Super Stuff in the Bronze Age: December 2021

Friday, December 31, 2021

Happy New Year To All Of Our Readers

Superman © DC Comics. With apologies to Action #81

Just a note to everyone who stopped by our blog this past year to thank you all for the encouraging comments and to wish you all the very best for 2022.

Thanks especially for the support my good pal Nigel Brown and I received in getting the word out regarding the publication of the autobiography of Britain's first full-time comic dealer, the late Alan Austin. The book helped to keep the Bronze Age of comics alive in the hearts of many, fifty years later.

So, please ring in the New Year with the beverage of your choice and please read comics responsibly!

Friday, December 24, 2021

“Star light, star bright, First star I see tonight”

With the festive season now upon us, I thought it might be appropriate to cast our collective minds back to the days of DC Bronze Age Christmases of yore, and revisit some of those classic covers and stories where our heroes venture out into snowy vistas and experience a non-denominational ephipany of sorts (or at least lock up a criminal dressed as Santa). Before researching this blog entry, I’d assumed that I’d find covers galore – too many to adequately cover in a few pages – but in fact, I found that there have been relatively few Christmas covers on non-humour DC comics across the years. The Bronze Age in fact sports more than its fair share of Christmas covers, but it must be said that some of the best Christmas stories were buried at the back of a comic, and had no corresponding Yuletide cover.

Going back to the earliest era, the first DC comic that I could find with a Christmas cover was in humour book More Fun Comics #16 from December 1936, but it wasn’t until December 1940 that a popular hero – Superman – first shared a cover with Santa in the special Superman’s Christmas Adventure #1. It was 3 more years before a superhero again featured on the cover with Santa, when Wonder Woman, Flash and Green Lantern appeared on the cover of Comic Cavalcade #5 in December 1943. The following Christmas, Superman returned in Superman’s Christmas Adventure #2 (Dec 1944), and Batman & Robin appeared with Santa on the cover of Batman #27 along with the related story inside “A Christmas Peril”.

In the wartime era there followed a few other stories inside comics which featured our heroes (Batman, Superman, Wonder Woman, Boy Commandos, Sandman, etc.) in a Christmas setting, but nothing that merited a Christmas cover. Of course, the lack of a Christmas cover may have been a sales tactic to keep the comic books on the stands longer, into the January period.

Generic Christmas covers appeared on mainstream DC hero comics throughout the late 1940s, but in the 1950s and well into the 1960s, Christmas covers exclusively graced the humour magazines (Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer, Buzzy, Leave it to Binky, Fox and Crow, Sugar & Spike), and it was not until Christmas 1967, seventeen years after Superboy appeared in the snow on the cover of Adventure Comics #161 , that a mainstream superhero/hero DC comic featured a Christmas scene. That comic was Teen Titans #13, “The TT’s Swingin’ Christmas Carol” with a great cover and superb interior art by Nick Cardy, destined to be reprinted at least 7 times over the years. I love the colouring of the story, a good-hearted updating of Charles Dickens’ “A Christmas Carol” complete with groovy hip dialog courtesy of scribe Bob Haney, who at age forty-one rolled-out every cool phrase he imagined the flower-power generation used.

Two years later, Christmas 1969 saw the publishing of the famed “Silent Night of The Batman” which received rave reviews, even though it was hidden as a back-up in Batman #219. This was a pivotal story, in that it directly addressed the spirit of Christmas, was “relevant” (a GI is shown returning from Vietnam), had no villain – only good will to all men. Mike Friedrich and Neal Adams have never been better.

Perhaps the Teen Titans Christmas cover in Dec 1967 was an experiment to see if a Christmas-themed drove additional sales on hero comics. It seems it had not been the case, and it was three years later (Dec 1970) when DC instituted an annual pattern of only one non-humour comic featuring a festive scene, with the Hot Wheels club featured in Hot Wheels #6 in “The Humbug Run”. Christmas 1971 was blessed with two Christmas covers – one from Tomahawk #138 “Hawk Son of Tomahawk: Christmas” and the other from Batman #239 “Silent Night, Deadly Night”, a tale of redemption and second chances for a hardened criminal on a snowy Christmas Eve. Batman says “God Bless” and spots the star in the night sky.

The back-up story was “The Loneliest Men in the World” from Batman #15 (Christmas 1942) in which our heroes spread good cheer and gifts to various men who have lonely jobs and often get overlooked. But it ends on a slightly jarring note when villain Dirk Dagner gets sent to prison for life and Bruce Wayne says that since Dirk is consumed by hatred and greed he should remain caged…no warm thoughts of Christian redemption from the Batman of 1942!

Christmas 1972 featured Batman again (Batman #247 “Merry Christmas”) , a 6-page hostage situation on a snowy Christmas Eve where Batman gets an unexpected helping hand in the form of a bright star in the sky. Denny O’Neil and Irv Novick share the creative honours on this one.

