Superboy and the Legion of Super-Heroes (1977) #246

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It’s half an excellent issue. The first story is a big success, an And Then There Were None type mystery set at a research hospital on Mercury. It’s the done-in-one feature. The second story’s a little shorter, but with the cliffhanger. Unfortunately, it’s also kind of bad. The writing’s not terrible, but the art falls apart during the big fight scene, and the story can’t recover. The pacing’s all off.

What’s strange is both stories have half the same art team; Joe Staton pencils the feature, and he pencils the backup. Only on the feature, he’s got Dick Giordano inking, which makes the art look nearer Gil Kane or Carmine Infantino than anything else, and quite good. The expressions on Phantom Girl are terrible, but otherwise, the art’s aces. On the backup, Murphy Anderson inks Staton. While Anderson’s inks aren’t Giordano’s by any stretch, they’re better than last time. But once the action starts, Staton’s layouts start crapping out, and Anderson’s inks aren’t any help. It’s fascinating to see the two examples of different inkers consecutively, but it would’ve been much better if Giordano had inked both stories.

Paul Levitz gets a credit on both: the feature’s plot and the backup’s script. Len Wein scripts the feature. It’s a good mystery with a solid sense of humor. It opens with a mini-mystery—the Legion lost track of Karate Kid after the previous issue’s big battle, and it turns out he’s in the medical lab on Mercury. Except people only go there when they’ve got a terminal disease. It’s unclear why the lab is on Mercury—the doctors are insect people who aren’t native to the planet—so maybe part of the research involves saunas.

After the heroes discover what Karate Kid’s actually doing there, one of the doctors asks if they can investigate missing persons. Insects, actually. It becomes an engaging mix of mystery and action, with the solution not entirely unexpected but well-told. Wein’s got great pacing and does an excellent job with the investigating without feeding the reader red herring. There are actual good clues throughout.

It’s an impressive story; as I was reading it, I kept hoping it’d somehow go on for the whole issue, even though a cover blurb promised the backup. So I hoped they’d have Giordano inking on it too.

Nope.

The second story is about how Legion villains The Fatal Five accidentally reformed and started shepherding a developing planet. Naturally, they want to join the Federation or the Union or whatever it’s called. Except no one trusts them because they call themselves the Fatal Five, so the Legion has to go investigate this new planet.

Superboy leads the team.

Levitz also structures it as something of a mystery, but not as well as Levitz does in the feature; the two stories contrast on multiple levels.

There’s an okay reveal (kind of out of “Star Trek”) and then a big action scene. The action’s not good. It’s also a dramatically inert action sequence and probably reductive (we won’t find out until next issue).

So half a good comic. But, wow, what a good first half.

Superboy and the Legion of Super-Heroes (1977) #245

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Maybe I need to be more invested in the big villain reveal—it’s Mordru, who’s some kind of space wizard who the Legion always foils. He talks a lot and has no weaknesses other than being buried underground. Only four Legionnaires are left to take him on—Superboy, Karate Kid, Lightning Lad, and Saturn Girl. Last issue, I thought Saturn Girl was the science police officer who’d been trying to warn everyone; nope. That officer never comes back in the issue, so no one has to learn to listen to lady science cops.

The four heroes have to figure out how to beat Mordru, who’s commanding an invading army of a million Khurds on Earth. Mordru’s mind control powers seem limitless, with a couple of pages dedicated to recapping how he was controlling x, y, and z in the last five or six issues of Superboy and the Legion. He’s just an infinitely powerful villain. There’s nothing else to him. His goal is just to destroy Earth for revenge against the Legion. It’s not particularly interesting.

After their initial escape, Superboy gets temporarily brainwashed—that magic weakness—and there’s a fight scene with Karate Kid. It’s pretty silly. I don’t know if it’s because of Karate Kid’s giant lapels or the tropical island setting, but it’s not particularly exciting. Then the superheroes’ plan for taking on Mordru is also visually wanting. They’ve got to free the entire captive Legion… it might just be the mix of Staton and Anderson. Maybe the visuals would be better with different inking, but also maybe not.

There’s not a lot of dramatic weight to the story. Of course, in the background, there’s still the intergalactic peace process or whatever, but it’s not part of the main story. It’s like writer Paul Levitz ran out of creative angles for the story and instead did a superhero team versus villain story.

The epilogue’s got a significant potential development for the Legion going forward, but it’s mostly just an excuse for Staton and Anderson to draw the whole team together, which isn’t visually impressive. That exceptionally minor charm Staton’s art had in the previous issue must’ve been because of the Joe Giella inks. Does Anderson sap the energy, or is there just no energy to such a lackluster conclusion?

It’s hard to go from future sci-fi superhero war comic to just a wizard.

Though, again, maybe it’s different if you’re invested in Mordru. But Levitz doesn’t do anything to suggest one ought to be either.

Eh.

Superman (1939) #242

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The Pseudo-Superman story comes to its close with Superman choosing to be de-powered. It’s a strange move, since he’s still really, really powerful. Maybe not Silver Age powerful, but he hadn’t really been doing those feats during the rest of the issues… it’s a little confusing. It’s an effective scene, but it doesn’t hold up under much scrutiny.

