since the 1980s, breathless books like these have been released by Abelard Publications, each spreading the same kinds of ideas put forth by William Cooper in Behold a Pale Horse .

According to this tale and its variations, we (the USA) captured the crew of one or more downed alien vessels in the 1940s or 1950s, and were able to keep them alive and then to negotiate with their race of extraterrestrials.

The idea is that the government of the USA, perhaps in collusion with other world powers, agreed that the aliens could kidnap and experiment on Earth citizens.  In return, the guys from Kwatloo were supposed to give us some wonderful access to fancy alien technologies.

This led to several underground bases staffed by mixed human/alien crews, and indeed a hybrid race of the worst of both worlds.

Then, so the story goes, the aliens pulled a double-cross on us by kidnaping (and doing worse than that) to many more people than agreed to.  Also their vaunted technology has lost some of its vaunt.

Supposedly, these kinds of disagreements led to a shootin' match in an underground base around (or BELOW) Dulce, New Mexico.

Other breathless revelations have included various suggestions that the biologies of pigs, or cows, are similiar enough to human in some ways, that secret government experiments on cattle have been performed as part of some strange weapons program, probably involving germ warfare.

You can make of tales like these what you will.  I think it's a bunch of malarkey.  For fifty years or more, folks interested in mysteries like these -- a group that includes me! -- have been strung along by hints of cover-ups that will soon be revealed.  The big governmental information cave-in will be any year now . . .

And it's been just around that event horizon for half a century.  It's not any closer, because it's the tantalizing hints of "possible maybes" that sells books and lecture tours, and videos.

See you again soon.  Any comments?

The Mirror Master and Alpha

In another TV angle on the Flash's classic Rogue's Gallery, we have the episode "Done with Mirrors," reflecting a new take ("reflecting" -- get it?) on the Mirror Master, with holograms.

Then we have the pet android, Alpha, who doesn't want to be a government assassin.  Now, no offense to the actress Claire Stansfield, who plays Alpha, but the TV Guide ad is pushing it a little bit.  Alpha is exotic, fascinating, but not gorgeous.  She's a lot better than that.

Captain Cold and the Clone Wars

The guy who plays Captain Cold, Michael Champion, does a pretty chilling job of playing a cold-hearted killer.

And the next episode, cleverly titled "Twin Streaks," is a pretty fun look at a really improbable scenario.  Like the Talosians who didn't mean to be evil, the clone of Barry isn't intentionally destructive -- he just wasn't raised right.  He's depraved on account of he's deprived, Officer Krupke!

The Trickster and More Twisted Fun

Man, how could it get any more fun than this?  Megan, the lawyer who discovered Barry's identity while falling for him, is being stalked by a wacko who decides that getting his own costume will make him irresistable.  And thus is born ... THE TRICKSTER!

Read the caption in the ad above.  Now, really -- How can you resist anything involving an EVIL SCHEME !?!?

Then we have some really, really, really superspeed running, ending up a decade in the future.  Where, after the Flash's disappearance, bad-guy Pike moved in and took over.  Talk about always winter and never Christmas!

Mext we have "Deadly Nightshade," where Central City's first vigilante has his identity stolen (twenty years ahead of you or me) and has to reclaim his name, with the Scarlet Speedster's help.

Plus, kudos to the headline department.  "Trias by Fury!" -- doesn't it just give you the chills?

More Flash Listings

Here are the synopses for episodes 4, 8, and 9, "Watching the Detectives," "Shroud of Death," and "Ghost in the Machine," the latter of which introduced us to the wonderful character of "The Nightshade," Central City's FIRST vigilante.  Shades of the Minutemen!

New Superman Movie Officially Sucks

With the announcement that an actor has been hired to play the role of Zod in the new Superman movie, I have sighed and hung my head in defeat.

There's a picture of this guy Michael Shannon as Zod on this page: http://www.mtv.com/photos/michael-shannon-imagined-as-general-zod/1661693/6017657/photo.jhtml

The idea of Zod cannot be good.  It brings images of huge hams laced with cheese.  It brings memories of a unmasculine screechy tenor voice whining, "KNEEL before Zod ... and admire my freshly painted fingernails!"

