Review of Revelry, By Johnathan

Hallowe'en is done, and I was so cool. As I may have hinted to some people out there (unless I hinted that I was going to be Parade Hater Horace), I went as Matter-Eater Lad. Here's the best picture I was able to produce with my feeble little webcam:

Legions of all worlds must bow to the awesome power of my mighty jaws!

Luckily, Rachelle over at Living Between Wednesdays was at the same party as my matter-eating self, so there are much better photo-recordings of the costume here. Please note the awesomeness of the other costumes in attendance, including a mysterious and amazing Captain Cold.

And she let me steal one away to post here! Drunken Matter-Eater Lad meets the Flash! Later, the Flash played drums in a game of Rock Band! Truly an awesome spectacle.

Those boots are the reason I didn't post anything last week, by the way. The rest of the costume was sewn up by my homework-avoiding roommate over the course of an evening (I was totally okay with this. The costume would not have been half as good if I had done it) but those damn boots required a buttload of hand-sewing. I'm going to eat those things.

Hallowe'en? JOHN APPROVED,

Super-Human Detritus of the Thirtieth Century: Review of Green Guy and Camera Eye, by Johnathan

I have listened to the will of the people, and just under half of them want to hear about some future-losers with super-powers. This poll thing seems to be working all right, so I'll be keeping it up for a while - not necessarily in any consistent format, mind you.

Today we'll look at a couple of guys from way, way back in the day (Adventure Comics No. 307, that's how way). I've been kind of putting off discussing them for a while now, not because they're not rich and fascinating topics for online pontification but because they've only got one panel of action - their combined in-continuity adventures span one-third of one page. Thankfully, on further investigation I found that a full two-thirds of the page in question was suitable for discussion, so the Internet will get to hear my opinions after all!

Here's the Legion, fresh from an encounter with the arch-pirate Roxxas, who has been flying around with his band of cutthroats stealing simply everything in sight - seriously, he goes to one planet and basically ends up making off with all of their light bulbs. The Legionnaires are concerned that they don't have the numbers to take on this murderous, awful, bloodthirsty crew, so they hit upon the idea of signing up a few new recruits, presumably as cannon fodder. Note that Invisible Kid is wearing that same black-hair-and-yellow-jumpsuit number that he was sporting during the Dynamo Kid audition. Colouring error or early-onset midlife crisis ("Bright colours - bright colours are young, right? And... and I'll dye my hair black! Get a sporty hover-car, a sexy Durlan ladyfriend - nobody'll ever guess that I'm an old man of seventeen.)?

Having neglected to give a name, this youngster is variously identified as Green Boy, Green Guy and possibly Green Lad. Me, I figure that anyone who bothers to inject himself with chemicals until he gets a side-effect that qualifies as a super-power just (I assume) so's he can apply for a club is going to think up something a bit more grandiose than that. Lime Lad? Emerald Ed? Ral Kint, the Chlorochromaticistic Kid? Guess we'll never know, though, so I'm going with Green Guy, 'cause it's short and I like alliteration.

Green Guy might - just might - be the most delusional person ever to walk away from Legion HQ with a consolation flight belt. He's at least in the running beside Rann Antar. Check him out: from the explanation that he has just given I am lead to believe that his powers affect only the world around him. I mean, he's not turning green, that's for sure. So a) why the hell is he decked out in blue and orange when a quick trip to the Army/Navy Surplus (Stormtrooper/Spacefleet Surplus) could at least lend a little weight to his argument and b) how the hell is that any use in camouflage? Even on a world with green foliage, wouldn't that field of greenifying rays just make him easier to spot? He'd just be this blue-and-orange figure at the centre of a blobby field of green. Boo, Green Guy, boo. You're lucky that Sun Boy was feeling uncharacteristically kind and let you down easy with that "Different planets have different leaves." excuse. On any other tryout day he'd just roar "REJECTED!" and set your hair on fire.

