Funny Book Forensics 403 Here Comes the Sun Eater

[00:00:07] Speaker A: You're head bobbing. [00:00:08] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:00:10] Speaker A: That was a 360 foot out there. [00:00:13] Speaker B: Oh, yeah. Yeah. [00:00:18] Speaker A: If anybody wants live Cal Raleigh updates from the day we're podcasting. That was a 360 foot out, man. Nobody wants Cal Raleigh updates right now. He's in a hell of a slump right now. I mean, I can't really complain after he hit, like, 38 home runs that he's in a slump, but he's in it. [00:00:37] Speaker B: He's in a slump now. He got that. Well, he. [00:00:40] Speaker A: Yes, we watch baseball. [00:00:43] Speaker B: It's true we do. Dan watches considerably more than I. But on the occasion that I get a chance to watch some baseball, there's baseball to be watched. [00:00:54] Speaker A: But you know what we like better than baseball? [00:00:56] Speaker B: What's that, Dan? [00:00:59] Speaker A: Apple pie. [00:01:01] Speaker B: Oh, yeah. Apple pie is delicious. [00:01:02] Speaker A: Chevrolets. [00:01:04] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah, yeah. [00:01:08] Speaker A: Well, I mean, that was how the commercial went, but that's not what we like. We. We like comic books. [00:01:13] Speaker B: Yes. [00:01:13] Speaker A: I don't know why. [00:01:15] Speaker B: Because they're fine. [00:01:16] Speaker A: I like these comic books. Yeah, they're like these comic books. [00:01:21] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:01:21] Speaker A: Like this one. [00:01:22] Speaker B: This one. Oh, yeah. [00:01:24] Speaker A: Comics 253. Validus on the COVID Yes. Zapping Superboy. Zap Crushing Cosmic Boy. Punching Pharaoh Lad Punch Stepping on Sunboy, presumably. Actually, some boy's about to get manoed. [00:01:46] Speaker B: Yeah, he is. [00:01:49] Speaker A: And what's Projector doing? She's standing there. [00:01:51] Speaker B: Just standing there. She's like, oh, no. [00:01:55] Speaker A: Curse one is a little bit disappointing. Like, I know you always drew the men as the more powerful characters because obviously the Emerald Empress is just standing around there, too. [00:02:03] Speaker B: But the. [00:02:05] Speaker A: It was a little disappointing because last issue, even though Persuader grabbed her at the end of the scene. [00:02:13] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:02:14] Speaker A: Jim Shooter, who wrote this when he was 14, made projector into pretty much a badass. [00:02:21] Speaker B: He did. [00:02:22] Speaker A: I mean, she was using her projection powers. And I would say confidently, until Paul Levitt reworked Projector into Sensor Girl, nobody used her as well as we see here in that issue. [00:02:39] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah. [00:02:40] Speaker A: I mean, maybe a couple other issues, but, you know, used her. Used her in a way that really showed out her power. I mean, she had that. She has the power to. She's a mentalist. Right. She has the power to make you think that you're in something that is real. Yeah. Around you. That's a pretty ridiculously, ridiculously good power. [00:03:00] Speaker B: It's a wild one. [00:03:01] Speaker A: I. I think one of the things when they made her Sensor girl in the 80s, though, is she was wearing a mask and the villains didn't know she was Projectra. I do think if you have that power, you probably shouldn't tell people that. That's your power. [00:03:14] Speaker B: True, true. [00:03:15] Speaker A: Keep that under wraps. [00:03:16] Speaker B: Use it when you need to, but don't let anybody know. [00:03:20] Speaker A: That'd be like something a villain would do. Like, hahaha, I have this, See this power. And then look what I could do. Yeah. [00:03:28] Speaker B: And goes full store on him. Yeah. [00:03:32] Speaker A: Well, the good, the good news is we have a, an amazing Kurt Swan cover. [00:03:36] Speaker B: Yeah, it's, it's very Kurt Swan. You got, you got all the dudes looking the same. [00:03:44] Speaker A: Except the poor persuader and his bald head. [00:03:46] Speaker B: Yes, that's true. [00:03:49] Speaker A: Well, I guess he sort of likes like Pharaoh Lad. [00:03:51] Speaker B: He kind of does. [00:03:53] Speaker A: Same hairstyle. [00:03:54] Speaker B: And suit. [00:03:57] Speaker A: And suit. [00:03:58] Speaker B: They're the same. Same dude. [00:03:59] Speaker A: That's, that's hadn't considered that until just now. Ever in my life. [00:04:05] Speaker B: But you're welcome. [00:04:06] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah, thank you. I'll never unsee that. Well, we have an issue brought to you by one Jim Shooter and one Kurt Swan again. [00:04:15] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:04:15] Speaker A: And we also have the same, we have the whole same crew. Crew. George Klein is inking Kurt Swan. Milt Snapping is lettering. Do you think he snapped while he. [00:04:25] Speaker B: Lettered or he's just snapping away? I, I, I, I, I don't know. I, I think, I mean, yes, we'll. [00:04:33] Speaker A: Have to ask Mr. Orochevsky if, if. [00:04:37] Speaker B: If, if he knows the truth. [00:04:40] Speaker A: Yeah. Or if he can snap while lettering. [00:04:42] Speaker B: Can you snap while lettering? I don't know if you can. [00:04:46] Speaker A: And Mort Wisinger, the evil one. The evil one, well, he has some bad history. I don't know. I tried, we're trying to honor Jim Shooter, so I stayed away from some of the controversial stuff the last couple episodes. I sort of hinted at it by picking, I would say, the most glb eqi friendly character. [00:05:11] Speaker B: The Grimbor. [00:05:12] Speaker A: Yeah. But there's some rumors that, that Jim wasn't so friendly to. [00:05:21] Speaker B: People. [00:05:21] Speaker A: Concepts in comics, in Marvel. [00:05:24] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:05:24] Speaker A: When he was the editor in chief. I don't know if it was a product of the time or not, but he might have been. But I'm not here to, I'm not here to put the guy that can't defend himself on trial today. But I am going to point out a couple of problematic things. And Mort Wisinger, one of the problematic things that we have here. I want to start before we start with Feral Lad and the issue here. [00:05:51] Speaker B: All right. [00:05:52] Speaker A: And Cosmic Boy and Sunboy and Superboy and Projector, because on this cover it says one of the legionnaires on this cover will Die. You'll be shocked by the identity of the doomed Legionnaire. [00:06:07] Speaker B: Oh, my gosh. [00:06:10] Speaker A: And could it be? It is 1960. What? Five here? Six. 1960. We established this last time, last episode. It's 1967. February cover date. Which means this would have been written and drawn in 1966. [00:06:25] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:06:26] Speaker A: And there are rumors. [00:06:30] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:06:31] Speaker A: That Jim Shooter wanted Pharaoh Lad to be an African American character. And that one. Mr. Wisinger would not allow it. [00:06:43] Speaker B: He said no. [00:06:46] Speaker A: That's. That's the rumors. [00:06:48] Speaker