Zod was invented for the 1970s Superman movies.  There had been a Kryptonian general in the comics, but he was a heartless villain, not a swishy-boy in leather with self-image issues.

On the bright side, I guess I will now be a lot easier to impress if the movie gets ANYTHING right.

Tomorrow we will return to TV's the Flash . . .

The Profoundly Titled "Pilot"

Here's how TV Guide presented the (2-hour) first episode of the Flash TV show.  It introduced Iris West and waved her into the past, established Tina McGee as the second lead, and introduced the great character of Julio, Barry Allen's assistant in the crime lab -- played by Alex Desert.  Desert played the thankless part of clueless citizen who is presented with all the evidence that his boss has a secret crime-fighting life, but *just misses* the proof.

In its original listing, here, the show is listed as "Fantasy," you'll note.  Soon after that, it became "Adventure."

TV Guide on TV Superheroes

Inspired by the debut of The Flash on CBS, TV Guide ran an article on TV superheroes in its December 22, 1990 issue.  Probably also inspired by some money from CBS?

Let's Flash!

Over the next few days I'll be pulling out some TV Guide clippings on that late lamented CBS TV show, the Flash.

La La Land Records still has copies of their 2-CD soundtrack release from the TV show.  This is great stuff, folks!      www.lalalandrecords.com/Flash.html

Now, I can understand quibbling about the lack of Iris West after the first episode, the addition of Earl the dog, and so on.  But this was a fun TV show, with an actual attempt to put this silly idea into a world at least similar to our world.

When his superspeed kicks in, suddenly, Barry runs to Catalina, burns off half his clothes through friction, and has to wipe out a pizza buffet to restock his starved cells.  This scene may have introduced this energy-consumption idea to the comics.  Does anybody know for sure?

Starting Friday evening, we'll share a few days loking back on The Flash.

Finally Number One at SOMETHING

See you in a few days . . .

James Whale's Dracula's Daughter, last part

The actual script printed here, as I’ve said, actually includes Bela Lugosi’s Dracula character for a good fourth of the movie. It explains how Drac became a vampire, and the origin of the gal who plays the title role of Dracula’s Daughter.




It is also very plain in this script from 1933 that the author (probably screenwriter and Laemmle friend R.C. Sherriff) was sixty years ahead of his time. See if these plot elements don’t remind you of Coppola’s Bram Stoker's Dracula. It appears that James V Hart, credited writer of the 1992 film’s screenplay, *might* have been inspired by some things in THIS script. Here are some similarities:



-- Dracula was Vlad Dracula, who led his armies to success against the Turks

-- He was a cruel despot who enjoyed torturing his subjects

-- He was converted to a vampire for his evil

-- When van Helsing leads his party of vampire hunters back to Castle Dracula in pursuit, they must encamp in the snow.

-- van Helsing protects them by making a circle in the snow and crumbling communion wafers into the circle, saying, “I have a dispensation.”

Quite a few similarities, eh?


The film treatment uses many plot points from the original novel that were not used in the 1931 film – chasing back to Transylvania after the vampire; using the vampire’s victim as a clairvoyant aid to track the monster; and so on.



But the finished script takes another tack, first by introducing Dracula in the 1400s and his conversion to vampirism, and then by showing the sexual enthrallment that his “daughter” casts over her (male) victims.


If you are fascinated by monsters and what might-have-been, you must read this book!

As another bit of fun, take a good hard look at this unused publicity piece for Dracula’s Daughter. Then look at the original depiction of Magenta from Rocky Horror. Coincidence? I think not!



See you later, Gator!

James Whale’s Dracula’s Daughter (part two)

Thanks to the magic of “Memorama” (a term I just invented!), we can learn about the Dracula’s Daughter that never was.




In the original script, the title gal was a peasant girl, one of a bunch of young lovelies kidnapped by Dracula for the pleasure of a party of noblemen in Castle Dracula. Jane Wyatt, young and fresh-looking, would have been a great fit for this role.



