Wednesday Comics: DC, October 1983 (week 1)

My ongoing mission: read DC Comics' output from January 1980 (cover date) to Crisis! This week, I'm looking at the comics at newsstands on the week of July 7, 1983. 

There was a freebie this week, DC Sampler #1. It has no real story in it, just two-page ads for DC Comics and all comics that are already on the shelves. Two things jumped out at me. It does give away how Supergirl defeats her mini-clone foes, and the Legion of Super-Heroes ad cleverly evokes the titles and logos of old DC non-supers books to taut the various genres at play in the title.

Amethyst: Princess of Gemworld #6: Granch and his brothers go down in defeat and are killed in their assault on Dark Opal while Amethyst says good-bye (at list for a time) to her Earth foster parents and undergoes a training montage. Princess Topaz is still mopey about his upcoming wedding. Not a whole lot of forward motion story-wise, but Colon's art is still great.

Wonder Woman #308: Nice cover by Andru/Giordano, and representative of the issues contents, for once! Sofia Constantinas is getting used to Paradise Island by eavesdropping and witnesses the ceremony in which Wonder Woman's bracelets of submission and magic lasso are restored by Athena and Aphrodite. She keeps snooping and hears the goddesses and the queen mention that Steve Trevor has been brought back twice from the dead. Elsewhere, Black Canary intervenes with a woman chasing an old man, only find that the old man is a Nazi, Karl Schlagel. The woman mystically transfers her consciousness into Black Canary's body. As Canary, she goes to the League satellite, and is captured by Wonder Woman and the Elongated Man, who learn that she is a Roma mystic and Nazi-hunter. Meanwhile, Black Canary, in Zenna's body, is captured by beast-men goons, and Dr. Schlagel prepares to inject her with something.

The Cavalieri and Bair (credited as Hernandez)/Gaicola Huntress backup seems to be mostly setting up a new status quo but it's awkward. There's a crusading reporter who reveals she's really just out to get Huntress because the heroine has the freedom she was taught she couldn't have as a woman. After allowing Huntress the use of his shower, Minelli asks her out--but we find out in a separate scene that he's an undercover agent for Commissioner O'Hara. The story ends with Huntress thwarting what she believes to be a drug deal, which turns out to possibly be a baby exchange.

Blackhawk #263: Blackhawk has been assigned to find and stop Domino while for her part, Domino has been ordered to assassinated Blackhawk. The two wind up in Marrakesh where they are captured by a group looking to ransom them both. Meanwhile, the Blackhawks are tracking the war wheel and discover the secret of its appearances and disappearances (its being carted around by zeppelins) and bring all that to a stop. Blackhawk and Domino work together to escape, but then Hendricks shoots and kills Domino after she appears about to turn on Blackhawk. But was she? Blackhawk is haunted by the possibility she might have been ready to reform. I'm surprised they killed off Domino. Maybe Evanier just felt they had done everything with her they could? Spiegle's art really sells that seen though, and in general this issue with the war wheel and its large scale carnage this is a standout in an already great run from him.

Justice League #219: Only a few months after his exit, Conway is back, albeit teaming up with Thomas. I wonder if this turn is due to cancellation of the JLA/Avengers project, which Conway was writing? In any case, this JSA/JLA team-up story seems more of a Thomas idea as it is in service of a retcon regarding the history of Black Canary--though that goal isn't entirely clear from this issue. Johnny Thunder's T-bolt attacks the two Flashes then assaults the annual JLA/ JSA reunion, incapacitating only those heroes born on Earth-One, leaving Black Canary, Red Tornado, and the Justice Society members uninjured. Before they can figure out what's going on, the heroes they have to go off to stop the Crime Champions, who are attacking various locales on Earth-One. Starman and Black Canary, meanwhile, trail the Thunderbolt to his home dimension, where they discover villain behind it all is the criminal Earth-One counterpart of Johnny Thunder--and he's got transparent coffin type thing containing the bodies of Larry Lance and Black Canary!

Arak: Son of Thunder #26: Ron Randall comes on board as artist. Arak and Satyricus arrive in Byzantium to report the death of Kallinikos to Emperess Irene and request the use of a ship to get back to the New World. Those plans have to wait as they're attacked by a lioness that Arak must defeat Tarzan-style, which leads to him getting an offer to be a charioteer for the Green team (not to be confused with the Green Team).

The chariot race is about as Ben Hur amped up for comics as you might imagine, but Arak is victorious after killing some rivals. Before he can ask his boon of Empress Irene, he seems the lioness about to be burned alive in a cage in front of the cheering crowed--then she turns into a beautiful woman!

DC Comics Presents #62: Rozakis/Mishkin and Novick/Hunt serve up a goofily patriotic team-up with the Freedom Fighters, which seems like it would have been more at home in the bicentennial ramp-up of 1976, but I guess is honoring the 4th. There's even a framing sequence where a kid visiting a museum who doesn't care about the U.S.'s history reads this very comic and sees the error of his ways. In the story proper, Uncle Sam and the Freedom Fighters come to Earth-One to stop Neo-Nazis from stealing and destroying the Constitution and Declaration of Independence, which in fact, are some sort of totemic, mystical protectors of America. Superman is busy dealing with the national crises the theft caused and can't help. We do get a couple of references to the Freedom Fighters' 70s series, at least.

Fury of Firestorm #17: Conway and Broderick/Tuska/Rodriguez open on the funeral for Ed Raymond, who we find out isn't dead. There are suggestions of maybe some sort of witness protection type situation, but we aren't given a lot to go on. Anyway, Ronnie and everyone else believes he's dead. While this is going on Hewitt's experiment turns Lorraine Reilly into the nuclear-powered, Firehawk, who has been conditioned to obey Hewitt's commands. He sends her to attack Firestorm. Ronnie, distracted by grief and the feeling he is responsible for his father's death, initially just tries to escape the attack, but once Firehawk burns some civilians, he fights back and quickly defeats her. When she reverts to Lorraine, that gives Ronnie something else to feel guilty about. 

Dissatisfied with Firehawk's performance, Hewitt decides to create another superhuman. This time, he'll be the test subject.