Wednesday Comics: DC, October 1982 (week 4)

My ongoing mission: read DC Comics' output from January 1980 (cover date) to Crisis! This week, we review the comics hitting the newsstand on July 22, 1982.

Action Comics #536: This is more of the Omega Men crossover, and Wolfman/Kupperberg and Staton/Trapani have the injured Superman in the hands of the Mole and his gang. They've taken him to an underground city they're using as a hideout. The Mole plans to auction of the right to kill the Man of Steel, provided he gets the weapon they use in exchange. The Omega Men are from space and don't know from spelunking, so Lois leads on a search for Cave Carson. Kallista's magic is able to locate him. Carson isn't interested in helping, until Lois tells them that Superman is in danger. They hop into the Mighty Mole and take off. Carson suspects he knows where their heading. His crew discovered the abandoned city, and one of his former crew absconded with a prototype Mighty Mole.

The group arrives in the nick of time and rescues Superman, with Lois shooting the villain about to kill him. In the aftermath, Superman takes the Omega Men to the JLA satellite in an effort to help them get the fuel they need, but the Teen Titans show up needing help, so this story actually precedes the Teen Titans issue earlier this month.  

All-Star Squadron #14: Thomas cannot get enough Per Degaton--or maybe "plotter" Conway is the instigator here. Anyway, this is sort of the backstory of this month's issue of Justice League. Degaton regains his memory, steals Professor Zee’s time machine, then discovers the existence of Earth-Prime. He rescues the Crime Syndicate from their imprisonment and enlists their help in stealing atomic missiles from Earth-Prime Cuba of 1962. When they try to double cross him, he hurls them into another dimension.

Meanwhile, on Earth-2 in 1942, the All-Star Squadron members battle a badguy called Nuclear. After he disappears, they return to their meeting room and discover the presence of the Justice League.

Captain Carrot and His Amazing Zoo Crew #8: Scott Shaw turns one man band on this book, taking over writing duties from Thomas. It doesn't really change much in terms of content. Everyone experiences a segment of missing time and it turns out this cosmically powered Bear from outside spacetime known as the Time-Keeper is responsible. He was awakened from his hibernation by the time travel shenanigans of Bow-Zar mentioned last issue. He does the usual time villain thing of turning Captain Carrot old and the other usul time villain thing of turning the rest of the Crew into babies. Even with Yankee Poodle backup them main story still seems to drag on for too many pages.

Detective Comics #519: I may never forgive Conway and Kupperberg for forcing me to write the description: "Batman has his final showdown with Colonel Blimp." But really though, it's not bad despite the Batman TV show sort of concept behind the villain (complete with backstory of avenging his father's disgrace for championing blimps to the military, then having his career tank). It seems like maybe one of the writers read something about blimps and got his imagination fired up, because we get tidbits like blimp hangars can be so big they can have rain inside. Anyway. Batman and Robin use teamwork and a combo of brains and brawn to win the day, so it's a decent Batman yarn.

In the Batgirl backup, she's on the trail of Velvet Tiger. Batgirl manages to capture most of the villain's gang, but the Tiger escapes thanks to her brother's mercy. Frustrated by the Ward's action but more by her own failure, Barbara returns home to her loving and understanding father, who definitely knows what it's like to have the villains get away!

New Adventures of Superboy #34: I know the Yellow Peri only from the Who's Who and would never have guessed she debuted in the 80s, but here she is, courtesy of Rozakis and Schaffenberger. She's a circus sideshow performer who gives herself real magical powers by conjuring up an imp named Gazook from a book of magic and names herself the Yellow Peri. When her attempt to help the farmers around Smallville goes awry and Superboy gets in the way, decides to bedevil the Boy of Steel as revenge.

The backup is Dial H was hero which is still about the water-based villain Naiad trying to get revenge on her former friend, the movie director. Our heroes defeat her, but then somebody shoots the director!

Unknown Soldier #266: Haney and Ayers bring this title to close with the Soldier trying to kill Hitler and stop a doomsday weapon--which involves bioengineered octopuses with vampire bat genes--during the fall of Berlin. Old Unknown Soldier allies Chat Noir, Sparrow, and Inge give their lives for the cause. The Solider kills Hitler (Braun commits suicide) then impersonates him to stop the weapon from being deployed before appearing to give his own life to save a child. I can't say I will miss reading this title in the months (and years!) to come, but I do like the character of the Unknown Soldier and wish something a little different had been done with the title. Not sure what. I feel like Larry Hama might have been a good fit.

Weird War Tales #116: The stars the Creature Commandos and G.I. Robot now have bigger billing on the cover than the books title. In the first story by Kanigher and Carillo, the Commandos encounter a prevously unknown Greek goddess in Sicily: Inferna, daughter of Pluto. The lonely goddess has taken a shine to Shrieve, but her fiery love threatens to burn them all up until Myrra convinces her that she's going to destroy the thing she's after. Lovelorn Inferna relents and returns to the Netherworld.

Better is Kanigher's and Infantino's sentimental and goofy, but charming, G.I. Robot tale. On the island of Tattu, Sgt. Coker wonders if the G.I. Robot ever gets lonely. When they get back to camp, Coker finds a package that contains a robotic canine named C.A.P. The robo-dog's a big help to them both, as he swims out into the ocean to expose an ambush from a Japanese sub. A great white shark tries to eat C.A.P., but J.A.K.E. shoots the shark and takes his pooch back to the military scientists for repairs. Coker is happy that J.A.K.E. won't ever have to worry about being lonely.

 

World's Finest Comics #284: The Burkett/Tuska Composite Superman story continues, with Supes Superman bringing the Legion back to the 20th Century to help him and Batman fight their foe, who now calls himself "Amalgamax." Even with the Legion's help, Amalgamax is too tough, but once they figure out is identity, Batman and Superman formulate a plan to trick the villain into thinking that he has a lethal disease that can only be cured if he gives up his powers. Amalgamax falls for it.

This turns out to be the last issue of World's Finest with more than one story, though I guess you wouldn't know that until next month. As it is, only Green Arrow by Barr and Spiegle is left. Ollie stops a young girl, Ronnie Tempus get away with stealing a hot dog because she's hungry; her grandfather spends all their money on a grandfather clock. When Ollie takes Ronnie home, the old man explains that  he feels that he must keep the clock working, because when it stops, he'll die. The Clock King, loser that he is, tries to steal to clock, but Green Arrow stops him. The clock stops and old Tempus has a heart attack, but GA gets him to the hospital and he survives, having learned to pay more attention to people than clocks.