Keith Giffen is Everywhere

Plucked from the longboxes is All Star Comics #62, from October 1976. The title had been, at this point, recently revived to carry the continuing adventures of the aging Justice Society of Earth-2.

I'm a little confused on the provenance of this issue, as I'm pretty certain I didn't read it in real time...in fact, it felt like the first time I was reading it last night. Over the years, I made a few trades with other collectors, freeing my collection of my unwanted Marvel titles and picking up some DC ones. I suppose that's how this issue came into my hands.

It was Gerry Conway who revived the JSA, and he helms the creative list here, credited for Plotting. Paul Levitz is down for "patter", Keith Giffen for "pacing" and Wally Wood for "pictures". So the creative team gets a point or two for alliteration...but ASC #62 is the issue that, for me, begs the question, just how old is Keith Giffen, anyway?

I was always more interested in characters than creators, as a young reader, and I suppose the first thing I think of his being involved with was the post-Crisis Legion I enjoyed so. His writing there and elsewhere felt young and fresh,and I suppose I assumed he was some new upstart. I had no idea he'd been in the business as far back as 1976!! (But no worries, Keith, I won't actually calculate an age here...folks can visit your Wikipedia entry and do the math for themselves!)

Anyway...the story is already underway here, and numerous threads to follow...but the team, newly reformed has the younger characters of the Star-Spangled Kid and Power Girl at the core of the team, formed of older members Hawkman, Flash, Green Lantern and Wildcat. Dr. Fate's been working with them too, but as this issue begins, he's in some sort of magically-induced coma.

So everyone's pretty pleased when Rex Tyler, AKA, Hourman dons his costume and shows up to offer his Miraclo power to the team. Of course, Rex is a little confused by all the changes time has brought to the team, especially as regards the new addition of something called a "power girl".

I love his snippy and respectable response to Hawkman's description of the new girl on the team.

Amusing to note that here, as seems to be so often the case in more recent years, the JSA Brownstone has been ruined...but we still get this great cut-away of the JSA sub-basement, still in perfect condition.

Unfortunately, Wildcat and Power Girl seem to be forever sniping at one another. Ted's a little miffed that Kara's able to make short work of their recent foes, and she doesn't leave him anyone much to punch.

Their somewhat good-natured in-fighting leaves Rex a little cold, since he remembers the glory days, when everyone seemed to get along, or at least set aside those differences to focus on the Axis threats of World War II.

Meanwhile...Sheira Hall is attacked by a man-monster who has escaped from a cube of amber which had been stored in Carter's private museum. The creature calls itself Zanadu (yes, with a Z...but you can still hear Olivia Newton-John in your head, can't you?) and while he kills an intruder in the library, Sheira he transports to some alternate dimension, leaving a shimmering silhouette of the two of them for Hawkman to discover and ponder.

Hawkman sounds the JSA alert, which interrupts the bickering of Wildcat and Power Girl...and also reaches the quiet offices of the Editor of the Daily Star, in Metropolis. Although retired, the latest edition of the paper has gone to press and the editor finds that he's free to respond to his former team-mates's call for help.

This is, of course, the Golden Age (original) Superman whose appearance at JSA headquarters pleases Wildcat, who's growing tired of the verbal sparring with Power Girl. Kal-L defends her and says he's heard she's been doing a great job...but Kara isn't interested in being patronized...and feels a little threatened by the appearance of her well-known cousin.

Part of Kara's trouble is that Kal can't stop saying things like this, which to her mind are a little exclusionary of her considerable talents and abilities.

Of course, it's this team in-fighting that distracts them from their battle with Zanadu, who seems to be able to overpower Kryptonians easily...and perhaps has taken possession of Wildcat with strange hypnotic music; Wildcat attacks Hawkman as this issue draws to a fast close.

The next issue box promises a battle between Kryptonians, among other things. I always wondered why Power Girl was characterized as such a grump when she was a member of Justice League Europe, especially since then she didn't remember that her home planet(s) had been destroyed. Now I realize she's always been a grumpy puss...and I understand that Giffen was just carrying on the tradition years later.