She becomes Dracula’s Daughter when the King Vampire makes her into one of the Undead after desecrating her husband’s corpse in front of her.



Both she and Dracula would remain in the castle until she is released through the blundering of a couple of English would-be tough guys who are showing off for their girlfriends by exploring broken-down Castle Dracula. After this point Dracula (to be played by Lugosi) would exit the film’s storyline.



Now, after becoming Undead, DD is exotically beautiful, her country-girl charms having taken on a new, dangerous seductiveness. She enslaves one of her unwitting liberators and uses him to enter England, where she established herself as the rich and mysterious Countess Szelenski.



Professor van Helsing, and Dr Seward, reprising their roles from the first film, become involved in the quest to rescue the film’s “hero” from the clutches of Dracula’s Daughter.

Read this “The Main Idea” for original author John Balderstone’s take on the – umm, more sensational, shall we say? – other aspects possible by using a FEMALE vampire.




The three-page early treatment of the idea, like the actual eventual film, picks up precisely at the end of the 1931 film. Besides van Helsing and Seward, John and Mina Harker from the first film also appear, giving aid and advice to their friends, one of whom is enthralled to the vampire.



More on this creepy non-extant classic next time!

James Whale’s Dracula’s Daughter (part one)

This is another in Philip Riley’s series of “lost” scripts – fully completed treatments of movies about the classic Universal monsters that were, for whatever reason, unfilmed.




The story behind this unmade movie is that, after the success of Frankenstein, Whale was under contract to Junior Laemmle for more pictures, and Laemmle wanted Whale to direct sequels to both Dracula (the original was directed sopoforically by Todd Browning) and Frankenstein.



Whale produced a quirky masterpiece with Bride of Frankenstein, but didn’t want to take on the project that had been labeled Dracula’s Daughter. Whale, however, wanted very much to take on a different project, the musical Showboat.



Laemmle, head of production at Universal, was just as vehement that Whale make a follow-up film to the surprise smash of 1931, that strange Valentine to Universal’s bottom line, Dracula.

According to the introductory matter in this book, Whale got around having to make the monster movie by, without Laemmle’s knowledge, sending a way over-the-top script treatment to the Breen Office, the screen censors who had approval over public morality (and corporate profits) via the Motion Picture Production Code. Supposedly this 1933 script had beaucoup gore, torture, and perverted sex in it – to which the censors immediately reacted with horrified rejection.



This reaction from the folks who had to green-light any widely released film was a temporary death-knell (ha ha) for Dracula’s Daughter, leaving Whale free to continue preparations for his beloved Showboat.



It wasn’t until 1936 that a film called Dracula’s Daughter was released, with a script and plot so very different from the early treatments.



For example, the title role, played by Gloria Holden in the final film, was originally to be played by Jane Wyatt. Dracula himself plays a central role in the first 30% or so of the film. This would certainly have revitalized Lugosi’s already fading carrer!



More on this fascinating “might-have-been” next time.


 

The End of Superman 180

The last few pages of Superman 180 have ads and other filler.  On this page, it's kind of interesting that there is really no difference in visual design, or other divider to separate the Trix ad (the top 3/4 of the page) from the bottom, editorially-generated strip.

Of course, the strip "Little Pete" is itself halfway towards being an ad for AMT models.  But "Little Pete" was an actual filler strip seen from time to time.

This the inside back cover is one of the infamous "Make Money, Get Prizes" genre.  These greeting cards might be considered the "creme de la crap" of such, because they would be actually imprinted with the buyers' names.  Just think -- in 1963, if such things were ordered, the system would require an involved chain of events that would involve writing down the name; sending in the name; a printer actually being able to READ the name written by a ten-year-old; setting up the name in a linotype machine; and so on.

Nowadays that ten-year-old kid could run off a card template on his home computer and probably would imbed a dirty picture in the background of the greeting card.

The back cover, in glorious dying color, presents the two newest Aurora monster models, The Witch, and Bride of Frankenstein.  I had both of these models, and they were sweet (no sexism intended)!

