Teen Titans #14, "Requiem for a Titan!"

TEEN TITANS #14; March-April 1968; DC Comics; George Kashdan, editor; 
featuring "Requiem for a Titan!"  written by Bob Haney and drawn by Nick  Cardy.

Review by Bill Henley

It's not often these days I get the  chance to buy and read a Silver Age
comic I've never seen before.  I  picked this one up at a comics show this weekend
though (for a mere buck  and a quarter for a reading copy), so I'll try
reviewing it even as I read it  for the first time.  I had seen the cover, however,
in DC house ads of the  period, and it's a striking one by Cardy (I've said I
didn't care much for  Cardy's cover work when he became DC's workhorse cover
artist for a while, but  his covers were just fine on the titles he handled
himself, such as TITANS and  AQUAMAN.)  A shadowed figure of Robin stands bowed
in a graveyard, as  ghostly figures of his three Titans teammates urge him
"QUIT, ROBIN....QUIT,  QUIT!" and the story title "Requiem for a Titan" appears
on a  tombstone.

The splash scene also takes place in a graveyard, but here  Robin trudges
toward an open grave presumably meant for him (dragging his cape  behind him, as
on the cover) as in the background we see tombstones marked "Kid  Flash",
"Wonder Girl" and "Aqualad".  And perched on a gnarled tree is a  living gargoyle,
asking the Boy Wonder if he is ready for their  "rendezvous".  Yes, he is,
says Robin.  "Then let it be done!   Let the last knell sound for the Teen
Titans!  HAH! HAH!   HAH!"

The Gargoyle orders Robin to toss his cape into the grave before  him, which
Robin does, and then his red tunic.  Robin again obeys-- "Like  whatever you
say, creep!"-- leaving him clad only in his green jerkin and  shorts.  But
Robin balks when the Gargoyle orders him next to remove his  mask, exposing his
secret identity.  "Shall I call back those who have  already gone beyond?", the
Gargoyle asks.  "You have no need of your secret  identity where you are
shortly to go!"  But when the Boy Wonder still  hesitates to expose his face,
ghostly figures of Kid Flash, Aquaman and Wonder  Girl appear, greeting him with
mocking words; ""Look at the kid, team!   He's rockin' with fear!" "Check,
Twinkletoes...he's really got the cold and  clammies!" "Not so high and mighty now,
eh Boy Wonder?  By Hera, let's play  chicken with the chicken!"  Faced with
the spectral anger of his former  teammates, Robin succumbs and removes his
mask, and the Gargoyle bids the ghosts  begone.  With a "mournful moan", Robin
says he is ready to "cross over",  and his bare face undergoes a strange Jekyll
and Hyde like transformation from  the normal features of Dick Grayson to a
more brutish and evil face.   "Excellent!  You are now prepared for the
journey!", says Gargoyle, and he  fires a beam from a ring on his finger that causes
Robin's body to "melt and  fade away", leaving only the remnants of his costume
lying in his grave.   "The Teen Titans are embraced by Limbo.... and in Limbo
rule I, the  Gargoyle!'

But how did all this happen?  For a clue, we visit Titans  Lair, which now
stands empty.  (On a bulletin board are notes such as  "Aqualad, stop tracking
water into the Lair", "Wonder Girl, your mother called,  says don't forget to
polish bracelets", and "Kid Flash, don't be late for next  meeting", along with
congratulatory notes from the Beatles, "from one fab four  to another", and
President Lyndon Johnson (who in real life by 1968 was not  exactly the toast
of the teenage set).  Earlier, however, the team was  present and engaged in
its usual playful banter, as Kid Flash proposes that the  Titans form their own
rock group playing hits such as "I Wanna Hold Your Cape  and Mask!"  Wonder
Girl demurs, "UGGH!  If you cats play like you  joke, it'll be one farewell
performance after another!"  But meanwhile, the  figure of the Gargoyle appears at
a nearby TV station and demands a spot on  "Titans Hookup", a TV show on
which people can appear to give messages to the  Titans.  (Can't they just use a
post office box, like the JLA?)   Despite his bizarre appearance the Gargoyle
insists he has just as much right as  anyone to appear on the show, and the TV
executives go along with it; "OK, put  Mr. Goyle on the tube!"  "Right!  He's
socko in un-living  color!"  During his five minutes of TV fame, the Gargoyle
claims that he is  an ex-convict who wears the weird disguise to hide his
identity-- and that he  served time in prison on a false conviction because one of
the Teen Titans hid  evidence that would have freed him.  Seeing the
broadcast, three of the  Titans angrily deny the possibility of any such wrongdoing,
but Robin wants to  hear more.  The Titans try to figure out if the Gargoyle
can be any of  their former foes in diguise, but conclude he is not fat enough
to be Ding-Dong  Daddy, too grammatical to be the Scorcher, and doesn't have
the right accent for  the Mad Mod.  As Robin remains mostly silent, the other
three become  suspicious, wondering if the Boy Wonder, the team leader who does
all the  detective work, could be guilty of hiding evidence.  The issue is put
on  hold as the Titans are called out on a mission, to stop an incipient riot
at the  Bijou Theater among teeny-boppers outraged because a rock star didn't
show  up.  But when the arriive at the theater, they find the stage and the
seats  empty-- except for the Gargoyle, who has laid a trap for the Titans.

In  part 2 of the story, Robin orders the other Titans to attack the
Gargoyle, but  they hesitate momentarily, and the Gargoyle exploits the pause by
charging that  Robin is sending the others into danger when Robin, and only Robin,
is the one  who deserves to be punished for sending him to prison unjustly. 
Each of  the other Titans wonders if Robin really is guilty and is exploiting
their  loyalty, but before they can resolve their doubts, Gargoyle fires a beam
from  his devil-faced ring which causes Kid Flash, Aqualad and Wonder Girl to
vanish.  Gargoyle is chagrined that Robin didn't disappear as well-- "I 
should have known the noble, superior Robin would be the last to fall to 
suspicion!"-- but explains that the "doubt and suspicion" in his teammates'  minds
gave Gargoyle the power to send them to Limbo, the realm where he  rules.  An
outraged Boy Wonder uses his circus acrobat skills to pursue the  creeping,
leaping Gargoyle, but he is interfered with by the other Titans  appearing one
after another, in giant phantom form, to attack him.   "Destroy me--?  Why? Why?"
Robin pleads to Aqualad, and is told, "Because  that's our bag, Buster!  We
from Limbo hate all in the real world!"   Kid Flash chimes in, "Getting sent to
Limbosville was the best thing ever  happened to us-- and the WORST gig that
ever happened to YOU!"    Battered back and forth by his renegade teammates,
Robin is finally knocked  unconscious by a falling sandbag, but as the Gargoyle
prepares to rip Robin with  his claws, he is forced to flee by a fire
accidentally started during the  fight.  Disappearing along with his phantom Titans,
the villain leaves an  unconscious Robin to be found and rescued by firemen
called to the burning  theater.  "He must be the lone surviving Titan!" 

In Part 3, a  ragged and despondent Robin knows that his teammates are not
really dead, but  might as well be, existing in Limbo under the control of the
Gargoyle.   Returning to Titan Lair, he wonders "how I can go it alone--
fighting crooks and  creeps-- without the team!"  (He seems to have momentarily
forgotten that  he usually has another partner, name of Batman....)  But as he
enters the  headquarters, he finds that the Gargoyle and his phantom slaves have
already  claimed it for their own lair.  Gargoyle is amused when Robin dives
into a  laundry chute-- "How droll, since he is already washed up!"-- but the
limbo-ized  Titans know Robin actually has a secret escape route through the
chute.   Wandering the city streets, the Boy Wonder finally remembers his other
team-up--  "I could go back to Batman with my tail between my legs!  NO!  That
would mean the end of the Titans forever!  I've got to try it on my  own!" 
But alone and demoralized, the Boy Blunder loses one encounter after  another
with petty criminals, until at last he is left beaten and humiliated as 
police chase a gang he failed to stop.  "There's only one thing left to  do...."
and, as told in the first part of the story, he approaches the Gargoyle  to
admit defeat and join the other Titans in Limbo, which his state of despair 
qualifies him to enter.

But has Robin really given up?  Now in the  same oversized phantom form as
his teammates, he is at first greeted by them  enthusiastically-- "He got
smart-- knew he was beaten!"  "Now we can really  put the real world up-tight,
serving groovy old Gargoyle!"  But the Phantom  Boy Wonder suddenly attacks his
erstwhile allies, booting Aqualad to the other  end of Limbo with a dropkick, and
surprising Kid Flash with a judo throw.   Wonder Girl takes him on with her
Amazon strength, but Robin manages to stay  conscious until the Gargoyle
reappears to find out what's going on.   Unchivalrically punching Wonder Girl out of
the way, Robin takes on Gargoyle,  who is dumbfounded; "You tricked me! 
Somehow you entered Limbo without  becoming an evil servant of mine!"  "Batman
taught me how to be a totally  convincing actor!", Robin triumphantly explains. 
He faked his Jekyll-Hyde  transformation from good to evil in order to gain
access, via the Gargoyle's  ring, to Limbo where his teammates were trapped. 
Pointing out that  Gargoyle stripped him of his cape and mask but not his
Utility Belt, our hero  tries to use its weapons against the villain, but its
gadgets malfunction under  the influence of Limbo, and the belt itself is severed by
Gargoyle's claw.   Making a desperate leap to retrieve the belt, Robin wraps
it around his arm to  serve as a shield against Gargoyle's claws-- and with
the claws momentarily  stuck in the belt leather, Robin pulls out a tiny pair of
pliers and smashes the  Gargoyle's devil-ring.  Since only the ring gives the
Gargoyle the power to  remain in Limbo (we never find out for sure whether
Gargoyle is a real  supernatural creature or the human villain he once claimed
to be) he and Robin  are swept away out of the Limbo dimension.  Gargoyle winds
up who knows  where-- "guess his evil vibrations kept him stranded between
here and Limbo!""--  while Robin finds himself back on Earth, along with the
other Titans, who  remember nothing since encountering Gargoyle at the theater. 
Baffled by  the sight of four graves with their names on them-- not to mention
Robin's  semi-dressed condition without cape, mask and vest-- they demand an 
explanation.  "You'd never believe it, Wonder Chick!"

Not a bad  story in concept, but weakened by the pseudo-hip jargon and by the
other Titans  being too quick to become suspicious of Robin.  It represented
a change  from the earlier "superhero beach party" type Titans stories towards
the weird  and creepy.  The change was sidetracked by a move toward
"relevance" during  Dick Giordano's editorship, but the last few issues of the original
TITANS  series, edited by Murray Boltinoff and again written by Haney, moved
much  farther towards the then-popular weird genre.

Among the contemporary  comics spotlighted in house ads in this issue are
SECRET SIX #1, BATMAN  anniversary issue #200, and INFERIOR FIVE ("DC's New Brand
of Humor is Coming  YOUR WAY!")  The letter column features short snatches of
letters and I  don't recognize any familar letterhack names....one of the
readers calls for  Superboy to make an appearance with the Titans, to which the
editor replies,  "Only one thing wrong with that idea....Superboy is Superman
when he was a boy,  years before the Titans were born!"  (Wonder if Kevin
Honohan, then of  Charlestown, Mass., is still around to see Superboy join the
Titans at  last.....?)