B: Interesting. [00:06:49] Speaker A: We don't get a African American character in Legion until. I believe E. Nelson Bridwell is the editor of the Superman comics. When we get Ty Rock. [00:06:58] Speaker B: Who. [00:07:02] Speaker A: Another story for a different day. [00:07:04] Speaker B: A different day. [00:07:05] Speaker A: Yeah, I can't. The Tyrak story with Mike Grell. I think we've talked about it before a little bit. Someday I would love to get Mr. You know, if Mr. Growl ever wanted to do a podcast with us, I'd love to get him on to talk about that. But honestly, we shouldn't talk about that. We should let him talk about Warlord or something cool he created. [00:07:24] Speaker B: True, that. Warlord would be awesome. [00:07:26] Speaker A: But anyway, yeah, that would be. They actually are doing a. They have a omnibus for Warlord out now. [00:07:34] Speaker B: Oh, wow. [00:07:36] Speaker A: Yeah, there's finally some Grell stuff going out from that time period that's not Green and Arrowy. [00:07:45] Speaker B: Some of the other stuff that's a little more. Hey, check this out. And you're like, whoa, space pirates. [00:07:50] Speaker A: Yeah, well. And I bought the Jon Sable omnibus through Kickstarter. Both of them. So that's cool. But yeah, I just. Anyway, the more Grel we can have in the universe, the better. And in this case, I turned the page here. [00:08:09] Speaker B: Okay. [00:08:10] Speaker A: And the first thing I saw, I wanted to. I need to buy this. For $1. I can buy the unbeatable self defense made easy ketsugo. Only $1. [00:08:25] Speaker B: Dang. Would you bring that? [00:08:26] Speaker A: I'm gonna go. Well, it says that Katsugo has the powerful choice secrets of karate, Aikido, Ate Wazo. I don't know what that is. Judo. Yawaro. Do you know what that is? [00:08:41] Speaker B: Yuaro Yuario. [00:08:44] Speaker A: Jiu Jitsu and Savat. [00:08:48] Speaker B: Some people call me a Saat. [00:08:50] Speaker A: Yeah. Savat died swimming away from the fight, if I remember correctly. [00:08:54] Speaker B: Oh, savant. Savat. Savant. Savat. [00:08:59] Speaker A: Anyways, did he same. [00:09:03] Speaker B: I mean, both are silly sometimes. [00:09:09] Speaker A: Reduce any assailant to cringing helplessness in seconds. Learn by yourself in just one week. Oh, do you think Jiu Jitsu lawyer Paul would. What do you think? Jiu Jitsu lawyer Paul would think of this Kugo. In just one week. It says I could render people helpless in seconds. If confidence. Fear. No men. [00:09:33] Speaker B: I mean, like, honestly, if God says, if it's like, just how to. To punch below the belt and always land your hit, then I bet you you could always win. [00:09:45] Speaker A: Oh, there we go. Maybe I'll try that on Jiu Jitsu lawyer Paul. What do you think? [00:09:49] Speaker B: I. I would. I'd pay to. I'd pay to see it. [00:09:53] Speaker A: You'd pay to see that? [00:09:54] Speaker B: I. I would. [00:09:56] Speaker A: Grinning like, your facial expression and your. Your. Your statement are contradicting each other. For those of you who are listening to the podcast, I. Greg's grin is looking like I would be murdered, which is correct. [00:10:09] Speaker B: I think what would happen is you'd punch him in the crotch. He would drop like a sack, and then he would think about how to get you back after that for days. And it would never. It wouldn't be enacted until you weren't paying attention. And then all of a sudden, something would happen, and Paul would do something, and it would be way out of left field. [00:10:39] Speaker A: And we all know Paul has a better attention span than I do, so that's just fact. [00:10:44] Speaker B: I mean, if he wasn't thinking that you're gonna go for a. For a crotch shot right off the bat, and. And like, all of a sudden, like, you're just, like, come up. You do your bow, and then you just, like, come up, and you're up just like that, and he just drops. Because, I mean, instantaneously. It's just. It's a. It's a given fact. You just. You. There's. The recovery rate is like. I mean, it's. It's minutes, not seconds. So he's done. [00:11:12] Speaker A: Well, I have a feeling you learn. [00:11:14] Speaker B: Oh. [00:11:14] Speaker A: Oh, sorry. [00:11:15] Speaker B: I was gonna say, I have a feeling. I know what he would do. I know exactly what he'd do to get you back. He would find a place that only you would want to go to, and you'd be so excited to go there. And then you would get there, and they'd be all out of fish. [00:11:37] Speaker A: That's right. [00:11:38] Speaker B: He would take you to Fish, Fish, Fish. [00:11:42] Speaker A: We don't ever want to go to Fish Fish Fish. [00:11:44] Speaker B: Ever. [00:11:45] Speaker A: And it's closed. And you're bringing back up an old joke that the listeners don't even know about. They don't understand the Fish, Fish, Fish joke. So we're going to transition on. But I'll just say, if you want a cold and calculating lawyer that can Help you out in times of trouble. You can have Jiu Jitsu. Lawyer. Paul. Paul. This is your last advertisement on this podcast because we've got to move on. But you can find him on Bridgeport and 27th in University Place. Some people call that road Jackson. It just depends on where you're at in Tacoma. [00:12:12] Speaker B: It's true. [00:12:13] Speaker A: It also has, like, five other names, so there you go. Anyway, Google. We are looking at the tales of the Legion of Superheroes. Guest starring Superboy. I guess. I didn't say starring Superboy, but Superboy is the acting leader. We have Cosmic Boy, the master of magnetism. Princess Projector, a creator of illusions. Sunboy, living beacon of heat and light. Wow. Feralad, who can turn to solid iron. And then we have the Fatal Five. Xerok, half man, half robot. Mano. Hand. Who's our Mano? Whose hand? Mono. [00:12:50] Speaker B: Mono. [00:12:50] Speaker A: Wrong. [00:12:51] Speaker B: Mano. [00:12:51] Speaker A: I said Mano. [00:12:52] Speaker B: Mano. Mano. Mano. Mano should be modern. [00:12:56] Speaker A: Whose hand disintegrates? Anything? Some gym shooter was taking Spanish class. [00:13:00] Speaker B: Mango. [00:13:00] Speaker A: Emerald Empress. [00:13:01] Speaker B: Mango. [00:13:02] Speaker A: Why are you drinking White Claw? Just mango. It's. I. [00:13:05] Speaker B: They didn't have my Dr. Pepper. [00:13:08] Speaker A: Yeah, quit telling jokes from other things. I'm getting the Fatal Five out here. Emerald Empress, mistress of the mighty Emerald Eye. The Persuader, owner of the invincible Axe. That's the Atomic Axe. Perhaps after you drink a White Claw, you'll have an atomic Something happening too. Yeah, and Validus, whose brain flashes lightning and then it says. How do you not let me get all this out? This is the best intro page ever. Can you imagine the FBI teaming up with the Mafia? In fact, yes, I can, because that came true. Can you picture Uncle? That's U, N, period, C period, L period, E period. Do you know what that is, Greg? [00:13:49] Speaker B: Man from U.N.C.L.E. yes. It was a TV show and then a movie with a cannibal starring against Harry Cavill. [00:13:57] Speaker A: Oh, okay. And making a pact with Thrush. [00:14:00] Speaker B: Yeah. Oh, wow. [00:14:01] Speaker A: That must be Uncle's enemy. Pretty unlikely, eh? Yeah, but no more unlikely than what's happening here. The Legion of superheroes forming an alliance with the Fatal Five. Their objective, to destroy the monstrous Sun Eater. That's about as easy as catching a tiger with a butterfly net. That would be pretty hard. All the superheroes can't possibly come out of the battle alive. One is fated to be the doomed legionnaire. And in fact. [00:14:34] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:14:35] Speaker A: One of these legionnaires is going to die. [00:14:38] Speaker B: Going to die. [00:14:40] Speaker A: Issue and for realsy, die. Like, not come back. [00:14:45] Speaker B: Done. Never. Never to be seen or heard from again. [00:14:49] Speaker A: Well, you know, there was zero hour. [00:14:54] Speaker B: It's true. [00:14:57] Speaker A: But anyway, we get the squarest background ever. I will say, like Kurt Swan feature scenes. [00:15:08] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah, yeah. [00:15:14] Speaker A: Remember that comic we, the indie comic we read? Was it critical hit? [00:15:20] Speaker B: Okay. Yeah. [00:15:21] Speaker A: Had the really square backgrounds. We liked the story. Was it crit? [00:15:28] Speaker B: Yeah, crit. It was the one that was based off an art. Like they played, they played an RPG and then they wrote it up as a comic. [00:15:35] Speaker A: Yeah, we had fun with it. [00:15:37] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:15:37] Speaker A: But it had really square backgrounds. [00:15:39] Speaker B: Yeah. Superhero rpg. [00:15:42] Speaker A: And I know this is Silver age art and you know, this is expected. There's a lot of pink and red and green squares and backgrounds here on the next couple pages. And I'll just tell you, right, like, not to appreciate another person that passed away. Gosh, over a year ago. Right. Longer. But with Keith Giffen's Legion, art just stands out as so good when you look at it compared to this art, doesn't it? [00:16:11] Speaker B: Yeah, it's different. It's very different. [00:16:13] Speaker A: The background art, I want to emphasize the background art. [00:16:15] Speaker B: The background art. Yeah. [00:16:16] Speaker A: I'm not saying Kurt Swan's faces and bodies and stuff like that aren't perfect for the time period. [00:16:22] Speaker B: No. And I, I, I, I made Swan. [00:16:24] Speaker A: Superman is great. [00:16:25] Speaker B: And I made a, a, a very tongue in cheek joke last week about the, about the background. I was like, oh, and the background. [00:16:33] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:16:33] Speaker B: And it was like, I, you know. [00:16:36] Speaker A: There. [00:16:38] Speaker B: It, depending on what he's drawing. Some of them are fantastic. Some of them are, eh. [00:16:44] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah, man. [00:16:46] Speaker B: It's a good background, man. [00:16:49] Speaker A: Well, we get a recap page with a lot of words. [00:16:54] Speaker B: It is so many words. [00:16:55] Speaker A: If you didn't buy the previous issue, you are now caught up. [00:16:58] Speaker B: You are caught up because it is everything in six panels. The whole dang book right there. Jim Shooter killed it. [00:17:07] Speaker A: And then we get a couple pages of power demonstrations which I'm not going to read all of to you. [00:17:13] Speaker B: It's, it's crazy though, because it's like their whole entire, I mean, we're not going to go through it, but there, it's basically like Mano is like, show me what you can do. And the Legion's like, what do you want us to do? And he's like, not you idiots, the bad guys. Yeah. [00:17:34] Speaker A: And yeah. Therox testing their powers. Mono and. [00:17:39] Speaker B: Oh no. Yeah. [00:17:41] Speaker A: You said mana. It's okay. I think we can say it however we want to. [00:17:44] Speaker B: Yeah. No, no, no, I, I, I meant Therak was telling them that. That's what I meant. [00:17:49] Speaker A: Oh, yeah. Well, Sarah But Mana was the first one to jump up and, like, do it. And then they get in this cool fight. And I will say now, here's one on page five. That panel where the ax goes against the hand. Yeah, I really love that art. [00:18:05] Speaker B: Yeah, no, it's like. I mean, the art for the fight scene is, like, really good. It's engaging. It's like, oh, what's going on? There's a lot of action. It's fun. [00:18:16] Speaker A: And it makes sense for the Superman artist to be able to draw action scenes. [00:18:19] Speaker B: Right. [00:18:20] Speaker A: Like, and the backgrounds are trash, but the. It's a color wall. [00:18:25] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:18:26] Speaker A: But the action scenes and the poses and everything and the fighting is really cool. Like, I really like it. I mean, and then after they fight on page six, they, like, Validus gets really upset and is like, no more fighting, and starts zapping everybody. And Superboy has to put his indestructible cape on his head like a hat. [00:18:52] Speaker B: Puts a little hat on him like a parrot. Put him to bed. [00:18:57] Speaker A: I always liked the Superboy indestructible cape for some reason. I'm not sure why. I just always thought it was really cool. I get it now. I. I think it's less cool now. I mean, when I was a kid, I thought the indestructible cape was super cool. [00:19:09] Speaker B: Why don't you like it now? [00:19:12] Speaker A: I don't know. It seems like a. There's a lot of Superman stuff in the Silver Age that was easy was McGuffiny and lazy writing. And so, you know, the Superboy like, you know, throw his cape on anything, it will stop anything. It's just. It's kind of lazy writing. But, you know, it's nothing the grown up adult writers weren't doing. So I'm not going to criticize Jim Shooter for it. We have a creepy turn of events come up next, where mono is getting a little handsy with the doors. But before we do that, we get an advertisement. We get a Christmas advertisement for peace on Earth. [00:19:50] Speaker B: Oh, yeah. Which I'm like, I saw that. And I was like, yo, dc, you're woke before, woke. [00:19:59] Speaker A: Oh, yeah. If anybody's saying Superman is woke now, we've really got peace on Earth written in, like, every language. Well, not every language, but many of them. [00:20:08] Speaker B: It actually, I mean, it's super. It's super nice, it's super great. And it's like a really cool ad in 60. What, 68, 67. You know, done in 66. So, I mean, that's really inclusive and really cool to see, you know, So, I mean, folks, it's not just for the airport bathrooms that you see everything in different languages. It's in DC Comics as well. What? [00:20:37] Speaker A: Wow. Wow. I hope your brain wasn't going where my brain just went with that anyway. [00:20:42] Speaker B: No, no, we don't share the same brain, folks. So I don't know what Dan was thinking. [00:20:52] Speaker A: Oh, no, no. Like, it wasn't not. People are going to think it was some sort of gay joke that I was thinking for. No, no, that's not what I was thinking. [00:21:00] Speaker B: Those. [00:21:00] Speaker A: I instantly went to those multiple