News:

Rings of Reznor!

Main Menu

Into the Bronze Age

Started by BentonGrey, January 02, 2016, 09:16:24 PM

Previous topic - Next topic

BentonGrey

Ha, true.  Serious doesn't have to mean depressing.  This is a joyful medium, and creators do best when they remember that.  Of course, Batman lends himself to darker stories better than most, but look at the best of all Bat-worlds, Batman:TAS.  That could do maudlin, introspective, brooding, and yet, Batman still had a dry sense of humor and had moments of happiness.

Also, ha, I know what you mean about feeling like the 90s were only a decade ago!  How has it been twenty years?!
God Bless
"If God came down upon me and gave me a wish again, I'd wish to be like Aquaman, 'cause Aquaman can take the pain..." -Ballad of Aquaman
Check out mymods and blog!
https://bentongrey.wordpress.com/

HarryTrotter

At worst he was a cool action hero,but we went from dropping one liners to "I thought about killing myself but instead I dress up as a bat and look ridiculous."
Actual Tom King monologue.Which you probably want to read in Will Arnet's voice.
''Even our origin stories have gone sour.''
Jon Farmer

BentonGrey

Well, I'd say that cuts right to the core of the character.  :rolleyes:
God Bless
"If God came down upon me and gave me a wish again, I'd wish to be like Aquaman, 'cause Aquaman can take the pain..." -Ballad of Aquaman
Check out mymods and blog!
https://bentongrey.wordpress.com/

BentonGrey

God Bless
"If God came down upon me and gave me a wish again, I'd wish to be like Aquaman, 'cause Aquaman can take the pain..." -Ballad of Aquaman
Check out mymods and blog!
https://bentongrey.wordpress.com/

HarryTrotter

Actually,Deep Six fought Aquaman and Koryak once.Possibly a few more times.
Dan Turpin was a supporting character in Superman titles and the Superman TAS (as you mentioned),But I dont think we saw him in a while.Since Final Crisis?
''Even our origin stories have gone sour.''
Jon Farmer

BentonGrey

Howdy guys, after a long, LONG delay, I'm back with more Into the Bronze Age!:
https://bentongrey.wordpress.com/2020/12/24/into-the-bronze-age-november-1971-part-5/

I'm covering the penultimate issues of November 1971, which puts me almost at the right month, just years later.

HT, here's an equally long delayed reply, ha!: Right, I've seen that appearance of the Deep Six during the PAD run, but it's just one story arc, and then they show up in the background of one scene in a big fight during the Sub-Diego run.  I'm pretty sure that's it, though.  What a waste!  As for Dan Turpin, I don't really follow the Superman books, so I couldn't say, but I certainly haven't heard anything about him since the cartoon.
God Bless
"If God came down upon me and gave me a wish again, I'd wish to be like Aquaman, 'cause Aquaman can take the pain..." -Ballad of Aquaman
Check out mymods and blog!
https://bentongrey.wordpress.com/

Silver Shocker

#486
Ah, yes, Dan "Terrible" Turpin. No doubt you remember him from the cartoon (his final scene in the show may well be the single most unforgettable moment in the entire show), but his role in Final Crisis is actually rather fascinating (then again, it was Final Crisis, one of the strangest stories in the long history of strange that is Grant Morrison's comics career)

The New Gods and Darkseid and his ilk in that story were....for some reason, being reincarnated on Earth in human form and/or possessing human bodies as hosts for their rebirth (it was a Grant Morrison story, so things were not as clear as they could be) and Turpin was actually the host body for Darkseid himself. Quite an interesting twist.

According to the DC wiki, Turpin died during Final Crisis, encountering the Black Racer. I don't remember it myself (it's been too long) but I'm sure that's true.

Late to the party on Ollie in the famous drug story, but yeah, Ollie really was a jerk in that story. Give me the JLU version any day.

"Just call me Cupid son, I never miss."

That joke worked better before they created a GA villain named Cupid who was a psychotic lovestruck stalker. Or maybe it's funnier now?
"Now you know what you're worth? Then go out and get what you're worth, but you gotta be willing to take the hits. And not pointing fingers, saying you're not where you want to be because of him, or her, or anybody. Cowards do that, and THAT AIN'T YOU. YOU'RE BETTER THAN THAT!"
~Rocky Balboa

BentonGrey

Well, that sounds quite odd, and yes, quite Morrison-y. 