What remains of "The Witch" are the snake (seen in the background of the color illo above) and the ol' gal herself, sans feet (they just glued into the solid flat surface that was the underside of her dress).

With "The Bride," all I still have is the lady-in-waiting.  For some reason, her head (of one molded piece with her neck) can be slipped right out of her shoulders.

These fragments I have shored against my ruin, as T S Eliot said in "The Waste Land."  Actually, the ladies DO come out at Halloween time when we get all the spooky stuff down from the attic.  About every three years or so we actually decorate inside with these and other trashy, scary things.

As you can tell by the posted price of $1.49, these were part of the second wave of Aurora monsters.  The first series were 98 cent list price.  In 1963 Oklahoma, that meant that a solid dollar would buy one of them, for the total state and local taxes was only two cents on the dollar.  Sweet!

Later on in the week we will start a look at Philip Riley's book James Whale's Dracula's Daughter.

How Orella's Mightiness Backfired

As we near the end of our page-by-page trip through Superman 180, we wrap up the tale of "The Girl Who Was Mightier Than Superman."

Turns out, not only did the ladies from Matrion trick Superman into coming to their island refuge; one of them, Orella, almost cheated Superman into marriage by stealing some of his super-powers.

But Supes figured things out and rewired the power-siphoning device to overload Orella.  She messed up the marriage rituals and now everything is being revealed.

In this last page of the story, we get contrition from the cheaters and a real downer of an ending when Superman glances skyward with his Super-vision and discovers that the women's home planet is a planet of the dead now.

Take a smart-alecky look at the top leftmost quadrant of the first panel on this page.  Orella is ejecting a Super-Sneeze.  Is it just me?  Without the sound-effect "achooo!" I think the picture looks a lot more like Super-Projectile-Vomit.

Note the bit of 1960s slang when, in the penultimate panel, Superman thinks about having barely escaped "doing the bridegroom bit."

At the bottom of the page we have a reversible ad for Tottsie Roll Pops.  When you turn the page upside down, you have to wonder why the kid's head has been cut off and balanced on top of a cereal bowl?

One the next page we have a house ad and a truncated Metropilis Mailbag.

This particular letters page is a fine example ot the give-and-take between readers and DC staff.  (Probable) Mailbag writer E Nelson Bridwell actually apologizes for a livestock goof in the first letter.  Note the reference to the SPCA, because according to the story referenced, "The Revenge of the Super-Pets" from Superman 176, the actions in the story actually INSPIRED the foundation of the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals.

Otgher letters project a timeline of future Super-Book anniversaries, try to catch errors in previous stories, and highlight Superman's pervasion of popular culture by noting a contemporary Jeopardy! TV reference.

The in-house ad that take up the bottom of the page highlights an accidental trilogy of silly (or at least light-hearted) comic issues.

While Kurt Schaffenberger's Lois Lane art is really impeccable, there's something about his depiction of Superman (rearing back on his heels, hand to forehead) that reassures us that both Lois and Lana will be wide-awake and catfighting over Superman by story's end.

On the right side, we have another of the famous/infamous tales of when Superboy was Super-Tot, this time in the prizefighting ring.

And in the middle, we have the jaw-dropping fun of the Krypton Crawl, from Jimmy Olsen's time-travel-tale, "The Red-Headed Beatle of 1,000 BC!"  Yeah, yeah, yeah!

See you again soon for the wrap-up of this classic ish!

This Is What Happens to Cheaters, Orella!

Ever since being lured to the island of Florena by a bunch of sneaky women, Superman has been manipulated at every turn.  Now he has been told the ladies' real plan:  He is to father a new generation of girls who will be hardy enough to return to their home planet, Matrion, where all the women are strong, and the men are subservient.

Orella bested the Man of Steel in three ceremonial contests, and now has begun the Matrionettes' (is that right?) marriage ritual.  First up, she was to build a honeymoon cottage.  But somehow when she started to drive the nails into the wood, she hit them so hard that they shot out the other side of the beams like bullets.  And that's where we are at the top of the above page.  The nails, like red-hot bullets, puncture a bunch of cocoanuts and give everybody a cocoanut-milk shower!