NOT APPROVED

Next up is Camera Eye (again, best guess on the name), a comparatively normal youth. Amusingly, he is green. Man, I got so worked up about Green Guy that I'm a bit spent on the old "Making fun of guys" front. Okay, here goes: Camera Eye, you'd have maybe the barest hint of a chance of getting into the Legion as some sort of living sex-tape maker or something if you weren't such a liar. At the risk of sounding like exactly the kind of pedantic nerd that I am: when the hell did Superboy ever meet Bizarro? Never, that's when, you liar. Oh, he met Bizarro Superboy, sure, but that's clearly a bizarro Superman up there. Go on home, Camera Eye. Go home and watch videos of yourself crying in the mirror. Jerk.

Nice shirt, though. Still, NOT APPROVED.

And I just threw this one in because Element Lad's costume looks pretty nifty with that question mark on it. And the lad himself looks particularly elfin, I must say. Also: surprisingly jaunty for someone who recently became the only one of his kind.

Away!

Super-Human Detritus of the Thirtieth Century: Review of Porcupine Pete, By Johnathan

Ah, Porcupine Pete. Not the first Legion applicant to have a stupid name but probably the one with the stupid-est name. Also, and this might just be where I'm from talking, but he's asking for a face full of .22 if Old Man Strong catches him anywhere near his spruce trees.


Pete has a few too many appearances for me to get around to sampling pictures from before the very sun goes cold and dark, so we'll just be looking at his very first appearance. Here he is, discussing his soon-to-be-crushed hopes and dreams with the well-dressed Molecular Master and the simply dreamy Infectious Lass. Take a good look: Porcupine Pete is also the ugliest person ever to apply for the Legion, and it's not because he's a member of some weird alien race or something - according to the Legion edition of Who's Who, he's just some kid who grew spikes as he got older. That's right: that's down home human ugliness there, no cultural sensitivity required.


I think that they used this setup exclusively for the purpose of judging applicants, and no wonder the poor schmoes didn't do so well. Keeping in mind that these are teenagers, can you even imagine walking into that place, with a semicircle of hot dudes and cute girls looming over you, and Superboy, straight out of history, dead centre and judging, judging, judging. Frankly, I'm surprised that there aren't many of these tryout stories that end with someone in the foetal position.


I have to admit: this is a good panel. Pete's costume isn't too bad - it at least makes sense that it's skimpy - and the sheer enthusiasm that he's displaying as he hoses the room down with quills is very endearing. He's going all out, folks. They'll be picking these things out of the upholstery for months. Plus, the more I think about it the more I like the idea of a superhero with a blast radius. Ooo! Porcupine Pete, the Human Bomb and that one exploding guy from the Blasters should team up! All they'd need is a spare JLA teleporter and they could be the most effective super-team in existence:

Kobra Minion 1: "Okay, the death-ray's finished, hail Kobra."

Kobra Minion 2: "Nuclear generator online, hail Kobra."

Kobra Minion 3: "Targeting Atlanta, hail Kobra. Hey, after this do you guys want to go get some wings or something, hail Kobra?"

*Fwazap*

Kobra Minion 2: "Hey, where did those three guys come fro-"

BAROOM *sound of many quills puncturing frail snake-fetishists* KRAPPOW!

Porcupine Pete: "Case closed." *lights quill-shaped cigar using Kobra Minion 1's flaming femur*


Sadly, the Legion doesn't see the potential inherent in having a guy like Porcupine Pete around, and yet another fragile ego is crushed beneath Superboy's bellows of "Rejected!" To me, this seems like another time that the whole thing where Karate Kid got in by beating up Superboy should be brought up. I mean, Supes isn't flinching but making the entire rest of the Legion dive for cover has to be worth something, right?

Ah, well. There's a bit of a happy ending, in that Pete joined the Legion of Substitute Heroes and even ended up leading them on the Legion cartoon, so his legend lives on.

JOHN APPROVED, Pete, JOHN APPROVED

PS: check out the poll on the sidebar. Just as an experiment, I'm looking to get some input from you wunnerful folks. What do you like, hey? Let me know and by crackers I'll do it.