Similarly, Superman’s decision to fight Pseudo-Superman to the death… again, shouldn’t he have tried to work something out with him.

It’s a good close though. O’Neil fits tons of story in–most of the issue focuses on these two bums slash crooks who “kidnap” an inter-dimensional being and use it to beat up Superman and terrorize the world in general. Some great art on those pages.

The beating up Superman scene is particularly rough to read, since it’s all so vicious.

The final scene’s a little anticlimactic though.

Superman (1939) #241

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I guess Wonder Woman wasn’t much of a draw back in the early 1970s because her guest appearance is a surprise (there’s no mention on the cover) and she’s practically in the issue more than Superman.

Following up on Superman’s epiphany from the previous issue (he’d prefer to live a normal life), Wonder Woman’s Indian sidekick convinces him otherwise. It’s only a couple pages, but it’s effective, maybe because O’Neil’s dialogue for Superman is so desperate.

But then there’s the subsequent problem (where Wonder Woman takes over). Superman has super-brain damage and is acting like a (well-intentioned) goofball. It’s almost like they have him do Silver Age things, then deal with the “real world” consequences.

The sand double gets a solid explanation here, along with a goofy name: Pseudo-Superman.

The reprint back-ups are cute, but out of place for the serious–if humorously handled–feature story.

Superman (1939) #238

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Superman finally decides he can’t go around on half-power–but there’s a great butt shot from Swan on the first page for the ladies when he’s leaping instead of flying–at the end of the issue. His sand-double has been sucking his powers away and worse, the sand-double isn’t willing to help as Superman has to save the planet.

It’s kind of a neat way to agitate a situation (it starts as a ransom demand, but then there’s the atom bomb being dropped into the earth’s core) and O’Neil’s of the crisis is excellent. His devices to distract from Superman when Superman’s off page getting his plan together… not so excellent. They’re okay, but basically just standard “Where is Superman?” scenes with the supporting cast.

The back-up Krypton story has nice art from Gray Morrow, but it’s a lame Adam and Eve as sci-fi story.

Superman (1939) #237

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Here’s a packed issue. Superman even comments on it–he rescues a rocket, Lois crashes, there are killer ants, his sand-double is around, he’s a carrier of some strange space bug–it goes on and on. O’Neil fits it all in with barely any room for anything else. Only when Superman decides he’s going to leave Earth (it takes him a panel, not an interconnected eight issue story arc), does the story take a breather.

There’s a particular moment, with Superman sitting out in space, waiting, basically, for Lois to die. He’s sacrificing her for the greater good (fear of infecting the rest of the planet with the space bug). It’s a very strange moment, because Superman’s given up. The solution appears, deus ex machina, to Superman; he doesn’t even try to save Lois.

Add in Swan’s odd head shots (they all look taped on) and the issue’s problematic.

Superman (1939) #235

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The issue ends with Superman in Metropolis Stadium attempting a heart-to-heart with his sand-double. It’s a really awkward moment, since the Colosseum’s full of people. O’Neil doesn’t get a single reaction shot in this sequence, after getting them in an opening action sequence at the Colosseum. It’s off. I mean, Lois should have a reaction, shouldn’t she?

There are other weak points to this issue–Morgan Edge being the J. Jonah Jameson of the DC Universe is problematic, regardless of if he’s just stooging for Darkseid–but there’s a lot of good stuff too, like Superman waving at a crowd of people to say hi to Lois. Or just O’Neil’s plotting, which allows for these nice action sequences without them taking over the entire issue before the big finale.

It’s solid, unspectacular.

O’Neil’s Superman seems way too nonplussed too, given the sand-double and losing his powers.

Superman (1939) #234

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Ok, here’s where it’s a little hokey. Both stories actually (there’s another history of Krypton back-up, which has a goofy villain reveal at the end). O’Neil has Superman trying to stop a volcano, but he doesn’t want to trespass on the land to do so. While I kind of get O’Neil making it “real,” he also makes it absurd. The villain’s the landowner who’s shooting his fleeing employees… pretty sure, even in 1971, you weren’t allowed to murder disobedient employees.

Otherwise, it’s a solid enough story. The sand-Superman is really creepy, Superman worrying about doing his newscast while fighting the volcano is amusing (though there’s a big plot hole when he talks, as Superman, and he’s still got his news commentary microphone on).

Nice artwork. Lots of thought balloons again, this time explaining how Superman’s thought process for combating the volcano.

Unfortunately, the back-up’s pretty weak overall.

Superman (1939) #233

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What a pleasure it is to read a Superman comic book where he’s not supposed to be perpetually thirty-one or whatever goofy age DC pins on him. The more mature Clark Kent, here becoming a television personality as the Daily Planet goes through changes, brings something else to the comic. I hate to sound like Joe Quesada, but a married Superman has different sensibilities.

The superhero antics–opening with a Kryptonite event–are a lot less sensational than the modern comics–it’s Superman versus gangsters. Gangsters in jets, but gangsters. The real boon to these scenes is the artwork. Curt Swan’s action sequences are fantastic. Even with O’Neil’s tight script–somehow, he gives Superman a lot of thought balloons but never makes them overbearing–it’s Swan who makes the issue feel like an experience.

And then there’s even a cute backup story featuring Jor-El and Lara getting together.