Yeah, the JLU version of Ollie is, as with most things, pretty much perfect.  Man, yeah, GA's portrayal in the 'Hard Traveling Heroes' arc is often pretty terrible, but that story may be one of the worst bits.
God Bless
"If God came down upon me and gave me a wish again, I'd wish to be like Aquaman, 'cause Aquaman can take the pain..." -Ballad of Aquaman
Check out mymods and blog!
https://bentongrey.wordpress.com/

Silver Shocker

Indeed. I just finished rewatching the entire JLU incarnation of the show on Canadian reruns recently (you will be unsurprised to learn it holds up exceptionally well) and what I really appreciate about Ollie is that unlike Flash, he's comedy relief often, but never at his own expense. He's not a buffoon, a blowhard, or a moron. As I've said before, I hate when writers make Hawkeye a moron, and GA's very similar in that regard. I like both characters when they're cocky, but very competent and wise.

In the comics, even many of the good ones apparently, Ollie seems to come off as quite stupid.

More specific to that comic storyarc: poor Roy. He seems to be the Jessie Pinkman of the superhero world. One of the most unlucky poor souls in the whole genre. Terrible stuff seems to happen to him an alarming number of times (with "bad writing" often being a repeat offender).
"Now you know what you're worth? Then go out and get what you're worth, but you gotta be willing to take the hits. And not pointing fingers, saying you're not where you want to be because of him, or her, or anybody. Cowards do that, and THAT AIN'T YOU. YOU'RE BETTER THAN THAT!"
~Rocky Balboa

HarryTrotter

He burns the drug out of his hands. 🤣

I rewatched JL/JLU last year and it still holds up. Also,most memorable version of Royal Flush Gang ever.

Turpin was a big supporting character back during the Triangle era. Superman titles all shared an additional numbering,printed in a triangle on the cover,so there is the name. This lasted from sometimes after the John Byrne reboot to 2000/2001. Good times.
''Even our origin stories have gone sour.''
Jon Farmer

BentonGrey

Well folks, here is the end of my coverage of comics from November 1971.  Enjoy!:
https://bentongrey.wordpress.com/2020/12/28/into-the-bronze-age-november-1971-part-6/

I rewatch JLU with some regularity, as it's about my favorite show of all time, so I'm definitely not surprised to hear it holds up well!  The first season (JL) is a little rough, but man it is excellent overall!

SS, yes, and all of Roy's bad luck starts with that story, which is perhaps the greatest problem with it - the fact that O'Neil put the character through that wringer and then abandoned him.

HT: Interesting, I didn't know that.  Thanks for sharing it!
God Bless
"If God came down upon me and gave me a wish again, I'd wish to be like Aquaman, 'cause Aquaman can take the pain..." -Ballad of Aquaman
Check out mymods and blog!
https://bentongrey.wordpress.com/

BentonGrey

Well guys, it's a new year, and that seems like the perfect occasion for a new Bronze Age post!:
https://bentongrey.wordpress.com/2021/01/03/into-the-bronze-age-december-1971-part-1/

Some fun stuff in this one!
God Bless
"If God came down upon me and gave me a wish again, I'd wish to be like Aquaman, 'cause Aquaman can take the pain..." -Ballad of Aquaman
Check out mymods and blog!
https://bentongrey.wordpress.com/

HarryTrotter

O'Neill and Adams do a great job,as usual.
I think killing people was okay for the censors ar long as it was a laser gun?
Androids thing reminded me of an 80's Outsiders issue where a guy called Ghetto-Blaster (really) got a whole costume/power armor with sound powers and went around destroying buildings in an effort to find 200$ he hid earlier. How is any of this economically viable?
''Even our origin stories have gone sour.''
Jon Farmer

Silver Shocker

Quote from: HarryTrotter on January 04, 2021, 08:57:57 AM
I think killing people was okay for the censors ar long as it was a laser gun?

It certainly seemed to be the case for Star Wars: The Clone Wars.

QuoteAndroids thing reminded me of an 80's Outsiders issue where a guy called Ghetto-Blaster (really) got a whole costume/power armor with sound powers and went around destroying buildings in an effort to find 200$ he hid earlier. How is any of this economically viable?
To quote Family Guy: "HOW CAN YOU AFFORD THESE THINGS?"
Admittedly, that's probably one of the single most common oddities in the history of fiction, and one that people are (or were) apparently just expected to roll with.
There's an episode of Batman: The Animated Series where the Joker is living in an apartment building and is strapped for cash, yet in other episodes has, for example, a robot that looks like a clown.
"Now you know what you're worth? Then go out and get what you're worth, but you gotta be willing to take the hits. And not pointing fingers, saying you're not where you want to be because of him, or her, or anybody. Cowards do that, and THAT AIN'T YOU. YOU'RE BETTER THAN THAT!"
~Rocky Balboa

HarryTrotter

I can see Joker having ups and downs in his career.
I mean,if you have money for robots and bombs,why do you need to rob a bank? Okay,its revenge this time,but in general...not economically viable.
There was that time in Mark Millars Spiderman when Scorpion reveals that the Illuminati are bankrolling all the supervillains,but that's too meta of an explanation IMO.
''Even our origin stories have gone sour.''
Jon Farmer

BentonGrey

Haha!  Yeah, the common question is, why don't most supervillains just patent their amazing inventions and what-have-you?  A lot of them would be rich!  To be fair, though, I remember reading something interesting about criminals a while back.  On average, they make less than people working a steady job, even at minimum wage, but they carry on for a variety of reasons.  For many, it's all about the dream of getting rich quick and the illusion of freedom.  I suppose you could apply the same logic to supervillains.  In fact, some particularly good/insightful stories, like Astro City: The Tarnished Angel have played with those concepts.