At Long Last, the Highly Anticipated Review of the Human Flame, By Johnathan

Haw haw haw! Time to put all the naysayers to shame! I will review the Human Flame, and not on my deathbed, unless of course it turns out that this chair reclines more and also I end up dying in it.

Dateline: Detective Comics No. 274, December 1959. On the cover, some crazy old dude shoots lightning at Batman - I haven't read the story yet, but I'll bet that he's got some sort of ingenious robbery-related hoax under his belt... yep, turns out. At the back, nestled behind Roy Raymond and Casey the Cop, we find a Martian Manhunter yarn entitled:


Now, this is not a fascinating tale. Nor is it exceptionally ridiculous, Silver Age or not, so no exhaustively broken-down plot for you. Instead, here are the highlights:

1. The Villain:


The Human Flame does not get off to a grand start, frankly. Purple is not a terrific colour for a flame-themed dude, and white is not a fantastic choice for a secondary colour. The goggles are good, but I only forgave Firestorm his puffy sleeves because his head was on fire, so those are out too.

2: The Plot:


Still, after seeing so many super-humans running around with astonishingly complicated facial hair, there's something (retroactively) refreshing about a simple moustache. While Ra's al-Ghul spends his mornings trimming individual chin-hairs and Green Arrow takes an extra half hour before bed to get his beard-curlers just right, ol' Mike there is getting the full night's sleep that he needs in order to plan really effective crime sprees. Though I suppose that if he had no facial hair at all he might have slept just a bit more and been clearheaded enough to consider pulling crimes in a town that wasn't infested with costumed crime-fighters.

The blonde guy is interesting, by the way. I can't decide if he counts at the Flame's partner, as his lone henchman or as a good friend that he brings along to keep him company on crime sprees.

3: Crime!


Let it not be said that the human Flame is a one-trick pony, no sir. In addition to having flame-thrower nipples on his suit, he has special energy-projecting nipples as well (urgh... I just had a disturbing thought: what if the purple on his costume is an attempt to simulate nipple colour? Fond as I am of the things, I find myself staunchly opposed to their use as a costume theme).

Where is all of the power and fuel for these nipples coming from, anyway? Mike's handing out some serious punishment with these things, and sure doesn't look like a wee lad. I suppose that he might have forgotten to eat a few meals whilst focusing on crime-suit construction - maybe he lost enough weight to stuff a propane tank and a 12-volt battery under each armpit? Or maybe he managed to create some ammo-less weaponry that he should have sold to the military for big bux instead of robbing armoured cars?

4: A Mighty Wind:


"Gosh, Martian Manhunter! Thanks for saving our armored car from those crooks! It sure would have been a shame if they'd managed to steal all of these Faberge eggs and Ming vases! Someday, you'll have to tell us how you ever saved out incredibly fragile cargo from that multi-nippled madman! Welp, we're off to the museum - thanks again!"

Not that being able to blow an armoured car around isn't great. I'm just sayin'.

Here's where the Human Flame gets his big shot:

5: Is this the End?


6. Seriously, is it?


Well! Not only has Mike triumphed, but he's completely vaporized J'onn J'onzz! And similar sarcastic remarks. In all fairness, The Manhunter hasn't been operating openly for long, so Mike might not know about the fact that he can turn invisible. Of course, he could just be an idiot.

7. Landscaping:


Turns out, he's an idiot. But, as this panel illustrates so clearly, he's an idiot that can shoot fire from his many nipples, which at least puts him a special category of idiot along with 60 or 70 percent of his fellow Silver Age villains.

8: Flying Free:


a) That's really cohesive sod.
b) Seems like Mike and friend would have trouble breathing up there.
c) That's a horrible way to get around. The neck cramps alone...

9: Clean Up After Yourself:


You know, I just have to assume that the Manhunter is putting that sod back because (holy crap, look at the huge chin on that policeman!) this comic came out in the early days of the Comics Code. Which is good, because society would have crumbled by now if our super-hero role models hadn't shown proper concern for lawn maintenance.