(Son of) Tomahawk #131

TOMAHAWK #131; (official indicia title; the cover logo reads SON OF 
TOMAHAWK); Nov.-Dec. 1971; DC Comics; Joe Kubert, editor; cover-featuring Hawk,  Son
of Tomahawk in "Hang Him High!", written by Robert Kanigher and drawn by  Frank
Thorne. On the cover by Kubert, a young man with dark hair streaked with 
blond sits on a horse with a noose around his neck, and a white-bearded 
gentleman is about to wield a whip to spur the horse out from under him and  carry out
an impromptu hanging.  But in the foreground, two aged but steady  hands are
pointed toward the would-be executioner; one of them holds an  old-style
flintlock pistol, and its holder demands, "What's it going to be,  Judge.... my
SON'S life.... or YOURS?"

Review by Bill Henley

By my  reckoning this review is slightly off-topic since I would regard this
issue  published in late 1971 as post-Silver Age (which, of course, by no
means  automatically translates to "bad comics").  But there seemed to be some 
interest on the list, so here's my review of the launch of a fnal effort to 
revamp and revitalize a venerable DC feature.  Starting in 1947 in  STAR-SPANGLED
COMICS  and moving into his own title in the 1950's, Tomahawk  was a
fictional frontiersman in the mold of the real-life Daniel Boone or Davy  Crockett. 
He spent most of his career fighting British redcoats and  hostile Indians (and
befriending friendly Indians) during the Revolutionary War,  at first with
only his kid sidekick Dan Hunter at his side, then (starting in  1963) as leader
of Tomahawk's Rangers, a kind of Revolutionary-era Easy Company  or
Blackhawks.  During the 1960's editor Jack Schiff kept the series going  (while other,
more traditional DC westerns reached the end of the trail) by  introducing
sci-fi and fantasy elements which mixed uneasily, to say the least,  with the
historical setting.  Then for a couple of years 1969-71 Murray  Bolftinoff
brought in the creative team of Robert Kanigher and Frank Thorne and  involved
Tomahawk and his Rangers in somewhat more believable frontier  adventures. 
Finally, with this issue, Joe Kubert took over the editorship,  keeping the
Kanigher/Thorne team but trying to take adventage of a resurgence of  interest in the
traditional Western by jumping ahead a generation (or more) to a  more familar
vision of the wild frontier.

The splash page, split into  three long vertical panels, depicts a young
woman (in a ragged dress showing  rather more skin at bosom and leg than a real
young lady of the era would have  considered decent) fleeing in terror on foot. 
Behind her on horseback is a  grim black-clad figure with a pistol.  The
final panel is a closeup of his  scarred face (which incidentally looks nothing
like the bad guy drawn by Kubert  on the cover).  The symbolic second splash
page shows a long shot of the  unequal chase (with two more horsemen behind the
black-clad man) passing through  a canyon whose sides are emblazoned
Eisner-style with the story title, "Hang Him  High1" while above the eyes of the
protagonist, Hawk gaze on the scene.   Appearing on the scene suddenly, the young
rider with blond-streaked brown hair  seizes the young woman by the arm, pulls
her up into his saddle, and spurs his  horse.  The pursuing rider fires his
pistol at them, shouting "GIT THEM  BOTH!"  As Hawk rides through a creek, his
horse stumbles and he and the  girl fall into the water where the pursuers catch
up with them. seizing the girl  and clubbing Hawk from behind with a pistal
butt.  Holding a thick rope in  his hand, the top-hatted leader orders, "Bring
them both to the clearing!   We're gonna hold court threre!"  One of his
followers chortles, "No one's  gonna say 'The Judge' ain't fair! Haw, haw!"  And so,
we find Hawk on that  horse about to be hanged.  "THE 'COURT' IS NOW IN
SESSION!  Defendant  Angela Addams, your brother already suffered the death penalty
because he  wouldn't tell me the location of his secret gold mine!  Unless
YOU tell me  where it is, I'm gonna stretch your boyfriend's neck!"  The
"defendant"  insists that there is no goldand that she never saw her would-be rescuer
before,  but her defense is overruled by the "Judge".

But as "sentence" is about  to be carried out on Hawk, a dfferent kind of
appeal is filed, as a bullet  knocks the whip from the hand of the executioner
and another well-aimed shot  severs the hangman's noose around Hawk's neck.  The
shots are fired from an  ancient long rifle in the hands of a buckskin-clad
figure, and they are followed  by a hurled Indian hatchet that knocks the
pistol from the "judge's" grip.   "Hurry, untie me!", Hawk urges Angela.  "I have a
notion who's bustin' up  this party!"  It is, of course, "like a legendary
patriarch out of the  past.... TOMAHAWK!"  Though gaunt, wrinkled and
white-haired, the old  frontiersman is clearly not ready for the rocking chair yet. 
Seemingly not  long on either gratitude or respect for his elders, young Hawk
jibes his father,  "Dad!  What kept you?  Waitin' for your Rangers?"  Tomahawk's 
reply is, "For a son of mine, you sure looked like you got your wings clipped
pretty good1"  But they both may yet get their wings clipped, for the Judge 
and his two henchmen are now disarmed but still ready for action, and
Tomahawk  is now out of ammo for his rifle.  The "Judge" recognizes Tomahawk but has 
no respect for his historic service to his country; "Tomahawk!  Youll be 
joinin' your whelp on the hangin' tree!"  Father and son prevail in a 
three-to-two hand to hand fight, with Tomahawk putting an assailant out with a  swung
rifle butt while Hawk punches out a club-wielding foe.  Now  outnumbered, the
"Judge" declares a sudden recess, leaping on his horse to flee,  but flinging a
parting ruling; "This 'case' ain't over yet!  I'LL BE  BACK!  I'll hold a NEW
trial!  With a 'hangin' jury'!"  

Tomahawk invites Angela to his homestead rather than her returning to  her
home to face attack by the "Judge", and as the threesome arrive at  Tomahawk's
cabin they are met by a middle-aged Indian woman who chides her  husband and
son for coming in late for dinner.  Angela is introduced to  Moon Fawn, Hawk's
mother, and to their other son, Young Eagle, a much younger  boy who looks
entirely Indian and is clad only in a loincloth (though clearly  the two
dissimilar brothers are devoted to each other).  Angela also  "meets", via a group
portrait hanging on the wall, her host's old associates,  the Rangers. "BIG ANVIL!
STOVEPIPE!  BRASS BUTTONS!  LONG  RIFLE!  KAINTUCK!  CANNONBALL!  I wonder
where they are now!",  Tomahawk muses.  (He found out about some of them in
later issues, as they  appeared as guest stars.)   Though she seems concened only
about  overcooked venison, Moon Fawn knows her son is in danger, and the next
morning  she confronts Hawk, telling him she knows what he plans to do, not
stopping him,  but warning him to be careful and use the Indian wiles she
bequeathed to  him.  Hawk rides off alone to catch and defeat the "Judge" and his
gang  before they can further threaten his family and Angela.  Or so he
intends,  but Angela insists on going with him.  "If you want to decoy the Judge, 
you've got to have ME there with you!"  "All you women got a mind of your 
own... just like my Ma's!" 

Hawk and Angela lure the Judge and his  men to the site of the secret mine
(which does exist, whether or not it has any  gold).  Creeping up by night, the
Judge's men blast a figure wearing Hawk's  fancy frilled shirt-- only to find
it is a straw dummy.  Hawk takes some of  the Judge's gang out of action by
firing shots to topple the mine sluice down on  them.  But the Judge himself
hurls a stick of dynamite at the Addams cabin,  then leads his remaining men to
"pronounce sentence" on Hawk and Angela "with  lead!"  But Hawk is playing
possum in the ruins of the cabin, and he meets  gunfire with gunfire.  As he
shoots, the Judge shouts,  "WHELP OF THE  DEVIL!  JUSTICE WILL PREVAIL!"  But the
Judge's shot misses while  Hawk's strikes home, and so, according to the
caption, "The Judge gave the  correct verdct-- with his LAST WORDS!"  And somewhere
off in the  background, an aged, pipe-puffing figure watches the scene with a
look of  satisfaction; "Looks like my son, Hawk, rushes in where angels fear
to  tread!  Figured he'd need my help, but.... he did ALL RIGHT for  himself!" 

The SON OF TOMAHAWK series continued for nine more  issues until the title
finally gave up the ghost wth issue #140, Apr.-May  1972.  (It could be said
that Tarzan killed Tomahawk, as Joe Kubert dropped  the title in order to take on
editing, writing and drawing DC's version of the  jungle lord, and Kanigher
and Thorne also moved on to work on DC's KORAK.)   The series might better have
been called TOMAHAWK AND SON, as the aged but hale  frontiersman continued to
share the action roughly equally with young Hawk in  succeeding issues.  The
big anomaly about the series had to do with the  time period.  No specific
date was ever mentioned of when the "Son" stories  took place, but given that
Tomahawk was a young man during the Revolution from  1776-83, Tomahawk's apparent
age in these stories would have put the time no  later than 1820 or so, at
which time the "frontier" was still in what is now the  Midwest, and only a few
explorers and trappers had ventured into the Great  Plains west of the
Mississippi.  Yet, the visual look of these stories is  that of the post-Civil War
West of the standard Western.  I guess we'll  have to ascribe this to a heavy
dose of artistic/historical license.  The  stories are entertaining and well
crafted, if (as always with Kanigher)  melodramatic.

This issue has several backup features in addition to the  14-page Tomahawk &
Son lead.  The first is a reprint of Strong Bow,  "The Moccasins That Won A
War!"  Strong Bow was featured (and sometimes  cover-featured) in early issues
of ALL-STAR WESTERN, the '50s Western title that  took over the JSA's old
home.  He was an Indian hero who operated "in the  days before the white men
came", wandering among the Indian tribes keeping the  peace and solving mysteries. 
In this story, Strong Bow gets involved in  defending a peaceful tribe led by
aged Chief Kyana against the machinations of  Running Buffalo, a warlike and
greedy chief.  Attempting to get past  Running Buffalo's warriors to enlist
aid from another friendly tribe, Strong Bow  decoys the enemy by firing an arrow
with his moccasin attached to it to leave a  footprint on a hillside where he
really isn't.  Despite the ploy, SB is  surrounded by the enemy, but he
enlists his other moccasin to float a message  (presumably in pictographic Indian
sign language) down the river past the enemy  to the friendly Indians.

A two page text feature deals with the origin of  "Arapaho Names", and
another reprint, a three page featurette on "Botalye,  Immortal Indian Warrior",
features the art of Frank Frazetta.  Botalye was  a Kiowa who won his fame by
riding three times in succession to "count coup"  against a troop of U.S.
cavalry, somehow returning uninjured each time.   Later, we're told, Botalye becane a
"famous medicine man" and made peace with  the whites.  (1950's DC liked
Indian heroes, but they avoided as much as  possible putting the "good" Native
Americans in conflict with white  people.  Strong Bow, as noted, had his
adventures before whites arrived on  the scene-- as did the short-lived, super-powered
Super-Chief.  Pow-Wow  Smith, a long-running feature, was an Indian who
assimilated to white life and  served as sheriff of a white town.  The Tomahawk
feature, though it's  protagonist was white, featured many Indians portrayed
positively-- but the  series simplistically depicted "good" Indians as those who
kept the peace with  whites and raised no objections to the incursion of white
settlers.  And  this featurette singled out for positive treatment an Indian
warrior who fought  whites-- but in such a way as to not actually kill any of
them!)  Finally,  speaing of Indian heroes, we have a two-page preview drawn
and scripted by Joe  Kubert of his "Fireheair" feature, which had previously
debuted in SHOWCASE  issues #85-87.  Firehair (no relation to the 50's Western
heroine published  by Fictin House) was a white, redhaired boy who is orphaned
and adopted by  Indians, only to find himself an outsider to both Indians and
whites.   Sales of the SHOWCASE issues and/or Kubert's work schedule didn't
allow Firehair  to get his own title, but Kubert did shoehorn short backup tales
of this  beautifully drawn feature into three future issues of TOMAHAWK.