HT, I wonder if you're right about the laser gun being a factor.  Of course, we're already into the days of the CCA loosening things up.  I wonder...
God Bless
"If God came down upon me and gave me a wish again, I'd wish to be like Aquaman, 'cause Aquaman can take the pain..." -Ballad of Aquaman
Check out mymods and blog!
https://bentongrey.wordpress.com/

stumpy

Just to pile on the econ discussion here, I remember a change in my thinking about these things as I was reading comics as a teenager. It was both a realization of how unrealistic some criminal activities were and also an appreciation of the value of some plot devices to add a touch of realism to something otherwise unrealistic.

For example, I eventually got old enough to realize that some technology/devices/gadgets/etc. would be really expensive, at least in the scope of an average person's budget. At that point, all of these plot lines where some random down-on-his-luck burglar used portable lasers to break into a house and had a robot-driven getaway vehicle were complete nonsense. No one who has millions of dollars of cutting-edge tech is stealing televisions for a living.

On the other hand, comics eventually made an effort to weave that aspect of things into the storyline. The new plot wasn't that Joe CantTieMyShoes is inventing great tech and using it to steal microwave ovens. It's that Marvello McGenius is inventing that tech and either selling it to criminal gangs who distribute it to a network of rogues who use it, or McGenius is selling it to other supervillains for their use. And, usually, even if the economics still doesn't quite pan out, it's part of some larger scheme to test and refine the technology for later use in a more nefarious plan or at least to gain control over a larger criminal enterprise. That's not to say that everything made perfect sense now, but at least there was a rationale that more-or-less fit in the context of comic books.

BTW, this whole discussion reminds me of the random loot in some games like Neverwinter Nights, where a rain barrel in the Beggar's Nest might have a pile of gold or (conversely) a mansion's locked fancy chest with a 500 gp trap might be safeguarding a 3 gp bottle of ale or a 12 gp copper necklace.  :wacko:
Courage is knowing it might hurt, and doing it anyway. Stupidity is the same. And that's why life is hard. - Jeremy Goldberg

BentonGrey

"Joe CantTieMySHoes", ha!  That cracked me up! :roll:

Great stuff, Stumpy.  Yeah, I appreciate those touches too.  That kind of attention to detail makes a story more viable for me, though I don't mind a fair amount of whimsy.  I love random costumed gangs with gimmicks running around the universes.  But yeah, full-on super-tech stuff is crazy for a random burglar to have up his sleeve!

Ha!  Yeah, I know exactly what you mean about those RPGs.  This is something that has driven me crazy since randomized loot became the norm after the Black Isle games.
God Bless
"If God came down upon me and gave me a wish again, I'd wish to be like Aquaman, 'cause Aquaman can take the pain..." -Ballad of Aquaman
Check out mymods and blog!
https://bentongrey.wordpress.com/

Silver Shocker

#498
Quote from: BentonGrey on January 05, 2021, 06:34:50 PM
Haha!  Yeah, the common question is, why don't most supervillains just patent their amazing inventions and what-have-you?  A lot of them would be rich!  To be fair, though, I remember reading something interesting about criminals a while back.  On average, they make less than people working a steady job, even at minimum wage, but they carry on for a variety of reasons.  For many, it's all about the dream of getting rich quick and the illusion of freedom.  I suppose you could apply the same logic to supervillains.  In fact, some particularly good/insightful stories, like Astro City: The Tarnished Angel have played with those concepts.

TVtropes has a great name for this exact trope: "Cut Lex Luthor a Check."  ^_^ Doctor Octopus tried that once, but it didn't really go anywhere.

QuoteThere was that time in Mark Millars Spiderman when Scorpion reveals that the Illuminati are bankrolling all the supervillains,but that's too meta of an explanation IMO.

I read that story arc, years ago, but I don't remember the details. I do like some interests of worldbuilding in the "Heroic Age" along those lines.  We have the Tinkerer, and Obediah Stane and Justin Hammer supplying tech-based villains with their tech, The Scalpal, a seldom-seen doctor who specifically treats supervillains, the street drug Mutant Growth Hormone, which can grant new powers to people, Roxxon Oil, who routinely have supervillains on their payroll, and the Power Broker, who supplies superpowers to aspiring villains (and sometimes good guy characters) as a kind of black market business. Over at DC, there were Batman storylines in the post-Flashpoint era that featured people who were permanently harmed, wounded, or had suffered brain damage as a result of violent encounters with Batman and his allies, who banded together to form a villain group out for revenge.