language things in the bathrooms at the airport that tell people to protect themselves from trafficking. [00:21:10] Speaker B: Oh, I meant like, you know, it's like when you go. [00:21:12] Speaker A: That's where my brain went. Really dark. [00:21:15] Speaker B: No, no. [00:21:15] Speaker A: Like you come in from an international flight, it says in the bathroom, like, who to call. [00:21:21] Speaker B: I was like talking about the hand washing. For the hand washing and stuff like that and all that other stuff. [00:21:26] Speaker A: Yes, yeah. And just to be clear, everyone, I was not going to make, like, who was that senator that went to the Minnesota airport. [00:21:35] Speaker B: Oh, a couple of years ago to cruise in a weird way. Yeah. [00:21:38] Speaker A: More than a couple of years ago. It's been a long time. [00:21:40] Speaker B: It's been a hot minute. But you know, but anyway, I was. [00:21:44] Speaker A: Not going to that joke. I was like, okay, when you said that, I was like, greg, please say. Greg's not talking about the. [00:21:52] Speaker B: No, no, I'm talking about the hand washing and you know, use the, use the soap and all that other stuff. [00:21:58] Speaker A: I under. I understand now. I was like, well, by the way, we got a really cool advertisement for Aquaman. And then we got. That was Nick Carty drawing Aquaman. Right. [00:22:10] Speaker B: I believe. [00:22:13] Speaker A: And then we get a advertisement for Sergeant Rock too. [00:22:16] Speaker B: Yeah, Sergeant Rock and these page giants, Renwall cars. [00:22:22] Speaker A: And then we get back into the story. [00:22:24] Speaker B: I'm not gonna lie. When I was a kid, I wanted those so bad. [00:22:27] Speaker A: The cars. [00:22:28] Speaker B: Yeah, because they, they looked neat. Like I'd go to the toy, the toy shows and look for those types of car that, that type, that particular brand of car. They were cool looking. They weren't like a matchbox or a Hot Wheel. They were cooler. [00:22:49] Speaker A: Anyways, when, when, when we get to the next page after the cool advertisements, Mono Mano is breaking into the Emerald Empress's room where she's staring at a photograph of Superboy. Yeah. [00:23:08] Speaker B: And it's very much like the meme of like, you know, Wolverine looking at a picture in bed. Did they get that from this issue? [00:23:18] Speaker A: Maybe. I think you get there's a lot from this issue that it persists on. [00:23:22] Speaker B: It just moves into the next thing of something else. It's like somebody said, oh, that's such a good panel. Let's make that happen. But flip it. [00:23:30] Speaker A: As we go through the history of the Legion, too, one of the things Jim Shooter did was really planted a lot of different things. Right. And the Fatal Five are used forever. The Emerald Empus is used forever. And I think one of the things, too, is as a kid, Paul Levitz was reading these books, and then when he recreated the Fatal Five, when he recreated the Fatal Five and had the Emerald Empress be the leader of the Fatal Five, she would not let Mano into the Fatal Five. [00:24:09] Speaker B: And makes sense. [00:24:11] Speaker A: And it all stems from dirt bag right here. [00:24:14] Speaker B: Yeah. Because he sneaks into her room and he's like, hey, proposition to for you. [00:24:20] Speaker A: Yep. And I think that's. I love that when those threads get pulled. And, you know, I'm not a continuity nazi here. Right. But I love when a writer can pull a thread like this and you're like, oh, yeah, of course. She wouldn't want to hang out with him. [00:24:36] Speaker B: She's a scumbag. [00:24:40] Speaker A: Well, Superboy steps in to save her, and then she has kryptonite for Superboy. [00:24:46] Speaker B: She pulls the same. The same thing that Mana was trying to do to her on Superboy. She's like, hey, well, we got a proposition for you. [00:24:54] Speaker A: She's bad because they're bad. [00:24:56] Speaker B: She's a baddie. [00:25:01] Speaker A: Well, soon after Cosmic Boy rescues Superboy, we find out that therock has been planning because Brainiac 5 is on a deep space mission. So we don't have our smart legionnaire. So we had to pull in the robot bad guy. [00:25:17] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:25:19] Speaker A: And he's got a plan that involves cutting up the Sun Eater into parts with the atomic ax. And then each person is going to attack one of the parts of the Sun Eater. [00:25:33] Speaker B: It makes sense. Everybody gets a chance to do their thing. [00:25:39] Speaker A: And now I will say get to shine. Yeah. In the part of the story that I don't like. [00:25:45] Speaker B: Okay. [00:25:46] Speaker A: I like most of this story, but somehow therock has figured out a way to put everybody in tubes and amplify their powers. [00:25:57] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:25:59] Speaker A: I really like most of the story, but I thought that was a little bit. [00:26:04] Speaker B: But you didn't. You didn't like the amplification tube power. [00:26:07] Speaker A: No, I mean, it just seemed like. It seemed like you didn't. You don't need that in the story. And it's really cheesy. It's like, oh, out of the blue, I know how to amplify everyone's powers, including the emerald eye and the. The super giant with lightning bolts in his brain. And everybody comes out and they're like, I better turn off my magnetism because it's going to tear everything apart. [00:26:33] Speaker B: It's true, it would. [00:26:34] Speaker A: And Sunboy is saying, flame on. I mean, bursting into flame. He wouldn't say flame on because that would mean he was with a different company. And, yeah, they might get in trouble. It's almost like having a boy that turns. It's almost like having a boy named Pharaoh Lad. [00:26:52] Speaker B: Yeah, I don't get. [00:26:56] Speaker A: Could get you into trouble how it might be similar to something else in a different company. [00:27:01] Speaker B: No, not at all. That guy is a man. This dude is a lad. That dude iron this guy Pharaoh and the other guy. And he's just wrapped in it. Yeah, two different things. Completely. [00:27:19] Speaker A: Completely. [00:27:20] Speaker B: But different. But dissimilar. [00:27:24] Speaker A: Different. Similar. [00:27:26] Speaker B: Yeah. Well, anyway, plastic, elastic, you know, whatever. [00:27:32] Speaker A: Well, the villains have a meeting, and in this meeting, they decide that Persuader decides he doesn't like being bossed around. And we find out that Therak has put a suggestion into Valadus, which is why he amplified everybody's power, so now he controls Validus. [00:27:49] Speaker B: You see, dog. [00:27:53] Speaker A: Well, first off, we go to the next page and we got to see if the plan can be implemented. And before you find out if the plan can get implemented, I have something to share with you from. [00:28:04] Speaker B: Oh, share it. [00:28:05] Speaker A: The beautiful Legion companion by tomorrow's publishing. Is that not beautiful, by the way? That is. It is. It is pretty stunning. Just the COVID But we had an interview with Mr. Shooter a long, long time ago, and he says, I spent a while acquiring Marvel Comics. This