Now, Mike ends up doing some time for this one, leading me to believe that he had a terrible lawyer (heck, maybe it was the blonde guy). Eight years for foring a weapon that there likely isn't any legislation on (this is the electric nipple I'm talking about) and then getting into a very brief scrap with someone who is demonstrably non-human and therefore not technically covered by the law? Sheesh, for any decent shyster this should have been a piece of cake. Perhaps the DCU wised up early and there are tough super-villain laws on the books as of Mike's trial? Don't know.

One last thought: you know how in a movie or tv show when there's a guy wielding a camcorder or whatever he's frequently characterized as a total dick, like the act of filming constantly, especially in a moment of tragedy, is a sign of a bad human being? Well, upon reading Final Crisis No. 1 I realized this: it's a hundred times worse if you're doing it with a cell phone.


Great Stars! The Human Flame is NOT APPROVED

Review of Even More Martians Manhunter, By Johnathan

Howdy, y’all! The grand crossover that is Martian Manhunter Week continueth! Today, we’re going to keep on looking at alternate versions of J’onn J’onzz, Manhunter from Mars. Fair warning: there’s a chance of spoilers for the stories that these guys come from, though I’m going to try to focus on the green men rather than the plots surrounding them.


Here’s another look at J’onn in his natural state, oddly shiny and blasting eye-beams all over the place. Wotta guy, huh?


Sadly, this isn’t the J’onn J’onzz of Earth-X-Men-Movie or something, this is what he’s been wearing since Infinite Crisis or so. I’m not sure quite why I dislike this costume so much. I definitely favour heroes who wear a complete outfit instead of running around in their underwear, so that’s not it. Plus, I really like collars like the one that he’s sporting there, and this costume does a good job of incorporating elements from the classic Manhunter getup. I think that it might be the radical shift in the balance of colours in the outfit as a whole: green with some red and blue looks nice, while blue with some red and green looks bleh. NOT APPROVED.


This is a fun one from a yarn called JLA: Riddle of the Beast that I haven’t actually read yet but which I understand to be the Justice League set in a fantasy world, one of the ones with goblins and such everywhere. From what I’ve gathered, he’s all hermitish and creepy, which is fun. And I always like it when non-humans don’t look completely human, so JOHN APPROVED.


So at one point, someone decided that they’d heard enough bitching and moaning about how a fear of fire was a stupid weakness for Martians to have and decided to justify it. The route they took was the same one that was ultimately used to explain the Green Lantern weakness to yellow. To whit: “It’s because of a monster! In the power battery!” Or in this case, in the Martian genome. Turns out that J’onn is descended from a race of flaming warmongers, and that the Guardians of the Universe did something to make them the nice green chaps that we know and love to this day, and that the fear of fire thing serves to seal the deal. So, when J’onn eventually conquers his pyrophobia, FAZAM! He becomes a giant, burning asshole named Fernus. It’s kind of a neat story, I suppose, but I mostly threw it in here because of that cover, one of my favourites ever. Go, Plastic Man, go! JOHN APPROVED.

Act of God was a neat idea for an Elseworld – one day, everyone on Earth who has super-powers loses them, and the world needs to adjust to this. Two big problems crop up pretty quickly: first, everyone who used technology to pull or fight crimes is unaffected, so there are a lot of guys like Captain Cold and Lex Luthor still running around causing trouble. Secondly, some of the former heroes find themselves unable to adjust to being unable to zap evil with their eyes and whatnot. In order to more effectively combat the former group, several members of the latter went to Batman and received training in vigilanteism. I’ll let our pal introduce himself:

“J’onn J’onzz, formerly the Martian Manhunter, now the Green Man – detective and martial arts skills, shock-value appearance, and a full range of multipurpose skull grenades.”


I don’t think that the 'multipurpose' part of the skull grenades was explored very thoroughly, beyond "You can put them down on the ground and they explode later, or you can throw them and they explode now." Regardless, they're pretty cool. As is J'onn, actually. Let's watch:


Possibly my favourite thing about this whole exercise was the effort that was put into creating new identities for the powerless heroes, without just saying "Okay, this is the new Aquaman, and since he can't breathe underwater any more, he'll be using a SCUBA rig. And the Flash takes a lot of speed." Yay, Green Man! JOHN APPROVED.