Batman #167, "Zero Hour for Earth!"

BATMAN #167; November 1964; DC Comics; Julius Schwartz, editor; featuring  "a
book-length spy-thriller", "Zero Hour for Earth!"  The cover is an  unusually
striking one by Carmine Infantino with (I think) Murphy Anderson inks, 
depicting Batman and Robin transfixed by twin beams of light emanting from the 
eyes of a Mayan-looking pyramid-sculpture.  The interior story is written  by
Bill Finger (credited on the letters page) and drawn, I'm assuming, by  regular
"Bob Kane" ghost Sheldon Moldoff with inks by Joe Giella.

Review  by Bill Henley

On the splash page, Robin is battling crooks (or spies?)  atop a Dutch
windmill, and Batman dives between the blades of the spinning  windmill to push
Robin out of the line of fire of a thug with a submachine  gun.  Our story begins
at Gotham City Airport where Batman and Robin are  meeting a representative of
Interpol, the international police agency.  But  before they can make contact
an assassin strikes at the Interpol man.   While Batman tries to help the
victim, Robin pursues the killer, but in his rush  to escape the assassin is
caught under the wheels of a taxiing plane and  silenced forever.  Later, Batman
and Commissioner Gordon meet with  reporters and reveal that the Interpol man
died without regaining consciousness,  but is believed to be a victim of Hydra,
an "internatinal crime syndicate" which  "calls itself after the monster
which grew a new head every time one head was  lopped off".  Noting that Hercules
destroyed the original Hydra, Batman  vows, "I intend to become a modern-day
Hercules and put an end to the Hydra of  Crime!"  (Yes, Hydra.  This was about
a year before Marvel launched  its Nick Fury, Agent of SHIELD series with the
international criminal  organization with the same name and motif.  As I
recall, fan-turned-DC-pro  E. Nelson Bridwell used to have a theory that DC and
Marvel stories really took  place in the same "universe", and he used this as an
item of evidence in  favor.)  But in a torchlit chamber somewhere, the news of
Batman's vendetta  against Hydra "brings a smug smile to a cunning face".  A
white-haired,  round-faced man with a black mustache gloats that "Batman
guessed wrong", didn't  learn the real reason the Interpol man was killed, and now
won't interfere with  his real plan.

Arriving in Holland, Batman and Robin receive a puzzling  clue to Hydra's
next meeting from local authorities; a card captured from a  Hydra agent that
reads "General Sherman Slept Here-- X".  "X" might stand  for the shape of a
Dutch windmill, but what does an American Civil War general  have to do with
Holland?  Making what might be called a SWAG (Scientific  Wild-Ass Guess) sort of
deduction, Batman deduces that since the "General  Sherman Tree" is a famous
giant redwood tree in America, their Dutch target is a  windmill called the
Redwood Mill.  Arriving there, our heroes do battle  with a Hydra gang who are
using the mill as a stash for stolen diamonds, and the  splash scene with Batman
saving Robin from a hail of bullets is enacted.   But as European newspapers
report Batman's victory against Hydra, Batman takes  off in the Batplane and
tells Robin, "Now to get on with the REAL reason we left  America!"  It seems
that, in reality, the murdered Interpol man lived long  enough to inform Batman
of a crucial bit of information, that a man named Karabi  is plotting to start
a war between two Asian countries, a war likely to embroil  other nations and
ultimately the United States.  For the peace of the  world, he must be
stopped.  Batman meets with CIA agents (this was the  innocent day when any U.S.
government agents including the CIA were  automatically counted as part of the
good guys and not depicted as more  villainous than the villains) and volunteers
his aid.  But if Karabi knows  he is hunted, he will go underground and delay
his plans until the heat if  off.  The answer is to create a decoy by telling
the public Batman is after  Hydra.

Flying all the way to Singapore in Asia, Batman disguises himself  as an
Asian nightclub-goer and makes contact with a female Interpol agent,  herself
disguised as an Oriental dancer; she passes along information in the  form of
semaphore signals camouflaged as motions in her arm-waving dance.   The info she
provides moves Batman a little closer to finding Karabi, but his  next move is
to backtrack back to Europe, to Greece (good thing gas prices  weren't as high
back then, or even Bruce Wayne probably couldn't have afforded  all this
flying in the Batplane) to continue with his "publicized Hydra  hunt".  Seeking a
Hydra agent who is described as a skinny man carrying  counterfeit money, all
Batman and Robin spot is a fat man; but Batman is  suspicious when he notices
that the man is sitting in a rickety wicker chair  which shows no sign of
strain from the great weight.  Our heroes follow the  man to the ruins of an
ancient Greek amphitheater, where  he meets with  some confederates.  But a slight
sound made by Robin's feet alerts the bad  guys to their presence (Batman
explains the ancient theater was built with such  good acoustics that the
slightest sound can be heard throughout it).  The  hoods empty their guns at a
shadowy, cowled fgure of Batman, but are baffled  when he appears unharmed.  "What's
holding Batman up?  Why doesn't he  drop?"  "If you want me to drop-- I'm
willing to oblige", Batman says as he  (minus his cape and wearing a makeshift
mask) and Robin leap from above to land  on and subdue the crooks. It turns out
that Batman has draped his cape and cowl  over a statue of Hercules in order to
create a false target for the thugs.   (Greek authorities may not appreciate
a precious ancient statue getting  bullet-riddled.  And don't ruins of this
sort have any guards or  attendants, even at night?)  Later, Batman confirms
that the "fat man" had  cheeks padded with cotton and clothes padded with
counterfeit bills.  Under  pressure from Batman, the secret leaders of Hydra meet and
consider laying low,  but decide to keep operating, since each "head" Batman
eliminates will be  replaced by another "head".  Meanwhile, as workmen prepare
a giant rocket,  Karabi again gloats that Batman has been diverted by his
Hydra hunt and has no  idea of his activities.  And Batman flies all the way to
Asia again, to  Hong Kong, to pick up secret info written in Braille inside a
hat offered for  sale.  Back and forth Batman flies, battling Hydra in Europe
(a panel shows  him and Robin climbing the Eiffel Tower in Paris, apparently in
pursuit of Hydra  hoods) while gathering more clues to Karabi's plans in
Asia.  At last he  has pieced together the mastermind's plan.  Karabi intends to
fire a  nuclear missile from "County A" to "Country B" in order to spark war
between the  two  (An editor's note explains, "For security reasons, we cannot
reveal  the true names of the actual countries involved".  Well, that was a
change  from the usual practice of making up names for countries not found on the
maps  of Earth-Prime.)  Karabi's ultimate intent is to form a group of 
"malcontent" confederates and seize power in the chaos following a worldwide  war.

Batman and Robin track Karabi's lair to a stone temple in the  jungle of
"Country A" (which  looks in the interior art more Asian than  Mayan), but as seen
on the cover, they are dazzled by the sudden beams of bright  light from the
temple sculpture's "eyes" long enough for Karabi's men to seize  them and
render them unconscius.  Batman comes to to find himself  confronting Karabi, who
boasts that in just fifteen minutes, when the alarm on a  simple alarm clock
goes off, he will launch his deadly missile-- and, also, his  soldiers will
carry out their orders to kill Batman and Robin.  "WATCH THE  CLOCK, BATMAN!",
Karabi taunts, as he locks Batman alone in a cell (Robin is  locked up
elsewhere) and goes off to make final preparations for the missile  launch.  Af first
the loud ticking of the clock distracts Batman from his  efforts to plot an
escape, but then it gives him an idea.  He shouts for  the guards, begging for
his life and offering to reveal a hidden flaw in  Karabi's plan.  Though
suspicious, the guards enter his cell, figuring they  have Batman thoroughly
outnumbered and outgunned. But as the guards level their  rifles at Batman, they are
startled by the loud ringing of the alarm clock, and  Batman responds; "Like
the referee says-- when you hear the bell-- come out  fighting!" He has set the
clock ahead to create this momentary distraction, and  given only a few
seconds' adventage, our hero is able to disarm and overcome the  guards and lock
them up in the cell, while he goes to free Robin and stop  Karabi.  Arriving in
the temple chamber from which Karabi is about to  launch his missile, Batman
and Robin fight their way through his henchmen, and  Batman leaps to punch
Karabi in the face before he can reach for the missile  control "Right on the
button!  But not the one on the control panel!"  

But though Karabi is defeated and the peace of the world saved, Batman  isn't
quite through with his war with Hydra, even though it was a side  issue. 
Karabi's records coincidentally reveal a clue to a planned Hydra  robbery of a
Swiss bank "late this afternoon".  Since it is already  evening, Robin figures
they have missed their chance to foil the robbery, but  Batman points out that
when it is evening in Asia it is still afternoon back in  Europe.  Back once
more the Batplane flies to Europe, where our heroes  intercept a Hydra gang
tunneling from a curio shop into the bank vault.   The leader gets away, but a
lump of wax he leaves behind enables Batman to  deduce that he is planning to
escape on skis through a "favorite route for  people who want to smuggle
themselves across the border between Germany and  Switzerland".  Donning skis
themselves, they catch up with the Hydra "head"  and take him into custody. 
Returning home at last, Robin muses that "even  though you couldn't cut off all its
heads, you certainly crippled Hydra's  activities!"  "Yes, Robin, and maybe
Hydra will never recover from the  blows we gave it!  Only time will tell!"  (As
far as I know, Batman  never took on Hydra again, though-- he left that job to
Nick Fury.)  Back  at home in Gotham City, Dick Grayson is amused to note that
thanks to time zone  differences, news reports have Batman and Robin
capturing Karabi in Asia at 8  p.m. and also bagging the Hydra head in Switzerland at
the same hour.  "You  seemingly were at two places at the same time!"  Bruce
Wayne tops that by  pointing out that back in Gotham City it is only 8 p.m.
now, so they both can  actually say they were in three places at the same time. 
(Given travel  distances between Asia, Europe and America even with a fast
jet, I find this  pretty hard to believe.  I didn't realize the Batplane had
lightspeed  capability.....)

The letter column conducted by Julie Schwartz has some  comments, mostly
favorable, about the recently introduced "New Look".  One  writer, Bill Elliott of
Wayland, Mass., sadistically notes that he was glad to  see Robin get shot in
the leg in an earlier story "after twenty years of being  under fire". 
(Actually Robin got shot and otherwise banged up a few times  back in the Golden
Age.)  Ye Editor responds, "Curious, isn't it, that  'after 20 years of being
under fire', Robin is still a teen-ager?  That's a  mystery that we doubt even
Batman can solve!"   Another writer, Cecil  Van Beuren of Slater, Mo.,
complains that Batman and Robin's "seeming  indifference toward the feminine sex" is
"unrealistic".  (I guess he wasn't  around a few years earlier to hear Freddy
Wertham's alleged explanation for  this....)  The editorial response is, "We
don't pretend to give you a  minute-by-minute accounting in the daily lives of
our heroes, just the  highlights, especially (of) their crime-busting
activities.  So to assume  they are 'indifferent' to embers of the opposite sex is
'unrealistic' on your  part."  (It's still curious, though, that each of his other
heroes was set  up with a love interest, Schwartz got rid of Batwoman and
didn't make any real  effort to establish a new girlfriend for Batman.  Well,
there were a couple  of stories in which a policewoman named Patricia Powell was
introduced as a  possible love interest, but that didn't go anywhere.)