COMING SOON: Justice League Week!!!

Explosive First Issue

March 1978 brought this first issue of Firestorm the Nuclear Man to newstands everywhere. Here, Gerry Conway (listed as both writer and creator...but it's unclear, there's no penciller...did Conway draw as well? Anyone know?) introduces the first new DC superhero we had seen in some years.

Ronnie Raymond is a high school student (tho he and all his peers are drawn to look like adults...hey, it's the end of the Silver Age, after all) who's recently transferred to a new school. Ronnie's more of a jock than an egghead, though still a nice guy...and he's trying to win the attention of Doreen Day. She's already noticed him, though, and was interested enough to check the teacher's seating chart to learn Ronnie's name.

But school smarty Cliff Carmichael is jealous and sets out to make Ronnie look bad, goading him into fighting in the lunch room and trumping all his question-answering in the classroom. That night, Ronnie sees an interview with a protester at a new Hudson nuclear power plant, and decides that taking on the business of activism will show Doreen he's not "some dumb kid."

Of course the protesters are actually bomb-toting terrorists in disguise and Ronnie ends up overpowered and left for dead at the new power plant. He wakes up to find himself near the plant's atomic pile, where he sees the unconscious Professor Martin Stein, the plant's creator, and a very large bomb.

Ronnie is trying to get the bomb out of the plant when it goes off...

...and his life is changed forever, when he and Stein are fused together into a new being, capable of reading and changing the atomic structure of any material. Stein appears in Ronnie's head like the "voice of reason", providing information and guidance, though having been unconscious at the time of the "fusing", Stein is not the dominant personality in their combined make-up.

This first issue shows us the accident and Firestorm's self-discovery of his newly-formed powers and abilities. The new hero fashions a costume for himself with those new powers and is able to stop the terrorists from blowing up another plant. Unbeknowst to him, there's another who was at the site of the blast...who we'll learn more of in future issues.

As this issue ends, Ronnie finds that he can seperate himself and Professor Stein, and he puts the confused Stein into a taxi cab, not yet explaining their new-found relationship.

I always liked Firestorm, possibly because he quickly was welcomed into the Justice League of America, the first new hero to be inducted after I began reading (okay, Zatanna technically became a member after I learned of the League, but in the issues immediately proceeding my regular purchase of the title. more about that another day).

I was particularly sorry when Firestorm was accidentally run through with the Shining Knight's sword during Identity Crisis. I suppose it was the magic nature of the blade which kept Firestorm from transforming it into rubber or gas and saving himself. As a result, Firestorm's containment shell was breached...and he sacrificed himself to prevent his fellow heroes from dying in the resulting atomic blast.

Later, a new Firestorm came on the scene, whom I'm not as familiar with. I'm sure the character is great (an opinion bolstered by how many fans of Ronnie Raymond continue to protest him loud and long on the internet!), but I thought it was a pretty cheap shot on Meltzer's part...it seemed like just one more death in a series that featured a little too much of it and added a whole new level (mindwipes, rapes, secrets and lies) to the shiny JLA age in which Firestorm debuted.

We miss you, Ronnie, but still love those old adventures...and look forward to seeing how you fit into Rip Hunter's plan to repair a damaged timeline.

All the News

What's that, you say? You're a little tired from "losing" an hour of time this weekend, and as you wait for the end of the afternoon in the office, you need something comics-related to read online? You'll find a thing or two at The New York Times today.

First up is the article, Batman's Burden, in which director Christopher Nolan discusses the challenge of keeping the Dark Knight fresh in the movies and also of honoring the memory of Heath Ledger's last performance, as the Joker, in this summer's forthcoming blockbuster.

When you're finished with that, you might want to surf over to the New York Times bookpage for a review of the new book The Ten Cent Plague, which chronicles the early comic companies implosion through the Wertham and MacCarthy scares of the 50s.