would be middle 60s, I guess, 64 or 65. So this is when he was like 11 and 12. Right when I thought I was ready, I wrote a script for Legion of the Legion of Superheroes. [00:28:36] Speaker B: Okay. [00:28:37] Speaker A: Why did I pick them? Because I thought that was one of the lamest comic books on Earth. The ones I had been reading around that time were created. I created this were the old John Fort comics. He was very nice, man and everything, but the drawing was kind of stiff and wonky. The covers were always great because they were. A lot of them were Kurt's one. And the stories never lived up to them. So I thought, I'll do one for the Legion, his pitch of superheroes. That way I'll show what a difference I can make. I don't know what a script looked like, so I actually Drew little panels and balloons and made it look as much like a comic as I could. I couldn't draw very well, but enough so that they could understand that Superboy, and that's Lightning Lad and all that. And then I sent it in and got back a letter. And the letter said, this is very good, and someday maybe I could, quote, draw a feature for dc. It was signed by editor Mort Wisinger, and he invited me to send more like I'd sent. That's how he got started, because he thought the Legion of Superheroes were the lamest comic, and he'd been reading the Marvel books, which makes sense. Right. And so, yeah, I think one of the things here you can start to see early on in the Shooter Legion is he's trying to give the characters some personality. And he'll continue to do that. Right. And start to make them a little bit more distinct. I don't think you see it as much with the heroes in this book as you do the villains. [00:30:10] Speaker B: Oh, yeah. No, the villains definitely have a lot more personality, per se, where the heroes are. It's suggested that you already know what they are, who they are. He really wants you to get to know the villains, to really buy into who they are and what they do, why they're bad and why you should like them. [00:30:37] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:30:38] Speaker B: Or not like them, but why they would be chosen for this job. [00:30:46] Speaker A: And so. And I. Yeah, and I like that. I like that character. And again, those characters have persisted over time. Even without a Legion book. Those characters persist, which says a lot in Jurassic Park. [00:30:59] Speaker B: They find a way. [00:31:01] Speaker A: They find a way. I mean, it just. It just says a lot. One more thing about Jim Shooter I think people don't understand is that his family was in a desperate financial situation when he started writing comics. And he said, they won't give you a job in the steel mill at 14. Uh, you can't get a job. The only hope is to make something and sell it. Yeah, I could deliver newspapers and make five bucks a week, so what could I make? I wasn't going to weave any baskets. And I had no idea then and saw these comics and thought, oh, that's an idea. It was like an act of desperation. And the money that I brought in kept us going. It kept the wolves from the door. So my mother thought it was great. My father wasn't the talkative type. He didn't say a whole lot about it, but I'm sure he was happy that I was doing something and it was going well and I had nothing but support. But that's kind of crazy. Like, he was literally going to high school and drawing comic. And writing and drawing comics and sending them to D.C. so his family could eat. [00:32:06] Speaker B: It's very inspirational. Like, I mean, yeah, in a. In a. I mean, I'm not. Yeah, I'm not. I'm not poking at it. I'm. I'm. [00:32:15] Speaker A: I'm like, not. [00:32:16] Speaker B: That is wild. It's like, whoa, this. This kid saw a way to make life better for him and his family by doing something that he wanted to do and found a way to do it. [00:32:33] Speaker A: Yeah, it's ab. It's absolutely wild. So we get. We get back to the story here, and we get the Sun Eater, and Sun Boy uses amplified power to get the Sun Eater to move toward him and away from the sun. We do have a letter column. [00:32:57] Speaker B: And. [00:32:58] Speaker A: I will say, like, they seem to be big fans of the Jim Shooter books. In the letter column. [00:33:03] Speaker B: Yeah. Did you have a letter that you wanted to share? [00:33:08] Speaker A: Not really. I was just going to say that overall. Well, here's this one here. While leafing through my collection of adventure comics, I'm amazed at how. How much the Legion has changed. Take issue 267, for example. This one, some time before regular Legion series started with number 300, Saturn Girl is emitting lightning bolts from her eyes. Her hair is blonde and long. So he's kind of going on about this. All in all, the Legion has changed for the better. And if you ever drop the series as you did the Bizarros, I will come down and picket your office. From Liz Kane of East Meadow, New York. So Liz Kane stuck up for Jim Shooter and Legion books. Very big fan. [00:33:48] Speaker B: Good stuff. [00:33:49] Speaker A: So, yeah, there you go. [00:33:50] Speaker B: We like you, Liz. Thank you so much for your words and appreciate that you. You enjoyed the books because. [00:33:59] Speaker A: And if you ever attack Gotham City, I'll be very sad. Ms. Kane. [00:34:11] Speaker B: She probably did. [00:34:13] Speaker A: See, I know a little bit of Batman Universe, folks. I'm not totally Batman hater, actually, am I? All right, so anyway, Slain by Sun Eater part two. All right, so the plant. The plan seems to be working amazing so far. We've. We've gotten the Sun Eater to go away from the sun. The Persuader takes his atomic ax and he cuts the Sun Eater into pieces. [00:34:39] Speaker B: Oh, my goodness. [00:34:40] Speaker A: And Validus starts attacking the Sun Eater with his lightning bolts from his brain. And it doesn't go well. [00:34:50] Speaker B: No, it doesn't. He has worked. [00:34:52] Speaker A: Yeah, It. It's like he. He. [00:34:54] Speaker B: It's almost like, okay to put into. To. To. To put it into retrospect for. For. For folks. I mean, for me, I was reading this, and I was like, he's like the big badge. You're like. You're supposed to be so. So. Big bad Jobber. [00:35:10] Speaker A: Yeah, Jobber. It's either that or it's like. It's kind of like when in movies have a big bad from the previous movie, but the big bad goes down in the first scene in the next movie, say, say Star Wars Episode one and Episode two. [00:35:25] Speaker B: Oh, yeah, yeah. Fair, Fair one. [00:35:29] Speaker A: Count Dooku. [00:35:30] Speaker B: Yeah, Count Dooku, man. Count Dooku. Down and out. [00:35:37] Speaker A: The Count Dooku. Or was it. Do I have the right character even? [00:35:40] Speaker B: No, Doku was like. Yeah, he was. He. He comes out strong and swinging and boom, out. Done. [00:35:47] Speaker A: Done in like, a minute. Yeah, well, Validus does the same thing, and he's done in, like a minute. And it doesn't look good for the rest of him because they back at Master Control going, oh, my gosh, the mightiest of all of us was defeated in, like, a couple of seconds. Looking bad. Nothing. Nothing. Like great layouts when you have to