In 1973 it was the JLA’s turn with Justice League of America #110 (“The Man Who Murdered Santa Claus”) in a story penned by Len Wein and drawn by Dick Dillin and Dick Giordano. The moral is that all of the JLA were willing to give their lives so that the rest of humanity might live. The cover of the comic was less than inspiring, though.

In Christmas 1974, DC decided to drop the idea of a new Christmas story in a mainstream hero book and instead issued Limited Collector’s Edition C-34 “Christmas with the Superheroes” collecting a number of Christmas stories published in previous years.

This collection approach had proved such a hit that DC again published a Limited Collector’s edition C-43 “Christmas with the Superheroes” which included the classic Neal Adams Batman story “The Silent Night of the Batman” amongst others. DC decided to also publish a brand-new Christmas story “Robin’s White (Very) Christmas” in Batman Family #4). It was a back-up written by Bob Rozakis, drawn by Jose Delbo and Vince Colletta. It is an amusing story of Dick Grayson helping his girlfriend and the Hudson University security chief deliver Christmas presents when thieves steal the sleigh and presents. After the case is solved, it looks like Dick will be snowed in and unable to meet up with Bruce, Alfred and Aunt Harriett for Christmas, but will get the chance for some one-on-one time with his girlfriend at Hudson U. But in the final panels his style is cramped when Bruce and team turn up as a surprise for Dick.

Christmas 1976 featured no Christmas covers on hero comics, and we had to wait until April 1978 when DC put out the “T’was the Night Before Christmas” in House of Mystery #257, well after the festive season.

Christmas 1978 featured three Christmas-themed mainstream comics – Batman #309 “Have Yourself a Deadly Little Christmas” from Len Wein, John Calnan & Frank McLaughlin (Blockbuster saves a suicidal young woman and sacrifices his life in the process), Brave & Bold #148 “The Night the Mob Stole Christmas” (Bob Haney, Joe Staton & Jim Aparo) (Bats teams with Plastic Man to foil a tobacco-smuggling ring and head down to Florida for the denouement. Back in Gotham City Lacey’s Dept store had been robbed of its goods and decorations ; Bats and Plas get the thugs to restore the store to its glory (Retail is just as important as faith) and Green Lantern #113 “That they May Fear No More” (a snowy Christmas Eve story by Denny O’Neil, Alex Saviuk and Frank Chiarmonte that finds GL and GA protecting a pregnamt woman and her famiy from thugs. The wife Marcy gives birth to a child – new hope – as Christmas Day rings in).

In Dec 1979, Frank Miller pencilled a new Batman story written by Denny O’Neil “Wanted: Santa Claus – Dead or Alive” published in DC Special #21. Again, the intervention of the light from the star gives Batman the edge he needs to rescue the department store Santa (a crook trying to go straight) and another tale of redemption on Christmas Eve comes to a close.

Following Miller’s popular tale, the era of the classic Christmas story appeared to have passed, even though various Christmas offerings have continued to appear over the years beyond the Bronze Age.

If the number of reprintings of DC Christmas stories are any gauge of popularity, then the stories of the Bronze age were the heyday of these tales. The stories were secular, but were also stories of hope, charity and love, with a nod towards the influence of a higher power of goodness to offer the chance of personal redemption. The star in the sky was a recurring motif in the tales written by Denny O’Neil.

Interestingly, despite the use of the term Christmas falling out of popular usage in the US media in deference to the more inclusive “Holidays” starting in the early 1980s, there has been little attempt to incorporate other religious festivals into stories. Out of the 246-plus original stories involving the Holidays in DC hero-comics since 1939, I counted only 14 instances of Hanukkah being referenced, and I found no stories built around any of the other religious festivals.

For those of you who like statistics, the most popular Christmas story (measured by the number of reprints) has been Batman “Christmas”, first published in Batman #9 (with no festive cover, but a classic cover nonetheless), having been reprinted at least 11 times. Filling out the top 3 spots are “The Silent Night of the Batman” (7-plus reprints) and “The TT’s Swingin’ Christmas Carol” (7-plus reprints).

Batman has appeared in more Christmas stories than any other hero, leading with 38 stories, followed by Superman at 15, with the Teen Titans at 9 and Flash at 8. Whether this preference for Batman as the bringer of Christmas cheer was down to the influence of Denny O’Neil, or simply that Batman is the most earth-bound hero, is open to conjecture.

Story titles across the years have been invariably plays on well-known Christmas phrases or repurposing of well know Carol titles, or nods to classic literature.

A good story appears perhaps once in a decade. To paraphrase Slade’s Christmas hit from 1973 “…..The Old Ones are the Best”.

“Merry Christmas Everybody!”

Tuesday, December 7, 2021

Comedians in Comics

Well, sorry for the delay, going through the whole of November without a SuperStuff post, but am hoping to make it up this month.