Mystery in Space #99, "World Destroyer From Space!"

MYSTERY IN SPACE #99; May 1965; DC Comics; Jack Schiff, editor; featuring 
Adam Strange vs. "The World Destroyer From Space!" and Space Ranger battling 
"The Living Robots!"  The cover, illustrating the Space Ranger story  (though it
appears second in the issue), depicts Space Ranger in an assembly  line of
space lawmen who are being converted into robots by a sinister  device.  One
alien in front is completely "robotized", another in back is  still flesh and
blood, and Space Ranger under the overhead beam of the sinister  device is in the
midst of being converted from flesh to metal.  The  parrot-beaked alien
operating the ray cackles, "Even Space Ranger is now under  my control!  Soon, I
will be king of this solar system!"

Review by  Bill Henley

After Julius Schwartz gave up editorship of MYSTERY IN SPACE  and took the
creative team of Gardner Fox and Carmine Infantino with him.   Jack Schiff
produced a further ten Adam Strange stories (MIS #92-102, skipping  #101), produced
by members of his own editorial stable, including Lee Elias on  the art.  The
conventional fan wisdom on these stories is that they're of  little or no
worth, a disgrace to the proud name of Adam Strange.  As I  mentioned in a
response to another review, I don't quite agree.  Certainly  the Schiff-edited Adam
Strange stories weren't as good as the  Schwartz/Fox/Infantino classics, but
they're still readable.  I at least  like them better than the Ultra the
Multi-Alien series that replaced Adam  (sorry, Ultra fans).

I think "The World-Destroyer From Space!" is written  by Jerry Siegel-- yes,
the co-creator of Superman-- though it might be Dick or  Dave Wood.  The art,
as mentioned, is pencils and inks by Lee Elias.   Elias was a comics veteran
and though his art lacks the pristine slickness of  Infantino it had its own
virtues, including expressive faces. (One thing to note  about Elias' depiction
of Adam is that he kept the costume the same except that  he immediately, and
permanently, got rid of the finned helmet and let Adam's  blond hair tousle in
the breeze.  I don't know if Elias and/or Schiff  thought the helmet looked
silly, or if Elias just wanted to place a visual mark  of his own on the
character.)   On the splash panel, Adam Strange is  in the midst of nuptials with a
pretty redhead in an Earthly-looking white  wedding gown, when he is attacked
by a floating pinkish-orange  monster  hurling lightning bolts as Alanna grins
fiendishly.  Her father Sardath  chides her; "How COULD you, Alanna?  Just
because Adam jilted you for  Lurinor,you wrecked the only weapon that could have
saved him AND our  planet!"

As our story begins, Adam makes his usual Zeta-beam trip to  Rann, where a
playful Alanna greets him with a hug-- "It's only been weeks since  our last
meeting but it seemed like an ETERNITY!"-- and a challenge to a race,  Adam's
jet-pack against her "air scooter".  When Alanna wins the race, Adam  reacts with
an uncharacteristic scowl; "You needn't rub it in!  You're a  bad sport!" 
Alanna is puzzled and upset by Adam's anger, and she and  Sardath are both
disturbed when he proves "quiet and withdrawn" during  dinner.  "Maybe some Earth
problems are still on his mind!", Alanna  speculates.  It gets worse when Adam
is invited to be the guest of honor at  a "special celebration" of his own
heroic deeds.  He is openly rude to the  crowds of Rannians hailing him as
"champions of champions"-- until one of them,  a redhead with a cinnamon-bun hairdo
of the sort later popularized by Princess  Leia, approaches him.  "You're the
prettiest girl here!", Adam declares,  and he snubs Alanna in order to dance
with her.  The redhead, Lurinor by  name, confesses that she has always
hero-worshipped Adam and envied his  sweetheart, Alanna.  "Forget Alanna!"  Adam
declares.  "She  belongs to my past!  You, who are infinitely more fascinating,
belong to my  FUTURE!"  And, addressing the crowd, Adam declares he is so
smitten with  Lurinor that he is proposing that they be married the very next day--
a proposal  Lurinor eagerly accepts.  While a baffled Sardath wonders if Adam
has "lost  his mind", a tearful but enraged Alanna declares, "I wouldn't marry
that heel  now if he begged me!  Lurinor is welcome to him!  I HATE  HIM!"

The next day, Adam and Lurinor are in the midst of a public outdoor  wedding
ceremony, with Alanna in the background vowing not to cry in public,  when an
amorphous, flying, orange creature approaches shooting lightning  bolts.  Adam
recognizes it; "It fits the descripton of the legendary  monster-- the
World-Destroyer Creature!  It's supposed to have exploded the  planet Goz, eons
ago!"  Explaining further, Adam says the creature searches  the galaxy for planets
containing the rare element Zymium from which it can gain  "illitmitable
power".  Once it gains a power boost by absorbing Zymium, it  can blast apart an
entire planet and absorb still greater power from the  explosion, keeping it
going for eons until it runs low and has to seek out  another Zymium-containing
world.  And Rann is in deadly danger, for it has  Zymium.  Though his romantic
inclinations have changed, Adam seems as  dynamic and quick-thinking as ever,
as he stops a guard from firing at the  creature-- "Your ray-blaster won't
harm the creature!  If anything, it's  making it STRONGER!"-- and rushes Sardath
to his lab to obtain a "large  repulsor-ray machine", which Adam uses to push
the creature back towards space  and gain time to find a more permanent
solution.  Adam sets Sardath to work  building a device to his specifications, but
refuses to explain the machine's  exact function; "Don't distract me with
questions!  Just do as I say!   Billions of lives are at stake!" 

Meanwhile, Alanna spots the  creature returning, shooting its lightning
bolts, and despite her alienation  from Adam she dons her jet-pack to rush to warn
him and her father.    The creature spots and follows her, and at first she
thinks it is attacking her  with its bolts.  But then one of the creature's
lightnings destroys a  deadly poison-quilled Razak bird that threatened to attack
her.  Alanna is  puzzled by the creature's behavior until she spots "a
pattrern in the woods  below, formed by the space-creature's bolts!  I'm beginning to
understand!"  Shortly afterwards, Adam Strange emerges from Sardath's lab 
with a new ray-weapon in hand and orders bystanders aside as he prepares to 
blast the creature.  But Alanna leaps forward, grabbing the weapon and  ripping
wires loose, inactivating it.  She then cheers on the space  creature:  "Go
get him!  Get him!"  And as Adam is wreathed in  the creature's lightning bolts,
Alanna laughs manically, and Lurinor and Sardath  are horrified; "Not only
will Adam die because of your hatred, but OUR WHOLE  WORLD WILL PERISH!"  But
then, as the creature flies off into the sky, an  unharmed Adam seizes Alanna in
an embrace and kiss, and now it is Lurinor's turn  to be outraged; "Stop it,
Adam!  She tried to destroy you!  How can  you....?"  But, still holding
Alanna, Adam insists, "No, I'm not  crazy!  Neither is Alanna!  She just saved me
from an awful fate,  bless her!"  Alanna explained that she saw the initials
"AS" burned into  the ground by the creature's bolts, and that plus he
creature's action in saving  her life enabled her to figure out by "intutition" what
had happened.   Somehow, as Adam traveled from Earth to Rann by Zeta-beam, the
space creature  got caught up in the same beam, and their minds exchanged.  the
creature's  mind in Adam's body landed on Rann, and it decided it wanted to
keep its new  form (and for some reason, took a shine to Lurinor as well). 
Arriving on  Rann to discover his own "wedding" in process, creature-Adam tried
to make  physical contact with Adam-creature, sensing that this would change
their minds  back.  But Adam-creature drove it away, and then had Sardath create
the  weapon capable of destroying its old form once and for all.  (Why the 
creature is so eager to exchange its natural form, capable of living for eons, 
for a mortal human body is not altogether clear.  I guess it was *really* 
taken with Lurinor.....)   But the danger is not over, for with its  plan to
remain in Adam's body foiled, the creature will proceed with its  original goal
to seek out Zymium and blow up the planet Rann.  Quckly,  Alanna repairs the
wires she damaged on the mystery weapon, and she and Adam jet  off to confront
the creature before it can reach Rann's Zymium mines.  They  are almost too
late, as the creature is already sucking up Zymium-energy, but  the ray-weapon
functions as advertised.  Working as "energy-absorbing ray",  it drains the
creature, making it smaller and smaller until it disappears  altogether. 
"Ironically, the creature created the SOLE weapon that could  destroy it!", Adam
comments.  Back at Ranagar, Lurinor (who apparently was  sincere about her
hero-worship for Adam) is crestfallen at being left at the  altar but "thankful I
didn't marry a monster in human form".  Alanaa takes  the opportunity to drop a
hint, "Speaking of marriage, darling..." when Adam  suddenly fades away as his
Zeta-beam charge wears off.  However, Alanna  knows he will soon return via the
next Zeta-beam, and, "Meanwhile I'll have  plenty of time to make myself look
my prettiest for him!  I'm not taing any  chances!"

As I've mentioned, I suspect Gardner Fox must have had one of  the happier
marriages among comics creators, since he liked to depict couples  (like Hawkman
and Hawkgirl and Adam and Alanna) who worked together closely and  were
romantically devoted to each other without a lot of jealousy and  bickering.  Here,
in this non-Fox Adam Strange story, Alanna shows  uncharacteristic signs of
jealousy and spite, but the provocation is  considerable.....and, on the other
hand, she is actually the one to make the  crucial deduction that saves the
day, which rarely if ever happened in  Fox-written stories.

The remainder of this issue is devoted to the  cover-featured Space Ranger
story.  Space Ranger was Jack Schiff's own  editorial "baby", reportedly
produced at the same 1950's editorial bull session  at which Julie Schwartz came up
with Adam Strange.  While Schwartz gave  Adam a home in MYSTERY IN SPACE,
Schiff featured the Ranger for years in his own  sci-fi title TALES OF THE
UNEXPECTED, but when Schiff took over MiS, he  shoehorned both characters into the
same title.  Like the post-Schwartz  Adam Strange, Space Ranger comes in for a
lot of fannish disdain, but in his  case I think the disdain is largely
warranted... at least, I've never found  anything very interesting about Space
Ranger's rather juvenile adventures.   On the splash page of this one-- drawn I think
by Howard Purcell, though I could  be mistaken-- Space Ranger's
shape-changing pal Cryll has transformed himself  into a green creature with double
vacuum-tube nostrils, but Space Ranger is  transformed himself into a glowing
metallic form.  "Look out, Cryll-- Space  Ranger's become a hostile robot and he's
utilizing his robot powers to attack  you with that glow!"  In Saturn Stadium,
two alien criminal types are  watching an exciting boxing bout, but though the
exciting climax is approaching,  one of them insists they both leave to meet
their boss, known as Zru.   "We'd be crazy to keep Zru waiting!  That brilliant
brain is on the verge  of becoming king of this solar system!"  Another
member of the audience is  eager to make their acquantance and learn more about
Zru, but as the "Martian  Mauler" wins the bout, cheering fight fans block the
aisles and prevent him from  catching up to the two hoods.  Removing his
undercover disguise, Space  Ranger, "Guardian of the Solar System", returns , along
with girlfriend Myra, to  his asteroid headquarters,  The Ranger is convinced
that the mysterious Zru  is behind a series of "unexplained disapperances", but
his "odd little  assistant" Cryll is busily but unsuccessfully trying to
locate info on Zru on  the "Z" shelf of the Ranger's large library.  (Wow, how
futuristic.   Didn't even Batman, a mere 20th century primitive, have a
Bat-computer on which  to keep his records of known criminals by this time?) 