QuoteHT, I wonder if you're right about the laser gun being a factor.  Of course, we're already into the days of the CCA loosening things up.  I wonder...

I've always found the concept of censorship and content restrictions, and all things related to it, strangely and intensively fascinating. One of my favorite examples comes from a Dilbert comic strip where a police officer fired a bullet out of a donut:roll:

Since then, I've found that modern comics have turned into a kind of "wild west" where they're largely limited only to their personal preferences and how much they think they can get away with before courting scrutiny and public backlash, which is how we get so much content these days (in comics) that seems to flit into "edgelord" territory willy nilly like it's no big thing.

Comics and other mediums have been trying to work around censorship for years, with lots of interesting results.
"Now you know what you're worth? Then go out and get what you're worth, but you gotta be willing to take the hits. And not pointing fingers, saying you're not where you want to be because of him, or her, or anybody. Cowards do that, and THAT AIN'T YOU. YOU'RE BETTER THAN THAT!"
~Rocky Balboa

daglob

Regarding comic book logic: there is a web comic available through GoComics these days, called The Last Mechanical Monster, which follows the mad genius who created The Mechanical Monsters from the Fleischer Superman cartoon after he is released from prison, and I believe one of the other characters asks him why didn't he patent all his work and just sit back and wait for the money to roll in. He has no answer (the real answer is known to anyone who reads Girl Genius: he wanted to show them; show them all!)

BentonGrey

Man, I need to check that out, DG!  Ha, that sounds cool. 

Well gents, I found some time to do the next Bronze Age post, so here we go, including the famous Green Lantern/Green Arrow #87!
https://bentongrey.wordpress.com/2021/02/04/into-the-bronze-age-december-1971-part-2/
God Bless
"If God came down upon me and gave me a wish again, I'd wish to be like Aquaman, 'cause Aquaman can take the pain..." -Ballad of Aquaman
Check out mymods and blog!
https://bentongrey.wordpress.com/

HarryTrotter

Well,Creeper is more like Joker,but heroic.
Stepfather- You come to me on my wives daughter wedding day...
John Stewart will continue to be the reserve/Earth's GL for a while.Filling in for Hal in the 80's for a long stretch after Hal quits. Until Cosmic Odyssey.
Green Arrow did become a mayor some 25-30 years later.
''Even our origin stories have gone sour.''
Jon Farmer

Silver Shocker

As some of you may remember, I met Neal Adams at the comic shop I used to go to, and he was a fantastic guest there as he was in a much better mood there than at a convention where other creators got more attention. He gave several incredibly cool anecdotes, including one about the creation of John Stewart.

The first time around was a fine recap, and I tracked it down on here, so I've simply copied and pasted it:

QuoteHe gave a very long and very funny anecdote about pitching John Stewart to DC editor Julie Schwartz, saying that instead of the "blond-haired, white high school phys-ed teacher" Guy Gardner, they should have an Asian or black character as the next GL (comparing this to the diversity in the Olympics). According to him someone involved (it was either Schwartz, Denny O'neal or a marketing guy, I can't remember) came up with the name "Lincoln Washington" which Adams said sounded like a slave name. He then, when prompted to name the character instead, pulled "John Stewart" out of the air as a real name. He made a quick joke that he had no idea that would later be the name of a late night comedian. He also took a shot at Hal Jordon being the GL in the movie instead of John Stewart, referencing children's familiarity with the character from the Justice League cartoon (though he didn't mention the cartoon by name).

As the JL cartoon was very much a gateway show for me for a lot of great DC characters, and John was certainly one of them. I'll probably always compare any other iteration to the Phil Lemar version, and I view his bald head and beard in JLU as being similar to Benjamin Sisco from Star Trek Deep Space nine having the same - showing the passage of time and how these characters have changed and developed as their stories go on.

I can enjoy stories with Hal, but I'll always lament the reduced roles John and Kyle got in the time since I got into DC's content. But I'll always be happy that the vast sweeping nature of the GL Corp and its narrative will ensure that characters like John, Kyle, Jessica Cruz, Simon Baz and yes, even Guy, will have a place in DC's content.
"Now you know what you're worth? Then go out and get what you're worth, but you gotta be willing to take the hits. And not pointing fingers, saying you're not where you want to be because of him, or her, or anybody. Cowards do that, and THAT AIN'T YOU. YOU'RE BETTER THAN THAT!"
~Rocky Balboa