Okay, a bit of setup for the next one: J'onn J'onzz was once affiliated with the Justice League Task Force, which was a... task force made up of various members of the Justice League. At one point, this task force was off on a mission to a place full of alien Amazons. The team that was going on that mission consisted of a bunch of women and J'onn, and they convinced him that he would stick out like a sore something if he was the only guy in the whole damn place. And so, after much writerly effort and justification...


Joan J'onzz was born! Yikes, right? I mean, there are certain parts of my brain that are responding in a traditional ape-man fashion, but for once they are being shouted down by the peanut gallery that is the nerdy portion of my psyche. I have questions, Joan.

Okay, first question: what's with the costume? I mean, I appreciate the effort that you went to to shapeshift the classic elements of your regular costume (oh, ew. I just realized that the Manhunter's cape is almost certainly a part of him, like a curtain made of skin or something. *shudder*) into something that will cover up girl-parts, but... but you can do more than just cover them. The x-bra thing I can see - it's just too clever a modification not to use - but why the hell would you give yourself a thong, with what looks like a bit of camel-toe? Have you just been hanging around with lady super-heroes too much?


Secondly, and again this might have its roots in the fact that you hang around with people like Maxima all the time, why the hell do you look like that? I mean, I can understand wanting to look good, but disregarding the juvenile sexual aspect of the whole thing (and J'onn J'onzz is generally as asexual as a beet), what the hell is the point of having breasts the size of your head? Are you planning on hiding behind them in battle? Did you have a lot of extra mass to use up? Gah. Martians today...


Man, this cover is pure bondage cheesecake, but it's so blatant about it that it's almost admirable. Still and all, J'onn's gender-bending is too mind-bending and gets a stern NOT APPROVED.


Oh, man. Justice Riders. This one's easy to explain: the JLA in the Old West vs. Maxwell Lord as a corrupt rail baron. Not too much to say about this incarnation of the Manhunter, except that it was fun and well-characterized - like the whole book, really. Oh, and he had a great line when he first joined the team:


Man, if he had only said "I reckon." at the end, it would have been perfect. Still, JOHN APPROVED.

This next one's from early in the Grant Morrison run of JLA. Superman and the Martian Manhunter are trapped in a maze that is being generated by the Joker's mind and J'onn's solution is to, well:


I just threw this one in because it was a really neat solution to the problem, and the Manhunter looks great with that grin plastered across his normally-stoic face.


It's also really creepy when he starts adding little "ha ha ha"s to every sentence. It's not even like he's finding anything amusing, it's just an eerie little vocal tic that comes with the Joker-brain. Brrr. JOHN APPROVED.


Not that I looked very hard, but this is one of the few pictures that I found of J'onn in his native form (and on his native planet). Everyone's so pointy! JOHN APPROVED.


From JLA: The Island of Doctor Moreau. Fairly straightforward: what if Dr. Moreau had turned various animals into analogues of the Justice League and they hunted down Jack the Ripper? J'onn is Komodo, the lizard-man, 'cos he's green. It was an interesting premise, but a bit stretched. I think that the lion with electric eels attached to his arm was supposed to be Superman maybe, and that's a head-scratcher.


Still, it's rare to see someone fill out a singlet like that nowadays.

JOHN APPROVED.


This is just Kyle Raynor, trapped in J'onn's body and unable to control it fully. He's all melty.

NOT APPROVED.


Ah, the Legion appearance. J'onn showed up while Mysa Nal, the White Witch, was going on some grand spirit-quest in an attempt to reclaim her powers after they were sapped by a painful divorce (this is what happens when you marry the most evil sorcerer ever, ladies). I never quite got why he was so interested in helping her, but it was nice to see 20th Century/30th Century interaction again.


Okay, so J'onn wasn't exactly 20th Century anymore, what with his having lived through the intervening years and all, but you get the idea.