The next  day, at Saturn City Hospital, a familar figure with an unfamilar
look shows  up.  The vanished Dr. Vervo, a trusted doctor, shows up, but he has 
reappeared wtih completely metallic skin, a "living robot".. Brushing off his
former colleagues, he uses his knowledge of the hospital safe combination to
make off with "the planet's total supply of rare and valuable pluradium"  
Space Ranger and Cryll show up on the scene, but the Ranger's ray-gun is
useless  against the metallic Vervo, and Cryll's shapechanging efforts also fail
when a  space flying manned by the gangsters Bru-rel, Toga and Zru appears to
seize  Vervo and the pluradium loot.  Trying to figure out the criminals' next 
move, the Ranger deduces that a "paper deal" they spoke of refers to a plan to 
attack the Interplanetary Mint.  One of the missing persons is a master 
engraver for the mint.  And the next day, Jar-nee the Jovian, developer of  the
"secret process for developing paper" for the mint, is accosted and taken 
capive with "immobilization fluid".  Or is he?  Actually, the real  Jar-nee has
been warned and his captured doppleganger is Space Ranger in  disguise.  Taken to
the gang's hideout at an abandoned asteroid mine,  "Jar-nee" is ordered to be
sent through the "reception center",  where an  X-ray device reveals not only
his hidden weapons but his identity as Space  Ranger.  Exposed and still
helpless due to the immobilization fluid, Space  Ranger listens as the
parrot-beaked Zru explains that he was an inhabitant of  another solar system whose
criminals are imprisoned on a planet where mere flesh  and blood beings cannot
survive, so the convicts are subjected to a  "robotization" process to give them
metal skins and make them subject to the  will of their guards.  Zru got
himself sentenced to this prison in an  attempt to free his gang boss Graz-vo, but
when the plan went awry, he fled  without Graz-vo but with the "robotizing
bulb" and control helmet he can use to  create "living robots" of his own.  He
fled to Earth's solar system and  plans to dominate it with his robot slaves, but
his first priority was to obtain  the supply of pluradium, not because of its
money value but because it can  substitute for Kronium, "an element necessary
for my existence".  Zru's  thugs suggest that Space Ranger ought to be
killed, but  Zru laughs off the  suggestion; why kill him when he can be "tobotized"
and become Zru's loyal  servant?  And that is what Zru proceeds to do.

Later, at  "Interplanetary Military Headquarters on Pluto", General Larki
appears in robot  form with a mission to steal vital defense plans for Zru's use.
But Cryll  is on the scene, since Space Ranger earlier warned that Larki
might be the next  target.  Becoming the blue double-trunked creature, Cryll
traps the robot  general in a pit, but Robot-Ranger shows up to disable Cryll and
rescue the  general.  Cryll and Myra are baffled how to make contact with the
Ranger  and overcome the control kept on him by Zru's control helmet.  But
some  time later, as Zru starts to direct his robot slaves on another mission,
Space  Ranger acts without orders and seizes the control helmet from Zru's head,
freeing the other robotized beings to revolt and overcome Zru and his  gang?
How did the Ranger escape control?  It seems that Cryll took  the form of a
Mercurian telepathic monkey and  beamed the Ranger  instructions on how to
escape Zru's control by removing his helmet.  Now  Zru is defeated, but the
Ranger and the others may be doomed to exist as living  robots forever, since even
Zru had no knowledge of how to reverse the  robotization effect.  Fortunately,
at this point the police of Zru's own  home solar system show up.  They have
tracked him to Earth's system because  of the presence here of pluradium, the
only known substitute for the vital  element Kronium, and now they can restore
the Ranger and the others to normal  while hauling Zru off to serve his own
sentence as a "living  robot".

Space Ranger and Adam Strange each had only two more MYSTERY IN  SPACE
appearances to go at this point.  Adam appeared without the Ranger in  #100 and
#102, while the Ranger appeared without Adam in #101 and made his last  bow in
#103, sharing the issue with the debut of Ultra the Multi-Alien (Lee  Elias' new
art assignment in place of Adam Strange).

Strange Tales #81, "The Scarecrow Walks!"

STRANGE TALES #81; February 1961; published by Marvel Comics (well, 
actually, on the indicia, by Vista Publishing Inc.); Stan Lee, editor.  On  the cover
by Jack Kirby, a huge straw-stuffed figure, which actually looks kind  of cute
and cuddly except for its gigantic size, is nonetheless terrorizing the 
populace, grabbing and pulling down a building with people looking out of the 
windows while other panicked citizens on the street flee from under the  seat. 
The cover caption warns us, "BEWARE!  For today, the SCARECROW  Walks!"

Review by Bill Henley

From the Mighty Proto-Marvel Age of  Giant Monsters comes this epic issue,
published some ten months before FANTASTIC  FOUR #1 (and so, of course, before
the debut of the Human Torch, an FF spinoff  series, in STRANGE TALES).  If
you're wondering what is exceptional about  this issue, the truth is that I took
a notion to review one of these Marvel  pre-hero monster/fantasy comics, and
this is one of very few that I happen to  own.

The splash page of "The Scarecrow Walks!" is signed by (Jack) Kirby  and
(Dick) Ayers.  Threre's no writer credit, but to my understanding  virtually all
these monster stories were plotted by Stan Lee (no doubt with  input by Kirby)
and dialogued by Larry Lieber.  On the splash, the huge  scarecrow figure
stalks a man and woman; "Johnny, I'm frightened!  He's  moving closer!  He's
coming toward us!:"  "Hang on, Sue-- don't  panic!  If he sees we're afraid, he'll
surely destroy us!"  (No,  despite the names "Johnny" and "Sue,", this does
not appear to be a prequel or  prototype of the Torch and Invisible Girl in the
FF.)

"You won't believe  this story!", the opening caption warns us.  "You will
say it's  IMPOSSIBLE!  And yet, how can you be sure?  In a universe of infinite 
space and endless time, how can you be sure that ANYTHING is impossible?"  
One Jarvis (again, no apparent relation to the Avengers' kindly butler), a 
banker in the true Snidely Whiplash tradition, is delighted to learn that the 
government wants to buy up a property on which he holds the mortgage in order to
use it for a nuclear test.  While some property owners might see NIMBY 
issues in this, Jarvis' only thought is for the money he can make, and he  hurries
to the Smith farm to foreclose the mortgage and evict poor farmers  Albert
and Martha Smith.  The Smiths, who have been paying Jarvis what they  can
despite being unable to make a decent crop out of the hardscrabble farm, beg  Jarvis
to let them keep it so that they can share in the profit from the  government
sale.  "Don't be a fool!  To me you're just in the way and  I don't care what
happens to you!  Now start packing!"  As the  elderly, destitute Smiths
trudge away, Martha's chief concern seems to be for a  figure hanging in the barren
field; "What about our scarecrow?  He's been  with us for years!  It...it's
like leaving an old FRIEND!"  "I know,  Martha!  But we no longer have NEED for
it!  We'll never have money to  buy another farm!!  Our friend will be better
off HERE!"  That's  debatable, for as Jarvs counts his money, "the wheels of
military  experimentation move fast, and soon once more the breakup of atomic
particles,  the creation of inconceivable heat and the monstrous explosion of
another  nuclear test!"  Now you'd think that in the face of such heat and
blast, a  mere straw-stuffed figure would last less than a microsecond before
being  obliterated.  But somehow, perhaps due to the presence of "a new element, 
far more POWERFUL than deadly gamma-rays" (does Bruce Banner know about
this?)  instead of vanishing in a puff of flame, the forlorn scarecrow begins to
grow in  size, and then to move.  "I can... think...can speak....I am ALIVE!"  
Ultimately, the Scarecrow finds itself to be "the MIGHTIEST of all living 
creatures!"  And then, the creature makes an "ominous vow".  "Nothing  on Earth
can stop me!  I shall do what I must....and woe unto any who stand  in my way!"

Stalking across the countryside, the Scarecrow is seen by a  farmboy who
calls to his parents about "a GIANT in the field" and gets the  response, "Any
more wild stories from you and we'll take away your  comics!"  The Scarecrow
encounters Johnny and Sue of the splash page scene,  but lumbers on past them
unnoticing; "He left us alone!  He must be after  something BIGGER-- more
IMPORTANT!"  At last, the Scarecrow reaches the  town he seeks, and stalks it streets
sending the inhabitants into panic while  looking for one particular resident.
"I shall yet find the one I  seek!  He shall not escape me! By the power
that gave me life, THIS I  VOW!"  And his vow is fulfilled, as he spots one
particular man through the  window of a business office; "So!  I have FOUND you,
JARVIS  CRAGSTONE!"  Yes, it is the cruel banker the Scarecrow seeks, and to get
at  him the straw monster pulls down the entire building (let us hope that
Jarvis  was counting his ill-gotten gains all alone that day).  Leaping to the 
ground through a window of the collapsing building, the surprisingly agile 
banker reaches the ground and tries to flee in his car, but the Scarecrow 
squashes the vehicle with a stomp of its foot; "It is no use, mortal....for YOU, 
there shall be no escape!"  Next Jarvis tries to hide in an old-fashioned  well
but the Scarecrow reaches down to seize him.  "I have done you no  harm!  Why
do you torment me?"  "I attack you for your GREED, your  RUTHLESSNESS....for
the harm you have done Albert and Martha Smith!"  The  Scarecrow accuses
Jarvis of deliberately selling the Smiths worthless land and  then chiseling them
out of the profits from the government sale.  "Now I've  come for the profit
you made....for the money that rightfully belongs to Albert  and Martha Smith!" 
Desperately, Jarvis agrees to buy back his life by  turning over his entire
profit (which seems to be in cash rather than stocks,  bonds, or bank deposits,
as you might expect a banker to keep his wealth).   As Jarvis vows never to
cheat anyone again and the surrounding townspeople agree  never to tell anyone
what they have seen for fear of being thought mad, the  Scarecrow lumbers off,
muttering, "Must go....must search....time grows  short....so short...."   As
it searches for days, its size slowly  shrinks as the radiation that brought
it to life wears off.  It is hardly  bigger than it started when it finally
finds the object of its search, which is,  of course, the elderly couple Albert
and Martha Smith, reduced to living under a  crude lean-to in an open field. 
The Scarecrow leaves Jarvis' money for  them to find the next morning, so that
they can rejoice that they can now buy a  new farm and home.  As they set off
to do so, the Scarecrow follows after  them "with his last bit of life ebbing
away".  Once established in their  new farm, the Smiths are utterly puzzled
to find their old scarecrow hanging  inert in their new field.  "And, Albert,
see-- on his face, there's a  SMILE!"  "Yes, he looks almost as if he had been
ALIVE!  But that's  impossible!  And yet, maybe it isn't!  Maybe there are
more forces in  this world than we know....more than we will EVER know!"  So ends
what the  final caption tells us is "an incredible tale, a fantastic
tale....but one which  none can prove false!  And neither can YOU....NEITHER CAN  YOU!"