Anyway, I thought I’d take a closer look at a comic that had always intrigued me, but never had. I’m not sure if Thorpe & Porter ever put it on our spinner racks in the UK. The comic in question is "Jerry Lewis meets Batman". (The Adventures of Jerry Lewis #97). I didn’t even know who Jerry Lewis was back in 1966. To me this seemed to be a bizarre edition of The Brave & The Bold.

The cover is credited to Bob Oskner, but appears to incorporate a swipe of Dick Sprang’s rendition of the Joker’s face, with perhaps also a swipe of Batman & Robin drawn by Carmine Infantino and Joe Giella. It also seems to incorporate an homage of sorts to Goldfinger with the laser beam cutting through Jerry’s sun-bed.

Finally reading the comic today, it is a bit of harmless fun with Batman and Robin goofing around with Jerry Lewis. The renditions of the Dynamic Duo by Bob Oskner are an improvement over the work being ghosted by Sheldon Moldoff on the official Batman comic at the same time, but there is a lot of evidence that no-one from the Batman/Detective creative team had informed Oskner of elements of the "New Look" introduced two years earlier in 1964. The renditions of the Batmobile and Joker are right out of Dick Sprang's 1950s comics. Also of note is that there is no “Bob Kane” logo on the splash page, which illustrates a scene not to be found in the comic itself, with Jerry Lewis being tied to the clapper inside the bell in a tower.

The reason for this scene is an allusion to the Batman TV episode “The Bookworm Turns (April 20th 1966) which had appeared earlier that year, and incorporated Jerry Lewis in a cameo turn during a "Bat-Climb". (In the TV episode, it is Robin who is tied to the clapper in a clocktower bell. )

Reading this nonsense, it made me realize that there used to exist a whole sub-genre of comics, with a well-known comedian as the protagonist, that appears to be no longer with us.

But it got me thinking? How did comedians get into comics? And where are comics featuring comedians today?

So why did this trend start? As the old joke goes

"What is the secret of successful comedy?"
"T-T-T-timing!"

DC was late to pick up the potential for "comics in comics", and it was only the pressure from the anti-horror lobby that drove DC to look for other subject matter to divert criticism of their superhero line. In the early 1950s, with sales for superhero themed comics on the decline, National Periodical Publications began licensing the right to use celebrity images. Family favourite Bob Hope was tapped for a series which was to run for 109 issues from 1950 through 1968. Bob's wisecracking, yet nervous (but ultimately heroic) persona was deemed ideal for the medium. Shortly afterwards comics appeared featuring Jerry Lewis and Dean Martin, to be followed by comics of Phil Silvers and Jackie Gleason, amongst others. They enjoyed robust success throughout the 1950s.

The comedians featured were famous for slapstick and one-liners. All white men. They were of a generation that had embodied the strong tradition of comedians crossing over from vaudeville.

But as the 1960s got underway, public taste in comedians was changing, as was the age and taste of DC's comic book writers. Stand-up comedians were now the rage, with an edgier set of material and a strong appeal to the college set.

And so in 1967 DC tried-out a comic featuring a young stand-up, Woody Allen. The comic was Showcase #71 - a Maniaks try-out featuring a story about Woody Allen putting on a Civil War musical, written by young DC staffer E Nelson Bridwell.

Back in 1967, Woody Allen was a break-out star in movies, not only appearing in films Casino Royale and What’s New Pussycat, but was also heavily involved in writing the scripts. His appeal was of a brash New York humour revered by the pop culture intelligentsia, far removed from the comedians of prior generations. An acceptable Lenny Bruce.

As anyone who is familiar with Woody Allen’s standup routine of the early sixties as recorded on Long-Playing LPs will attest, his wandering monologues get seared into your brain, as they were no doubt by young writer E Nelson Bridwell. But material that is very funny when delivered in front of a crowd can become very laboured in the written form, and more so on the comic page. Bridwell even went so far as to include the "My parents bought me a dog. It was an ant. I called him Spot" story, but it comes across as pretty flat as rendered by Mike Sekowsky.

The comic died a death, and neither Maniaks nor Woody Allen appeared in another Showcase. DC did not try again, and quietly left their humour line to decline until it was quietly cancelled between 1971 and 1972. Don Rickles, the stand-up "insult" comic made a brief appearance in Jimmy Olsen #141, and that was it. Neal Adams was to draw the final 4 Jerry Lewis comics.

Humour comics resurfaced subsequently in comics targeted at the young crowd, usually as a TV tie-in to a family-friendly comedy or cartoon. More recently celebrities Stephen Colbert, David Letterman and Sarah Silverman have appeared as guest stars in the books of others, but It is difficult to image a DC comic today led by current stand-ups like Bill Burr or Patton Oswalt.

Will we see the re-surgence of comedians in the comics in the future?