Wednesday Comics: DC, April 1982 (week 1)

I'm reading DC Comics' output from January 1980 (cover date) to Crisis! Today, I'm looking at the comics at newsstands on the week of January 7, 1982. 

Arak Son of Thunder #8: Continuing the story from last issue, Valda and the Pope are captives of the subterranean Black Pope and his people and Arak is forced to fight in the arena to try to save their lives. He succeeds, of course, but a kidnapped woman from Rome above saves the day by knifing the Black Pope from behind. There's a Viking Prince backup by Kanigher and Duursema, but I feel like this is a bit of recap from what's gone on before with that character.

DC Comics Presents #44: Rozakis and Irving/McLaughlin resurrect Dial H from Adventure Comics. Superman goes to Fairfax to investigate why the town has become a hotbed of new heroes, just as Chris King pulls a boneheaded move. He turns himself into a monster called Beast-Maniac by dialing H-O-R-R-O-R instead of H-E-R-O. In the course of solving this problem, our heroes discover the mysterious Master is behind all the super-villains.

Ghosts #111: In the first story, Mishkin and Texiera present a doctor who has figured out a way to both analogize and present psychological pathology and sort of a virtual reality game--except when he's confronted by his colleagues over his methods it doesn't stay virtual, and his own deathwish does him in. In "The Last Kung-Fu Movie" by Kelley and Giffen, Bruce Lee appears to have been the inspiration for an Asian film who gets his revenge from beyond the grave on unscrupulous Hollywood types. 

Mayer and Ditko present "Shrieeeeek!" a mildly (perhaps intentionally) humorous tale of a man brought to ruin by th ghost of a mouse he had killed. It's really kind of an Atlas Horror sort of story, actually.

Justice League #201: Conway is joined by Heck for one of his lesser outings in this run. A down-and-out, one shot super-villain, Joe Parry (not Perry!), encounters Ultraa living as a normal guy in Atlantic City. He befriends the superhuman lug and manipulates him into turning to crime. When the Atom alerts the Justice League to a bank robbery perpetrated by the duo, Flash deliberately brings Hawkman in on the case, hoping to get his friend back in the game post-separation from his wife. Ultraa battles Superman, Flash, Green Arrow, Black Canary, Atom, and Hawkman to a standstill in a board-walk casino, until Hawkman convinces him give up the fight. Parry is taken into custody, and Ultraa goes to live with a tribe of aborigines like those who raised him back on Earth-Prime.

Weird War Tales #110: When surgeon Myrra Rhodes is able to restore Shrieve's damaged face after an accident, the Commandos are hopeful she can make them human again. When she tries to explain to them why that won't work, they throw a tantrum and break stuff. Rhodes gets exposed to a random combination of experimental gasses and is rather improbably transformed into a snake-haired freak. She joins the team, because being a creature is apparently the main requirement for being a Creature Commando.

Allikas and Zamora follow that up with a story of Germans being psychically lead to a new British supr-weapon, only to discover they had come to ground zero of the test of that weapon. Kanigher and Trinidad have a sailor adrift aided by mermaids against Japanese frogmen. Finally, there's a story of flag-bearer during the Crusades which I guess is "war" but nothing in it is particularly "weird."

Wonder Woman #290: The fight with Silver Swan continues. Just as the tide seems to be turning in Wonder Woman's favor, Dr. Psycho, smitten with Silver Swan, enters the battle as Captain Wonder using ectoplasm from Steve Trevor. With Wonder Woman defeated, they plan to take her and kill her in front of President Reagan. Trevor awakens, though having realized he isn't a native of this Earth. With him conscious, Captain Wonder is no more, and Psycho crashes the plane. Mars has had about enough, and takes Swan's powers away in disappointment, turning her back into regular old Helena. When Psycho and Helen see each other as they truly are, they are mutually repelled and run away from each other. Trevor and Wonder are reunited, though.

In the Huntress backup by Levitz and Staton she finally defeats the Crime Lord, though after this thing being dragged out for three months, I've sort of forgotten what the point was.