He looks like he's been bumming around the galaxy for a thousand years, doesn't he? The word is "weatherbeaten", kids.

I actually thought that I'd have more to say about this one. It was a good time, I suppose, even if nobody took J'onn's advice.


He's as quick on the uptake as ever, folks!

JOHN APPROVED.


Okay, this one is weird. It's from All Access, a spin-off of the Marvel/DC Amalgam Comics collaboration. Now, I really enjoyed that whole event, what with the neato combinations of characters and so forth. Imagine my consternation, though, when I looked up J'onn's role in the proceedings and found that he had made only a one-panel appearance, merged with Phoenix and not even rocking a punny new name. Boo! Boo I say! Look, I'll make one up right now: J'onn Sampson, the Martian Hulkbuster. See? It's easy, Amalgam writers. NOT APPROVED.

(Aw, poo. It turns out that Mister X of the JLX comic was Manhunter, too - I just hadn't been looking in the right places [and god forbid I should go to the trouble of reading the comics again]. Well, live and learn, I say. I'll just change this one to JOHN APPROVED, hey? Wait, no... that amalgam's still hideous. Still NOT APPROVED)


The great hope for present-day Martian Manhunter to be alive: future Martian Manhunter! From Martian Manhunter 1 000 000, this is J'onn after 800 000 years or so of life, with all kinds of scraps and adventures and so forth having happened in the interim. Eventually he ended up as part of the since-terraformed planet Mars and got to make giant heads like this to impress Kyle when he came to visit. I liked this one - it was a good yarn, and J'onn looks good made of dirt.

JOHN APPROVED.

From the JLA/Young Justice crossover Sins of Youth:


Klarion the Witch-Boy has pulled some mystic mumbo-jumbo on the assembled heroes of Earth, making the adults youngsters and vice-versa. According to a text page somewhere in the comic, the de-aged Manhunter is known as the Martian Kidhunter, which actually sounds a bit creepy (though not as much, I just realized, as the Martian Boyhunter would).


Aside from the fact that his boots are too big and that he hasn't yet learned how to make a nose, the Kidhunter isn't too different from the Manhunter, which is a shame. I guess that by virtue of the fact that he was super-serious all the time whilst in the Morrison-to-Infinite Crisis JLA, J'onn was cast as the quiet, responsible type of kid that I'm sorry to say that I might have been at one point. Meh. The above scene was neat, though, with the pint-sized JSA and JLA rampaging around in the old Justice League cave HQ while grown-up Stargirl tried to keep them in check. JOHN APPROVED.


Another one I haven't read yet, a JLA special called Primeval. I include it here because that green blob at the back is everyone's fave Martian Manhunter, J'onn J'onzz, all devolved and this is more the sort of thing that I was hoping to see him become in JLApe. JOHN APPROVED. (the cute little devolved Zauriel at the top of the panel is also JOHN APPROVED!)

From the Elseworlds 80-Page Giant:


I love "Slim Green Lord of Glam Rock" as an alternative to "Martian Manhunter". I'm going to try to use it more often in casual, Martian-related conversation. That mullet, however, is a hundred million times more horrifying than Superman's ever was. NOT APPROVED.

That's pretty much it, folks, though if you can think of some neato variation on the Manhunter that I missed, let me know. I'm going to wrap up with a look at some images from the Secret Origins version of J'onn's trip to Earth:


Okay, now that is an alien that could inspire a heart attack. Plus, he was apparently in a Martian mosh pit when he was teleported. I like Doc Erdel's goggles, but a flattop is no substitute for a gigantic walrus moustache.


Pathos!


The world tour from the original J'onn J'onzz origin tale was neat, but I like the newer version, as shown here, where he just watched a whole lot of TV. That's one of the reasons that he was such a great character in New Frontier, I think: the 1950s broadcast enthusiasm that he had about things and life and stuff.


And those are just the cutest couple of panels ever. JOHN APPROVED.

Good night, folks! I've got one more Manhunter-related post in the works - look for it soon.