(Maybe I'm taking things too seriously again, but this last line  reminds me
of real-life arguments between believers in the "paranormal" and  skeptics. 
Often the believers try to confound the skeptics by pointing out  that though
no positive proof has been found of the existence of, say, Bigfoot,  the
skeptics have also not produced positive proof of Bigfoot's non-existence,  since
they have not been able to search every square foot of wilderness in North 
America and find no trace of the supposed hairy humanoid.  The fallacy here  is
that in traditional logic and debate, and in science,  the "burden of  proof" is
on the party making a positive claim, especially if that claim is of 
something supernatural or otherwise outside the normal realm of human  experience--
"Extraordinary claims require extraordinary proof."  The other side cannot,
and doesn't have to, provide positive proof of a  negative.  Maybe the
skeptics can't absolutely prove that Bigfoot doesn't  exist, but they aren't
obligated to accept the Bigfoot fans' claims or even take  them seriously, until  the
Bigfootites produce some sort of positive proof  of their claims.  The same
goes, I suppose, for giant animated irradiated  scarecrows.)

The second yarn in this issue is "A Giant There Was!", which  appears to be
drawn by Don Heck.  On the splash page, a man stands smugly  declaring that
"It's IMPOSSIBLE!  Nothing that LIVES can be enormous enough  to dwell in this
gigantic place!" while above him the huge hands of a giant  (flesh and blood in
this case, rather than straw) reach down to seize him.   Joe Farrow, a thug
from the big city, has sought out a small New England village  for his new venue
for crime because "small towns have less cops....it makes  stealing easy!" 
And the antique shop Farrow is casing looks like  particularly easy prey
because the owner is "a real STRANGE gink (who) never  even bothers to LOCK the
door!"  Sneaking into the shop after closing  hours, Farrow raids the owner's
"personal drawer where the most valuable items  would be kept".  Afterwards,
Parrow is satisfied with the loot from his  "perfect caper", except for three
simple beans marked "Beanstalk Beans".   He tosses them contemptously outside onto
the ground; "HAH!  With all the  VALUABLE stuff I stole, I sure won't have to
raise my own BEANS!"  "How  could Joe Farrow know that within those beans lay
nore energy, more growth  potential then anywhere else on Earth?"  But he gets
a clue when he awakens  the next morning to find that the beans have sprouted
into a gigantic beanstalk  reaching high into the sky.  Remembering the
legend of Jack and the  Beanstalk-- in which Jack found a treasure at the top of
the beanstalk-- Farrow  concludes this one may have its own treasure and hurries
to climb the stalk to  claim it.  Reaching the top at last, he finds that the
stalk reaches all  the way up into the clouds, but the clouds themselves are
solid and he can walk  on them in his quest for treasure.  He climbs a "small
hill" to get a  better view, but is startled when the "hill" moves to realize
that it is  actually a giant's foot.  Pursued by the giant through his
humungous home,  Farrow tries to escape but finds himself falling through an open win
dow.   In danger of falling all the way back to the ground, he grabs a hanging
rope and  is drawn upward, only to find himself a captive of the giant--
along with three  other crooks who confess that they were lured by their greed
into the strange  curio shop and now are the giant's slaves working day and
night.  And  looking upward at his giant captor's face, Farrow realizes that it is
the same  face as that of the curio shop owner.  Back on Earth, the shop
owners  leaves his door open "to wait patiently for the next criminal to pass 
through!  For the next unsuspecting enemy of society who did not suspect  that
there are stranger things in this Earth of ours than we dare DREAM  of!"

Next is "I Went Too Far Back!", which appears to be drawn by Paul  Reinman. 
The sory is set ten years in the future and takes place in a  science lab
whose custodians lock the door on the supreme invention of a  now-departed "great
scientis" named Farrington.  It is a time machine,  which the other scientists
have deemed too dangerous to be used because it might  enable someone to
change the past and "alter our entire present  civilization".  But hiding within
the locked lab is a rat-faced little man,  once Farrington's assistant (why do
comic book and horror movie scientists  usually make such poor choices of
assistants, I wonder?) who intends to go back  into the past for his own profit
"and I couldn't care less HOW much trouble it  might cause to the world today!" 
The man has a pistol, and he figures that  in any era before the invention of
his gun the possession of this amazing  killing machine will make him "the
nost feared man in the world, treated like a  king".  But when he makes his time
trip, he is chagrined to find that the  inhabitants of the past, wandering
around wearing white tunics, who appear to be  "too simple...too primitive!  No
machines....no homes!  There's  nothing I'd even want to STEAL"  Nonetheless,
he tries to impress the  locals with wonders such as matches and a wristwatch,
only to find that they  show no interest and don't even speak to him. 
Frustrated, he fires his gun  in the air and then shoots directly at one of the
locals, intending to "wing"  him and demonstrate his deadly power.  But the bullet
bounces off an  invisible barrier.  And then another invsibile force picks
him up, shakes  him until he gun falls out of his pocket, and drags him to a
structure which  turns out to be a courthouse.  Here, the judges finally speak to
him and  explain that the other inhabitants need no speech, nor do they need
elaborate  machines and possessions, because they have telepathy and mighty
mental powers  that meet all their needs.  But how can people of the primitive
past have  powers dwarfing those of advanced 20th century residents, our
villain  pleads.  "We're not your PAST-- we're your FUTURE!  This is the year  3005!
TIME IS LIKE A CIRCLE!  If you go TOO FAR in the direction of  the PAST, it
will bring you around to the FUTURE!"  And so, as he faces  life in a cage as
a zoo exhibit of "20th Century Man", he reflects that "at  least the people of
the 20th century won't have to worry-- I'll never be able to  change any
history NOW!" 

Finally, as typical for these Silver Age  Marvel pre-hero monster books, the
issue which began with a monster tale drawn  by Jack Kirby ends with a yarn
drawn and signed by proto-Marvel's other star  artist, Steve Ditko.  This one is
"The THING in the Cell!"  The splash  is simply a view of a huge, hulking
gray-black figure (no, not Ben Grimm) seen  though prison bars.  "The main road
to many of the European tourist  centers" contains a small town named Bork
which is, almost literally, a tourist  trap.  Any stranger driving through is
stopped by burly police chief Hans  Vogez (also the local mayor, , postmaster and
judge) , who demands ten dollars  (doesn't sound that bad, but then this was
before inflation) or else ten days in  jail for violating one trumped-up law or
another.  One couple is charged  ten bucks for driving through town without
headlights in the daytime (actually,  I think some states actually now have
laws demanding cars drive with headlights  day and night, on the premise it makes
cars more visible to other drivers) while  another is gigged for driving
through with the radio on (now I might actually go  for a law like that,
especially if there were an extra fine for playing rap  music at high volume with
four-letter lyrics).  Each fine is collected and  kept by Vogez personally, and at
last he collects enough to finance his life's  ambition-- the building of "the
finest prison on the continent-- and it's MINE  to run!  It will be a monumnt
to my importance-- my power!"  The  inhabitants of Bork are not pleased with
their one-man government's use of  public funds-- "The BIGGEST crime is
wasting money on such an unnecessary  building!"-- but Vogez cares nothing for their
opinions.  Eager for his  prison's first involuntary guest, he arrests a
strange, hollow-eyed man for the  crime of walking the wrong way on a sidewalk. 
The man claims to have no  money for a fine and is locked up for vagrancy and
resisting arrest, despite his  dire warnings that "They're COMING for me!  They
will not depart WITHOUT  me!"  "Then THEY can pay your fine-- whoever THEY
are!"  That night,  as the moon rises over the prison tower, "they" indeed
arrive-- hulking dead  white-skinned brutes.  And what they want is to take their
leader with  them, for he too, in his true form, is such a creature.  But since
their  leader is locked up in a cell, "There can be only ONE answer!  IT MUST
BE  DONE!"  The next morning, jailer Bork awakens eager to greet the new day 
and his first prisoner-- only to find that not only is his prisoner gone but
the  entire prison is gone along with him, leaving only the bare foundations! 
This loss of public property is too much for higher authority in Bork, and
the  once proud jailer is at last stripped of all his public offices and
reduced to  menial jobs such as gathering branches for firewood.  Meanwhile, Bork 
becomes a prosperous tourist center, attractng visitors not only by the absence
of its greedy cop but by the mystery of the vanished building.  And making 
his dreary rounds, Hans Vogez can only reflect that he was too arrogant to 
realize that the "they" he disdained might have been not mere humans, but 
creatures from "out there", and that "they must have been unable to open his  cell,
so they did the next best thing-- they took the entire building!"   And now,
"I have been justly punished for my greed and pride-- by someone who  even NOW
may be watching-- watching and  waiting!"

Detective #319, "Fantastic Dr. No-Face!"

DETECTIVE COMICS #319;  Sept. 1963; DC Comics; Jack Schiff, editor; 
featuring Batman and Robin vs. "The Fantastic Dr. No-Face!"  (Writer  unknown to me;
art probably by Sheldon Moldoff, pencils, ghosting for Bob Kane,  and Charles
Paris, inks.)  On the cover, a faceless and bald figure in a  trenchcoat is
stitting on a scaffold hanging down from the top of a mountain and  attacking a
giant Mount-Rushmore-like bust of Batman's cowled face (which  appears to be
wincing as No-Face's jackhammer destroys its eye).  The real  Batman swings down
on a rope as Robin declares, "Dr. No-Face is destroying  another 'face' in
revenge-- YOURS, BATMAN!"

Review by Bill Henley (by  special request of Hoy Murphy)

On the splash page, Batman and Robin burst  through the doors of an art
gallery to find their faceless foe already on hand  and destroying paintings with a
flamethrower.  "DR. NO-FACE has destroyed  the FACES of those masterpieces--
and now he's out to destroy ours!"  As  the story begins, "world-renowned
medical authorities" prepare to observe a new  advance in plastic surgery as Dr.
Paul Dent demonstrates his "skin rejuvenation  ray" on a chimpanzee. 
Supposedly, the ray will make the chimp's "rough,  wrinkled face smooth as a child" and
then go on to instantly heal "fleshy scars"  on human faces.  But as Dr. Dent
manipulates the controls, something  short-circuits, the machine explodes,
and Dr. Dent receives a "super-dose" of  his own ray right in his own face.  The
result is that his face is  completely blanked out, leaving only a smooth
expanse of skin and bald  head.  Screaming, :"My eyes, ears, nose...GONE!  I have
NO FACE!   YAAAA!:"   Dr. Dent flees in a fit of madness.  (You'd think he'd 
have more than just cosmetic and psychological effects to worry about.  
Without eyes, nose and mouth, how is he going to eat and drink, see, or even 
breathe?  The answer is unclear.)