Ummm, it's not supposed to work out that way.  Orella didn't SEEM to have been THAT strong, although she DID best Superman in those feats of strength . . .

Next, while Orella prepares the wedding feast, Superman goes off into the jungle and returns with some natural cosmetics.  He offers some of the face powder to Orella, and she powder-puffs her already-lovely face.

Vanity, thy name is Orella!  The stuff acts like sneezing powder, as (through a thought balloon) we read that Superman intended.  But she gives off a SUPER-sneeze that flattens the dinner table!  Man, this is getting to be an awkward wedding.

Next up, we have the last feat, where Orella must remove a magnetic sword from its stone scabbard, to prove that she is worthy to lead the women back to the home planet, Matrion.

Or, as Maxwell Smart would say, "Ah yes.  The old sword-in-the-stone trick."  Or, perhaps, "That's the SECOND biggest sword I've seen this week."

Well, Orella's bad luck holds true.  She yanks the hilt so hard that the sword dissolves.  And Superman was expecting it . . .   Hmmm.

So, having messed up the three rituals, surely Orella can perform the last, cutting off a bit of her hair to give to her groom as a symbol of love.

Note that Orella wants to shed her bracelet, but Superman asks her to keep it on.  Hurry up things, people, he says.  He's anxious for the wedding to start!  (Boy, is he mean!)  Soon we will find out why . . .

Sure enough, when they try to cut Orella's hair, the scissors shatter, just as when somebody tries to give Superman a trim.

And now comes the revelation.  Earlier in the story we saw how Orella, scheming minx that she is, cheated on the matrimonial sweepstakes so that SHE would be the Matrion to become Superman's bride.

Now we find out that she cheated again.  When she gave those three ceremonial gifts to Superman on his arrival, they were booby-trapped with superpower-stealing technology . . . powers absorbed by Orella through that bracelet.

Rember our cover image of Orella giving Superman the old heave-ho?  Well, you'll remember that in the story his aerial ride ended against a palm tree, where Orella's gifts fell from his cape pouch.  Now, in flashback, we see that at the time Superman took a closer look at them, and discovered Orella's trickery.

So, using his heat vision, he rewired the gizmo to make it a little TOO effective.  Orella's borrowed super-strength became super-DUPER-strength, and she couldn't control it.

Now, Orella did this all in secret.  Sophroni, the older woman who is the last survivor of the original colony of Matrionettes, didn't know anything about this.  Even though offworlders, they share our sense of decency and fair play.

So, Orella has been revealed to all as a cheat and a liar.  A darned pretty one, though!  What will be Superman and Sophroni's next move?  Will there be a wedding with the space girl?

Tune in after the weekend to find out!

Let the Marriage Contest Begin!

On these two pages we see Superman get into a bit of a pickle.  He must marry the lovely offworlder Orella if she can best him in a few tests of strength.  The reason is that these beautiful gals are of an Amazon-like race of space warriors.  Regrettably, they are the weakest of their race.  They hope that introducing a little fresh blood into the gene pool, they can raise up a new generation of stronger women and be worthy of joining their race again on their home planet of Matrion.

The last of the original generation of spacefarers, Sophroni, will act as referee for the three contests of strength.  And, as depicted on the story's splash panel, Supes is immediately dragged across the "line in the sand" in the tug-o-war.

Now what?  If not for the giveaway of the story title and splash/cover pictures, we would never have expected something like this.  Man, if these are the WEAKLINGS of their race, what are the strong gals like?!?!?

Now we see more embarrassment for the Man of Steel, but also, when those items fall out of his cape pouch, there's a "Hmmmm" moment.  The wheels start to turn in the ol' Kryptonian noggin, and the more contemplative of us begin to remember that, besides his super physical powers, this guy is also a Kryptonian scientist and the offspring of two Kryptonian scientists . . .

Well, the three tests are over, and Supes is now bound to marry Orella.  So, in the first of the wedding rituals, she is to build their first home.  What's this?!?!?  She's TOO strong now?

And what's with that smug smirk on Superman's face?

We'll have to wait until next time for more information . . .