draw arrows to get people to understand where to go on the comic book page, which happens on two straight pages. I know. [00:36:12] Speaker B: Well, it helped me. It helped me because I was like, where do I go? What do I do? Oh, thank God these arrows are here. [00:36:19] Speaker A: Yeah. I'm just saying the layouts probably should be in a fashion where you don't have to have arrows. I think it would be my argument there. But anyway, Superboy goes after the Sun Eater, and it's lighting him on fire. And then he starts to dissipate it, but it's got reds. It's eaten some red suns. Oh, no. Now Superboy is unconscious, and the Sun Eater doesn't care about him. So now Cosmic Boy goes after the Sun Eater, which makes some sense. He should be able to pull it apart with his magnetism, right? [00:36:49] Speaker B: Yeah, like a dj. He's mixing up the ones and twos over there. [00:36:54] Speaker A: But that doesn't work at all. [00:36:56] Speaker B: No. [00:36:58] Speaker A: And then the Emerald Empress goes after the Sun Eater. I feel like the Emerald Eye probably could take out the sun meter. We don't. We don't know much about the Emerald. [00:37:05] Speaker B: Eye yet, though, so I. I think it's pretty strong. I think. I think we might see something here. Dan, what do you think? [00:37:12] Speaker A: I think it's. I think she's got her eye on the prize. [00:37:14] Speaker B: Greg, you think she's got her eye on the prize? Well, let's see what happens in the next panel. [00:37:21] Speaker A: I don't know. Maybe she can see it, maybe she can't. [00:37:26] Speaker B: Well, it looks like we see that she gets her ass handed to her. [00:37:32] Speaker A: Oh, you mean she didn't. She turned away. [00:37:36] Speaker B: Yeah, she turned away the last second jobber. [00:37:40] Speaker A: Yeah, well, Princess Projector, I don't know if this is. Sarah claimed he had a sound strategy. And so Princess Projector Pass does some callosaurs which devour energy. And the Sun Eater doesn't seem to care. No, she's about to get incinerated by the Sun Eater. And here comes Validus to save the day. And Valid, he was down, but he's not out. A little less charred. There's one panel where he doesn't look charred at all. [00:38:10] Speaker B: I mean, he got. He had some baby wipes in his little pouch. He cleaned himself up real quick, did a little Irish bath, and then he's back to. [00:38:16] Speaker A: He's back. [00:38:17] Speaker B: Yeah, he's ready. [00:38:18] Speaker A: Is that on the. Is that on the inker or is that on the pencil? [00:38:22] Speaker B: Maybe both. Yeah, they didn't spot those blacks. [00:38:29] Speaker A: While Mano tries to destroy the Sun Eater. And he goes to destroy it with his hand. And the Sun Eater divides into six parts and then zaps him. [00:38:38] Speaker B: Oh, man. [00:38:40] Speaker A: And so we're down to Pharaoh Lad. [00:38:43] Speaker B: Who. [00:38:45] Speaker A: Seems like a good idea for. [00:38:48] Speaker B: Fighting the sun going. [00:38:50] Speaker A: Yeah, well, he goes into the Sun Eater and he turn. He dives in. He turns into white molten iron. And he sees a like atom looking thing in the middle. [00:39:02] Speaker B: Oh, it's one of those things where you like a gyroscope where you pull the. The rip cord on it spins around real fast and it's like stands up on his little, little peg. [00:39:12] Speaker A: Maybe. [00:39:13] Speaker B: That's what I think. [00:39:14] Speaker A: But he, he thinks maybe that's the core of the Sun Eater. What if he destroys the core? Yeah, he'd be okay. And. But he gets zapped out by the Sun Eater too. He gets zapped when he sees the core. So we are down to. Gosh, another advertisement. But we've got a hot rod dragster and some really cool pinups. [00:39:37] Speaker B: Hell yeah, they're pretty cool. [00:39:40] Speaker A: Is that a Neil Adams joker up there? [00:39:43] Speaker B: I think it might be for a buck. Dude, I'd be buying that. I'll be buying them all 1. [00:39:48] Speaker A: At the time, I know at the. [00:39:51] Speaker B: Time a dollar was a lot of money. [00:39:52] Speaker A: Remember a $75 could get you all the year's worth of adventure comics. [00:39:57] Speaker B: Yeah, I mean that's like a dollar back then was. You're. You're looking at like inflation. It Was probably a good 15 bucks. [00:40:09] Speaker A: Well, we get back together with the kids here and the evil villains and the Sun Eater is going back to attack the sun. God damn it. And we find out that Therak has devised another plan. And this other plan is to put the absorbatron bomb. [00:40:33] Speaker B: Yeah, it's got a smiley face on it. [00:40:35] Speaker A: Absorb the Sun Eater's power. The absorbitron. Absorbitron Absorb. A Tron bomb. But he has not had time to build a delivery system. [00:40:45] Speaker B: I felt like you could have busted a gasmatron. [00:40:50] Speaker A: Yeah, no, not in these pure stories here. [00:40:54] Speaker B: Not in these pier stories, okay? [00:40:58] Speaker A: There's no delivery system. So very quickly Superboy's like, I'll go, I'm invulnerable. Even though it was very clear he wasn't invulnerable. Literally two pages ago. [00:41:10] Speaker B: Two pages ago, he was tossed. [00:41:15] Speaker A: So far. Punches him because he's still weak from the red sun. Establishing that he's indeed not invulnerable at all. [00:41:22] Speaker B: Take that, punk. [00:41:25] Speaker A: And he flies out of the airlock and he flies into the Sun Eater and the bomb goes off and Iron Boy, I mean Pharaoh Lad is dead. [00:41:41] Speaker B: Dead, gone. He's no more. [00:41:44] Speaker A: As in turned. It dies on panel. [00:41:47] Speaker B: Dies on panel. Turns into a giant rainbow. [00:41:50] Speaker A: Crosses over. Yeah, really dead. [00:41:55] Speaker B: It's. It's pretty wild because that is not normal. That doesn't happen. [00:41:59] Speaker A: Yeah. If you were like a. If you were a 12 year old reading this comic. [00:42:04] Speaker B: Ah, yeah, you lose your. [00:42:08] Speaker A: He dead. [00:42:09] Speaker B: Dead. [00:42:10] Speaker A: He did. How did this get past your little. [00:42:16] Speaker B: Someone? [00:42:17] Speaker A: This is killing kids. I mean, this isn't like House of Mystery or you know, something like that. This is like we just killed a teenager in a comic book. [00:42:26] Speaker B: It's a teenage superhero dying on panel. Yeah, it slipped in because you know, he did it for the greater good. Right? [00:42:39] Speaker A: So I think, well, maybe. Yeah, well, he did it. He saved the galaxy. But at what cost, says Projectra Superboy says he gave his life willingly as any legionnaire would. Cosmic Boy, who clearly could have prevented this tragedy. Yeah, because you know, he has magnetic powers and. [00:43:01] Speaker B: Right. [00:43:03] Speaker A: He's literally the only one that could have stopped Pharaoh Lad when he dove out of the thing. His Legion career was a brief one, but his courage will never be forgotten. Well, I hope, because I mean, you, you literally let him die. [00:43:20] Speaker B: So you, you, you let him fly and die. [00:43:25] Speaker A: And then we get with their comrades deaths, death weighing heavily on their hearts. The