Some time later, the Bat-Signal  alerts Bruce Wayne and Dick Grayson to don
their "crime-fighting togs" and  Commissioner Gordon alerts them to Dr. Dent's
tragedy and asks them to be on the  lookout for him.  The doctor makes himself
easy to spot, as he is standing  on Gotham City's version of Broadway firing
a rifle at the giant faces on  lighted billboards.  "*Ha, ha*  I'm destroying
his face-- then he'll  look as I do-- DR. NO-FACE!"  Arriving on the scene,
Batman and Robin try  to urge No-Face to calm down and seek help from plastic
surgery, but the  doctor's shots sever an electric cable which falls to the
ground, threatening to  electrocute bystanders.  Batman hurls a "cutlass Batarang"
which cuts the  power line high up where it cannot threate anyone, but in the
meantime, Dr.  No-Face escapes.  "I'm afraid we'll meet him again!  Dent is
like a  man possessed-- he'll strike agan!"  Sure enough, he shows up at the
art  exhibition room of the Gotham Museum and starts destroying the faces of
famous  portraits with a flamethrower.  Robin uses a fire extinguisher, not
against  the flames but against Dr. No-Face's blank face, momentarily 'dousing his 
enthusiasm".  But the doctor pulls a giant Chinese plaque off the wall  which
blocks the exit to Batman and Robin as he makes his getaway.

Going  on further rampages, Dr. No-Face destroys the faces on clocks,
statues, and  ceremonial masks.  As Batman and Robin search for him at Dr. Dent's
known  past haunts, Robin suggests he might have a hideout in the mountans, but 
Batman  points out, "Hardly, Robin!  The doctor suffers from  acrophobia-- an
intense fear of heights-- remember?"  No-Face's next target  is the "Bonaparte
Emerald", seemingly an odd choice for him, but he intends to  destroy the
gem's "face" in a rock-pulverizing machine.   Batman and  Robin reach the machine
too late to save the gem, and as No-Face flees he  boasts, "YOU WON'T STOP
ME, BATMAN!  And YOUR face is the next one I'm  going to destroy!"  "Of course!"
Batman realizes.  "There's ONE place  he could have a field day with MY
facial features!  C'mon!"  Arriving  at the "Batman Face Monument" carved into the
side of Mount Gotham, our heroes  find Dr. No-Face already hard at work
defacing the stone Batman with  "high-powered sand-blasting equipment".  "We've got
him this time!"  declares Batman, but as he and Robin swing towards the mad
villain on ropes,  Batman's rope is severed by the sandblaster, and as Batman
clings precariously  to his likenss's face, No-Face prepares to use his
sandblaster on the Cowled  Crusader's real face.  Batman urges No-Face to remember
that he is a  doctor, not a murderer, but it is Robin who saves face for Batman
by cutting the  hose of the sandblaster.  Batman seizes Dr. No-Face's scaffold
and twirls  its hanging lines until the doctor is hopelessly and helplessly
tangled.   Once caught, No-Face seems to recover his senses; "What have I done,
destroying  all those things?  I must have been out of my mind!"  Batman
asures  him that the law will go easy on him and plastic surgery plus psychotherapy
should be able to restore him to his normal self.

But once locked up in a  prison hospital ward, Dr. No-Face in his private
thoughts is less repentant than  triumphant; "My plan worked!  I've fooled
Batman....the  police....everyone!  Ha, ha!"  It seems that the man called Dr. 
No-Face is not Dr. Paul Dent at all, but a gangster named Paul Magan who,  hearing
of Dr. Dent's skin rejuvenatio ray, approached Dent before his scheduled 
demonstration and demanded that Dent use the ray to erase a telltale scar on his 
features.  Dent claimed the ray didn't work properly and that he was about 
to cancel his demonstration but Magan insisted on going forward, operating the 
ray himself.  And it was he, not Dent, who found himself faceless.   But
instead of being driven to madness, Magan came up with a scheme to use his 
condition for criminal gain.  Having his gang hide the real Dent at their  hideout,
Magan the gangster disguises himself as Dent and goes through the 
"demonstration", removing he disguise to reveal his faceless face.  He then  goes through
No-Face's rampage of face-destroying crimes.  His ultimate  plan, it seems,
is to have plastic surgeons give him Dent's face-- and  identity-- permanently
so that he can live out his life as the respected doctor  rather than the
wanted criminal.  But as he prepares to go in for surgery,  he is shocked when
Batman shows him a picture of the face the plastic surgeons  will be working to
restore-- and it is his own, Magan's, face, not Dent's.   When he protests,
Batman says, "Come off it, Magan! We became suspicious of you  last night when
you put on that phony show at the Batman Face Monumnt!" because  the real Dent
was known to suffer from fear of heights and wouldn't have been  able to hang
from a high perch to sabotage the Batman face.  Becoming  suspicious, Batman
checks the fingerprints taken of "Dr. No-Face" and finds they  match those of
the wanted gangster Magan, not Dr. Dent.  And so, Batman and  Robin track down
Magan's gang hideout and find there not only the kidnapped Dr.  Dent but the
valuable paintings and Bonaparte Emerald, which "No-Face" actually  stole while
destroying fakes.  And now, the foiled faceless man faces a  long prison term
in his true identity rather than a brief institutionalization  followed by
freedom and wealth as "Dr. Dent". 

Speaking of whom,  it's curious to note that Dr. No-Face's supposed civilian
name was the same as  that of a better-known Batman villain with a facial
fixation-- Two-Face, aka  Harvey Dent.  (If No-Face and Two-Face had somehow met
and merged  identities, would they have wound up with a normal number of
faces?)  It's  also interesting that Two-Face made no appearances in Batman comics
between  1954, around the time the Comics Code started, and 1971, when the Code
was  liberalized.  Did the original stringent Comics Code frown on Two-Face 
because of his grotesqueness, or maybe because in his origin he was a law 
officer, a district attorney, who went bad?  And is it possible that Dr.  No-Face
was a conscious attempt to create a replacement in Batman's rogue's  gallery
for Two-Face, a similarly conceived but more Code-acceptable  variation?  (But
if so, I guess it didnt work out, since Dr. No-Face made  no further
appearances that I know of.)

It's also worth noting that a few  years after this story appeared, a good
guy adopted the faceless look-- Charlton  Comics' the Question.  And of course,
the Question was later taken over by  DC and has met Batman on occasion. 
(Though I doubt if Question creator  Steve Ditko was inspired by this No-Face
Batman story.)

Also in this  issue of DETECTIVE is John Jones, Manhunter from Mars, playing
the role of  "J'onn J'onzz, Wizard of 1463".  (Why do Silver age time travel
stories  usually have to take place in a year an exactly even number of
years/centuries  from the "present" year the story is published?)  Story probably by
Jack  Miller, art by Joe Certa.  As J'onn J'onzz upends a bridge to halt the 
advance of a medieval army, the opposing army's soldiers marvel that "Prince 
Charles' wizard body is defeating the Black Duke's soldiers!"  J'onn  thinks,
"They'd really be shocked if they knew  was secretly a Martian  living on
Earth 500 years in the future!"  Hardworking police detective  John Jones takes
some vacation time off to visit an unspecified European country  (and, receiving
plane tickets, reflects he could travel a lot faster if he  didn't have to
"keep up appearances").  Hearing as a tourist about the  "Dolmain Caverns" which
have never been fully explored, John Jones decides to  "duck the crowd" and
explore them himself, figuring if he gets lost he can  always just become the
Martian Manhunter and escape right through the cave  walls.  But Jones
encounters a strange hazy mist inside the caverns, and  when he finds his way back to
an entrace, he is confronted by what he first  thinks is "a gigantic movie
set" of a castle and a realistic-looking chase on  horseback.  More realistic
than he knows, as the man being chased is thrown  from his horse and would fall
to his death down a chasm-- if not for John Jones  becoming J'onn J'onzz and
flying to his rescue.  The man is understandably  puzzled by the appearance of
this flying green-skinned fgure, but explains that  he himself is the cpatain
of guards for Prince Charles of Auvergne Province (in  France?)  who has been
captured by the evil Black Duke,  Coming to  suspect that we're not in the 20th
century anymore, Toto, Manhunter asks the  year and learns that it is 1463. 

After leaving the guard captain  with farmers loyal to Prince Charles,
Manhunter enters the castle and spies  invisibly on the Black Duke plotting with his
henchmen.  The rightful  prince is safely locked away, it seems, but
adamantly refuses to abdicate in the  Black Duke's favor, and the Duke fears to simply
kill him lest this cause a mass  rebellion among the populace loyal to the
prince.  The Duke sends his agent  with guards to the Prince's hiding place to
try to again persuade the prince to  quit, but the Manhunter joins the mission,
knocking out one of the guards and  shape-changing into his form.  The
henchman boasts as they travel, "Soon I  will show you how tough I can get with
Prince Charles!"  but our hero's  silent response is, "You wouldn't talk so big if
you knew how tough I can  get!"   When the Duke's agent threatens Prince
Charles with death if  he refuses to abdicate, his "guard" turns on him and helps
the Prince escape to  rejoin his guard captain.  As the "guard" reveals his
true Martian form,  the captain marvels at the amazing powers of the prince's
new ally, but the  prince himself fears that the Black Duke will just take over
again once the  Manhunter returns where he belongs.  Manhunter explains that
he will take  the prince's own form and use his powers to rally the people and
defeat the Duke  once and for all, before departing 1463.  "Prince Charles"
appears to his  people and reveals that he now has supernatural powers which he
can manifest in  his green-skinned "wizard form".  (Hmmmm.... given religious
attitudes of  the time, it's possible that if anything like this had actually
happened, the  people would have rallied to the Black Duke, fearing to support
a prince who had  obviously sold his soul to Satan to obtain witchly powers.)
In his "wzard  form", the "prince" defeats a detachment of the duke's army
and twists their  weapons into a giant pretzel.  But then the Black Duke
decides to test the  prince's new powers in person, and sneaking up behind the
"prince" as he  addresses his people, the Duke knocks him unconscious with a pike. 
(It  wasn't portrayed completely consistently, but usually, in SA John Jones
stories,  when the shapechanging Manhunter was in his John Jones form or any
other normal  human form, he didn't have his other Martian powers including 
invulnerability.  It was also somewhat inconsistent whether or not he was 
vulnerable to fire in human form, but in this story, as we'll see, he  isn't.)

The "Prince" awakens in one of the Black Duke's cells and  prepares to burst
free as the Manhunter, but then has second thoughts when he  notes that the
cell is lighted by torches, whose flames will weaken and destroy  him if he
becomes the Manhunter.  When the Duke demands once more that the  "Prince"
abdicate,J'onn stalls for time by asking to be given till dawn to make  a decision. 
But in the meantime, learning that his doppleganger has been  captured and
seemingly lost his "magic" powers, the real Prince (who up to now  seems like a
rather passive, ineffectual sort) resolves to take matters into his  own hands
by rallying his people himself.  While the Prince leads his loyal  followers
in arms, he sends the guard captain to free J'onn J'onzz from the  Duke's
dungeon.  The Duke is baffled that the Prince is out leading his  people though he
should be locked up in the dungeon, but he leads his troops  against the
roused populace, and the people might face defeat by the better  armed troops were
it not for the now-freed Manhunter, who wrecks the bridge over  which the
Duke's troops are charging.  With his army beaten, the Duke  surrenders publicly
to the Prince, and the Manhunter takes his leave of the  restored prince,
saying, "You have proven yourself to be a brave leader, Prince  Charles!"  After
finding his way back to the future through the cave mists  and "sealing the
time-warp with tons of rock", our hero returns to America and  to his Detective
Jones job, where he smirks behind his hand as Diane comments  that he's "had a
good rest" during his  vacation.

Detective #324, "Menace of the Robot Brain!"

DETECTIVE COMICS #324; DC Comics; Feb. 1964; Jack Schiff, editor; featuring 
Batman and Robin versus the "Menace of the Robot Brain!"  The cover is a 
closeup of the metallic face of the "robot brain", whose eyes are windows behind 
which Batman and Robin are choking and dying in clouds of deadly pinkish  gas.

Review by Bill Henley

The only credit on this story is the  "Bob Kane" signature.... I don't know
the writer, I suppose the real artist is  probably Kane's regular ghost of the
period, Sheldon Moldoff, The splash page,  which somewhat resembles an
old-fashioned headache remedy ad,  shows a  cross-section of the giant robot head
with Batman and Robin trapped inside it  and about to be flipped by the robot's
mechanical "tongue" down its throat into  a pit.  "Robin-- we're about to be
swallowed by this mechanical  monster!"  As the story begins, we find Bruce
Wayne and Dick Grayson in  night court, posting $10,000 bail for a friend of
theirs, Daniel Williams.   It seems he is an employee of a jewelry store, the only
one possessing the  combination of the store safe, and a fortune in diamonds
has disappeared from  the safe.  And Williams can't even swear to his own
innocence; "My  mind....it's gone completely BLANK, Bruce!  I can't remember a
thing that  happened to me during those hours when the robbery must have
occurred!"   "To show our faith in you," Bruce responds, "I'm going to ask my friend,
Batman,  to help!"  But plans to question Daniel further the next day are put
on  hold when a strange armored car robbery occurs.  One uniformed guard 
punches out the other and drives away.  Hearing a radio report, Batman and  Robin
pursue the car down Route 46, where crooks have taken control of a  drawbridge
and are raising it to halt pursuit.  Batman attempts to jump the  bridge in
the Batmobile, but "The Batmobile didn't quite make it!  But we  did-- he hard
way!" as the Dynamic Duo flip acobatically out of the car as it  falls into the
river.  (Must be nice to be rich enough to treat Batmobiles  as disposable.) 
Rolling down the other side of the bridge, Batman and  Robin knock down the
crooks and take them into custody, but all they can report  is that they were
hired to raise the bridge by a man with "a waxed mustache and  horn-rimmed
glasses".  Then our heroes get word of the armored car driver,  who has been
spotted wandering around in a daze; like Daniel Williams, he has no  memory of his
criminal actions.  He does, however, recognize the descrption  of the man with
the mustache and glasses; he was a sidewalk photographer who  took the
guard's picture some time earlier.  Checking with Daniel Williams,  B and R find
that he too was snapped by the mustached shutterbug.  "But  what's he got to do
with my case?"  "Perhaps everything, Dan!  It's my  hunch that 'camera' of his
is a device that makes it possible for him to CONTROL  MEN'S MINDS!"

(This seems to be yet another example of a comic-book evil  scientist who is
smart enough to come up with an amazing invention but too dumb  to use it to
real advantage.  If he wants money, why not use his "camera"  on a tycoon or
two and get them to turn over wealth to him legally, rather than  playing around
with small-time heists and attracting police and  Bat-attention?  And if he
wants real power, snap a few  politicians...)

Obtaining a police artist sketch of the mustached  man,  Batman and Robin set
out to find him.  But we readers catch up  with him first, as we learn his
name, Ernst Larue, and see him in action  snapping a photo of a clerk in charge
of a rare coin exhibit.  The clerk is  too cheap to pay a dollar for his
photo, but Larue doesn't mind, for he has what  he really wants, "the brain-tape I
just recorded!"   Driving to his  lair in "secluded valley", a brick building
topped by a giant robotic head (it  must be "secluded" if the neighbors don't
question his taste in  architecture)  Larue dons a "control helmet", inserts
the "brain-tape" into  the robot bran, and prepares to take control of the coin
clerk.  Meanwhile,  Batman and Robin have traced the mystery photographer to
the area of the coin  shop and noting the coin clerk leaving the shop with a
heavy briefcase and a  "half-crazed" look, they deduce he is another victim of
the mind-control  robberies and follow him.  They pursue him to the building
with the giant  robot head-- "Undoubtedly the criminal's bizarre lair, Robin!"
(Are you sure,  Batman?  Maybe it's just one of those funky theme
restaurants....)   and observe the clerk entering through the opened mouth of the robot
head, then  leaving again without his loot.  Sneaking into the robot's mouth,
Batman  and Robin seek a route into the interior of the mechanism.  But
suddenly  the robot mouth snaps shut and the robot's "tongue" lifts to pitch our
heroes  down its "throat" to an unknown doom.  Ever resourceful, however, Batman 
manages to catch his cape between the tongue and the roof of the "mouth", and 
hang on to it as Robin hangs on to his legs.  When the tongue lowers,  Batman
and Robin reach temporary safety; "We fooled whoever is behind this robot 
brain!" but "If that character built one trap, he can build another!"  

Sure enough, jet blasts of air from giant fans blow Batman and Robin  into
separate chambers, one behind each "eye" of the robot, which are filled  with a
choking pink gas.  Closing steel "eyelids" prevent them from  smashing through
the windows, and though Batman is able to avoid the effects of  the gas with
nose-plugs from his utility belt, Robin, it seems, has forgotten to  replace
his own nose-plugs.  (Good thing for Robin he's not dealing with  the more
harsh and prickly Batman of today, or even if he survived he'd get  fired on the
spot for such a screwup.)  Advising Robin to lie flat on the  floor and remain
quiet, Batman desperately cuts through the chamber wall with an  oxyacetylene
torch, and reaches Robin just in time to save his life and revive  him with a
dose of oxygen.  Hearing Larue  gloat, "Ha, ha!   That's the end of Batman and
Robin!",  our heroes smash in to burst his  bubble.  "This is your finish in
crime-- you can count on it!"  But  the criminal mastermind has one more trap
in store, as he leaps through an  escape chute and locks Batman and Robin in
the robot brain's central chamber,  activating a device designed to set off a
cacophony of loud, discordant sounds  designed to drive our heroes insane.  "We
have....just one....faint  chance!" gasps Robin.  Sitting outside his robot
brain, Larue waits eagerly  for his trap to do its work and leave the Dynamic
Duo "completely out of their  minds".  But suddenly he gets a "wild expression
on his face" and climbs up  the robot head to deactivate the noise-trap control
located in its nose.   Then he returns to the control room where  an entirely
sane Batman and  Robin are waiting for him, unable to remember what he has
done or why.   Robin, it seems, has redeemed himself for his earlier goof by  a
brilliant  stroke.  Just before Larue made his escape, the Boy Wonder spotted
his  "camera", grabbed it and snapped a 'picture"  of the mind-control 
criminal.  Now possessing Larue's own "brain-tape", Robin and Batman are  able to
figure out how the device works and take control of Larue himself.  
"Yes....thanks for rescuing us and capturing YOURSELF!"

Following house  ads for BATMAN ("The Bat-Mite Hero!"), WORLD'S FINEST ("The
Ghost of Batman!")  and BRAVE & BOLD #52 (no, not a Batman teamup-- rather, "3
Battle Stars,"  Sgt. Rock, airman Johnny Cloud and tankman Jeb Stuart teaming
up for a "Suicide  Mission")  -- the second feature is John Jones, Manhunter
from Mars in "The  Beast Who Was J'onn J'onzz!"  Art is by regular JJ artist
Joe Certa and the  script, I'm guessing, is by regular writer Jack Miller.  On
the splash,  police in squad cars and helicopters are firing pistols and
machine guns at a  fleeing blue-furred creature.  Don't you know this is an
endangered  species, guys?  More than that, "How can I make them understand that I'm 
the Manhunter and  that I can't change back to my Martian form?" A crew of 
archaeologists, accompanied by a vacationing Diane Meade (John Jones' police 
colleague and quasi-romantic interest) discovers a petrified creature resembling
a purple stegosaurus (hi there, Barney)  along with rock carvings of other 
prehistoric monsters.  Suddenly a bolt of lightning strikes the creature, 
bringing it to life and panicking the archaeologists.  "Gracious!   What a
vacation this is turning out to be!  I'd better contact Manhunter at  once!" Diane's
message is relayed to Police Chief Harding and then to Detective  John Jones,
who allows as how he might be able to get in touch with the mighty  Martian;
"He's as good as alerted this instant, Chief!"  (thought) And I'm  not
kidding!"  Stopping by his cave headquarters to pick up his  extradimensional sidekick
Zook ("A creature?  I not afraid if YOU there,  Manhunter!") J'onn J'onzz
arrives on the scene to find that Barney has trapped  the archaeologists and
Diane in a blind canyon.  Taking on the creature  with a flurry of punches,
Manhunter finds that the creature can't hurt him but  he can't do it much damage
either.  Shooing the archaeologists to safety,  JJ carves out giant slabs of
stone to form into a wall trapping the creature  harmlessly in the canyon.

As the Manhunter studies the cavern where the  monster was found, "Martian
mental-power deciphers to ancient script" and he  learns that Barney was created
by "the sorcerer Marlon to create havoc among the  people!"  On the other
hand, one of the other creatures carved on the cave  wall has the power to defeat
the purple menace.  But the inscription  indicating which one is no longer
legible.  Manhunter concludes he must use  his shape-changing power to adopt the
form of the different creatures until he  finds out which one is Barney's
nemesis.  As Barney smashes out of his  rocky prison, Manhunter takes the shape of
a green cross between a dinosaur and  a praying mantis.  It has the power to
cast "a ray-beam from its single  eye", but the ray doesn't faze Barney, who
grabs the creature and nearly wrings  its long neck before Manhunter can resume
his normal Martian form.  The  next form tried by Manhunter is a blue
creature with a funnel-shaped mouth that  breathes fire.  "How ironic it would be for
my single weakness on Earth to  be the only thing that can conquer this
menace!  Luckily it doesn't hurt me  in this form!"  Trouble is, the flames don't
hurt Barney either.  And  worse, the Manhunter-beast finds he is unable to
change forms again.  "Is  it because of the FIRE that burns within this beast's
body?"  And  naturally, just at that moment the local police arrive in force and
open fire,  thinking the Manhunter is just another rampaging monster.  And of
course,  unlike Barney, this creature is vulnerable to bullets.  It is Diane
Meade  who is about to draw a bead on the Martian Monster (""N-not you, Diane!
  Not YOU!") when Zook's antennae "scent" the creature's true identity and he
leaps at Diane to stop her shooting.  But the other cops on the scene are 
unconvinced-- "That little creature must have taken leave of its senses!"-- 
until the Manhunter  gets an idea.  Feigning shivering, he gets across  to Zook
what he must do-- use his temperature--control power to freeze the blue 
monster.  Once the creature's internal fires are snuffed out by the cold, 
Manhunter is able to change back to normal.

But meanwhile, Barney has  broken loose again, and the Manhunter has no
choice but to adopt the form of the  third and last of the cave-wall creatures, a
blobby violet monster, hoping as  advertised it will be the one at last that
can stop Barney (and that he won't be  trapped in its form too).  Charging at
the purple creature, Manhunter's new  form "spreads itself around the juggernaut
like a blanket"  and "enfolds it  tighter and tighter" until Barney flops
over unconscious.  Returning to  normal again, Manhunter prepares to "bury the
beast in deep ocean where no  lightning can ever again reach it", when Zook runs
up to tell him, "I very glad  you back to yourself again!  I think you much
better looking now!"   "Thanks, Zook!  I love YOU, too!"  (Uh oh.....is Dr.
Wertham paying  attention?)