legionnaires turn to leave and they say, your outlaws, you outlaws will receive your pardons by up Messenger. Soon you can live decent, normal lives with no fear of the law, says Superboy. And the villains are like, hahaha. We don't want to do that. [00:43:49] Speaker B: Joke's on you. [00:43:52] Speaker A: And they chain them up. [00:43:55] Speaker B: Oh no. [00:43:56] Speaker A: I would say Grimbor would be very proud of this chaining that's going. [00:44:00] Speaker B: Oh yeah, he would have been so stoked. He's like, wait, you are ready with chains? That's my thing. But I'll let it slide because good plan, I like it. Right? [00:44:15] Speaker A: But as they're about to murder the Legion. Well, the part of the Legion that's there, the five, not the whole legion, which is like 23 validus. Projector appeals to Validus and said, you risk your life to save mine. Can you kill me now? Fight off Therox, evil influence. You can do it. Try. You can do it. And Validus and Therox, like Validus, destroy them. You have no choice. Validus is like, no, I can't. And he zaps at the Fatal Five. His lightning bolt hits the atomic axe. Oh, and all of them disappear. And Projector says, just to establish the difference here, are they dead? Oh, and Superboy is like, who can say? Could even that terrible onslaught have destroyed Balladas? Or could it have burst a dimensional barrier that sent them into all. All into some sort of limbo? Whatever their fate, for some strange reason, I feel like we haven't heard the last of the Fatal Five. But right now we have something to prepare. [00:45:25] Speaker B: Dinner. [00:45:26] Speaker A: We flip the page and we see the tribute to Pharaoh Lad who's going off to the satellite Shanghala to have his rocket being sent there next to Lita 87, who slipped on a banyo peel and ended her early superhero career. And if you don't believe me, look it up. [00:45:51] Speaker B: It's true, folks. [00:45:52] Speaker A: As Dan knows. You know, I know Legion. [00:45:55] Speaker B: Dan knows. [00:45:56] Speaker A: I know all about my Shanghala monuments. But this one says in memoriam Andrew Nolan Feralad, a mutant whose non human face was kept hidden behind a mask. He gave his life to save the galaxy. I'm getting chills. I just got goosebumps. [00:46:11] Speaker B: Oh yeah, it's. [00:46:14] Speaker A: This one's kind of sad. [00:46:16] Speaker B: It is sad, man. [00:46:18] Speaker A: And the rest of the Legion came back and. Yeah, it's not a good job. Gym shooter. 14 year old gym shooter. Good night. Geez. [00:46:27] Speaker B: It is, it, it's a, it's. It's a good story. It's a, it's a, It's a nice piece. [00:46:38] Speaker A: So I did say after the story too, I was going to talk a little Bit of little numbers here, which I know gets everybody super excited. [00:46:49] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:46:49] Speaker A: Number one numbers. Yeah. Do you want to hear about what else was on sale this month? I won't read them all this month, but I can show you. [00:46:56] Speaker B: Give us a couple. Give us a couple. [00:46:57] Speaker A: Supergirl's greatest exploits. Supergirl's greatest exploits with her super friends. That's the theme on the April 80 page giant number 347. [00:47:06] Speaker B: 80 page giant. [00:47:07] Speaker A: Just the newsstand. That's Action Comics. Oh. You are cordially invited to the wedding of Jimmy Olsen and Lucy Lane. [00:47:16] Speaker B: What? [00:47:16] Speaker A: In the hundredth issue of the Red Hair Reporter's mag. [00:47:20] Speaker B: Oh, my God. [00:47:20] Speaker A: An imaginary tale, but a genuine 24 karat 100 marriage. [00:47:25] Speaker B: Little boy is all grown up people. [00:47:30] Speaker A: So the green lantern, number 51, pretty near the first appearance of Guy Gardner. Yeah. Is Green Lantern's evil alter ego, the arch villain the Emerald Crusader has to defeat, but doesn't dare to. So we got some problems going on there. But, my friends, we have some circulation numbers. What's hot, what's not date filing October 1, 1966, title of the publication, Adventure Comics. And we have a paid circulation of 472,000. And the single issue nearest the filing date had a paid circulation of 514,000 comics. Just imagine that it is literally 10 times what you get out of your best comics that are sold now. [00:48:21] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:48:22] Speaker A: Though the Superman movie. I was reading an article today that the Superman movie has spurred interest in local comic shops or having people come in, want to reading, wanting to read Superman stories, which is fantastic. You gotta love it when they do a movie. Right. They can actually spur interest in these rags that I have, which. [00:48:45] Speaker B: Oh, my gosh. Yeah. And then people are gonna go back and read the other stories. [00:48:49] Speaker A: The old ones. Yeah. Consequently, before I get into the rest of the numbers here, you can see that my copy of this book is very terrible. Better than my copy someone has when they want to send me. Or. No. I will also say if you have a better version of this one out there and you want to sell it, reach out to me. I would take a better version of 352 or 351 and 3. Or 352 and 353. I'd happily take both off your hands if you're wanting to get rid of them. Yes. Dany comics also with this one here. So we had the paid circulation 481on average rate 522 for the latest issue. So wanted to bring up something Shooter said about the comics and why he got to keep his job for so long. [00:49:42] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:49:42] Speaker A: So Jim Shooter would write comics for several years. Right. And then go to college. So then he'd stop writing for a while and then he'd come back to D.C. and write the gems that we saw. Like it's back in its home, back in his home. Everybody back in their home safe and. [00:50:06] Speaker B: Sound so they can go to sleep tonight. [00:50:09] Speaker A: But the somebody, they ask him, did you ever give. Did you. The question in, in the interview is, did DC ever give you a sense of where the Legion was in their hierarchy at the time? And there was some controversy because they would get moved to Action Comics as backup, and it was because they thought Supergirl would sell more. And here's Jim Shooter's take on that. He wasn't a big fan of that, obviously writing the book. But when they went to Action, he got to write some of the Superman stories. So, you know, he got to write Superman. So. And complain. But anyway, he said, you read the sales figures which were published in the books. Just so we just did. And when I started writing Legion of Superheroes, it was selling about 500,000 copies a month, which is what we just saw. Five years later when I stopped writing it. The last issue also had a statement of ownership in it. It was selling about 500,000 copies a month. During that time, Superman went from something like a million and a quarter down to around 500, 600,000. And by the way, if you understand that, that was when. So that would have been six years from. That would have been five years from now. So that would have been when. When Spider man passed Superman. [00:51:22] Speaker B: Okay. [00:51:22] Speaker A: As the best selling comic. So gotcha. The timeframe all lines up. And during that time, Superman went from. Yeah, we said that. So practically every other book that DC published fell dramatically. So by holding my own, I actually doing very well at the. At the same time, Marvel was sort of taking off and taking market share away from dc. DC was just living in the past. They were still doing comics for eight year olds. And Marvel had sort of seized the initiative there. But in the hierarchy of dc, the Superman family of titles was the cream of the crop. And the number one was Superman, number two was Action. And then I believe by the end of my run, I believe adventure comics with Legion was an easily number three, maybe number two. And that was true. And what DC did then was said, okay, well now that adventure's selling, we want to maintain those sales, so we're going to move Supergirl and feature Supergirl as the lead in adventure. And they moved Legion to backups in action, and that did not work. Supergirl starred in the book for a couple years, and then Inventure became a book of a lot of different things, including Aquaman, Prince, Starman. Not Prince as Starman, but the Prince Starman, Prince as Star Man. [00:52:33] Speaker B: Oh, my gosh. [00:52:35] Speaker A: And a lot of different things. You saw one of those books when I bought it at summercon, I bought three of those. [00:52:42] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:52:42] Speaker A: That co featured Aquaman and some other heroes. And we did get some cool things. Show up in Adventure. The. We got the relaunch of the Golden Age. Specter showed up in Adventure later on. But eventually, eventually Adventure comics would die out. It would end its run in digest size, consequently repeating and reprinting Legion of Superhero stories in digest size. Just a testament to what Jim Shooter did with the book. And when they end the book, they end up reprinting a bunch of his stories. [00:53:17] Speaker B: I have a bunch of the Digest. [00:53:20] Speaker A: I do too. I wish that was one of the things we talked about, because I was buying Digest and I didn't know you had them, and I just would have taken them from you. [00:53:27] Speaker B: No, I can't give them to you. They're mine. [00:53:31] Speaker A: You would give me Legion digests. No. Yes, you would. [00:53:35] Speaker B: They're mine. [00:53:37] Speaker A: You would give them to me. [00:53:38] Speaker B: Mine. Yeah. Huh? Mine. Mine. [00:53:42] Speaker A: I would rehome them for you. So anyway, no, with that said, we got. I mean, that ends our little tribute to Jim Shooter. I know. Again, I understand that there may have been some problematic things that Jim Shooter did over his career, but in this case, I think taking a look back at the 14 year old who wrote comics, who put food on the table for his family, is where I want to leave this one off with Jim. And we might do another Jim Shooter book. Again, we did get some suggestions like reading Secret wars and things like that. And I think it would make sense to read Secret wars down the line since I've never read it. And taking a look at some of that stuff, I'd love to dig into some of the things that were happening during Jim Shooter's run as editor in chief, too. Specifically in Avengers. I mentioned wanting to take a look at Ms. Marvel at the time. Okay, Photon. And finding out the origins of that character and how we were promoting going back to what Jim Shooter wanted to do with Pharaoh Lad. Right. Increasing the presence of African American heroes in comics under his editorial watch. So, you know, there are some things there that I might want to go back and look at, but for now, I just want to leave it on a kid who wrote comic books for me, a kid to read that. As a kid, I scoured o' Leary's books trying to get the Legion books and read these old ones over and over again too, and thought they were great and was sad when Pharaoh Lad died and had to look up what Pharaoh was. [00:55:24] Speaker B: What is Pharaoh? [00:55:26] Speaker A: Yeah, I don't understand. Why is he turning to iron? [00:55:30] Speaker B: Oh my goodness. That's what it means. [00:55:33] Speaker A: And the Persuader. [00:55:39] Speaker B: I love it. [00:55:41] Speaker A: So anyway, you get a little glimpse into little Danny Shabbat in his comic books. And there we go. So anyway, when I close this one out, I want to shout out and thank Ann for letting you do the podcast on an off night tonight. So, and that would be Ann at the Retro Emporium on Meeker street in Kent, Washington. Go relive your childhood. I'm sure Anne would like us to stop podcasting now since she's taking the day off and probably wants to hang out with you. So we'll shut up soon. But thank you, Ann, for letting us do the podcast and go check out Relive youe Childhood there. Go smell the Froot Loops. And. And if you find. Basically, something you should know about Ann is her phone was stolen recently. And that's because the Squacho man was not there. [00:56:30] Speaker B: It's true. [00:56:30] Speaker A: Serving as the Employee of the month, taking care of her phone. And I know you never met the Squacho man because you're never in the room at this. Every time I see Squatcho man, you're gone. And I never see you all in the same place at the same time. But if I was going to talk to the Squacho man again, I'd really want to tell him that you dropped the ball. Squatro Man. [00:56:52] Speaker B: He did. If he was there. But he wasn't. He was. It's summertime. He's out. [00:56:57] Speaker A: Well, no. He didn't even bother to show up for work. That's the problem. [00:57:00] Speaker B: I know. [00:57:01] Speaker A: Well, he's the former Employee of the Month. He has dropped the ball. [00:57:07] Speaker B: It was Sunday. Kayla was there. She was doing her art thing and talking to the people. That's that. [00:57:14] Speaker A: Then you had even more need for Squasho man to show up to work so Anne could focus on the store. [00:57:20] Speaker B: That's true. Well, she was focused. [00:57:22] Speaker A: Watcho, man. [00:57:22] Speaker B: She was. [00:57:23] Speaker A: I have a bone to pick with you. Next time I see you, we're going to discuss this and we're going to consider removing you as Employee of the Month. [00:57:33] Speaker B: What? No. [00:57:35] Speaker A: You can't resist feelings that you don't even know why why does it hurt your feelings? You don't even know this man. [00:57:41] Speaker B: I. I think annuache. O man Employee. The employee of the month placard down. Because he hasn't been around. [00:57:48] Speaker A: Well, that doesn't make him not employee of the month. I mean, he still was. [00:57:52] Speaker B: It's true. He still was. [00:57:53] Speaker A: I'm gonna move it retroactively. [00:57:55] Speaker B: Oh. Remove it retroactively. Oh, my gosh. Scrub all the photos of the store with his. His picture. [00:58:02] Speaker A: Yeah, it'll be like zero hour when. It'll be like zero hour when Pharaoh Lad shows up again. Actually just shows up as Pharaoh. Yeah. Pharaoh Lad does eventually come back, by the way. [00:58:13] Speaker B: He's not dead, but. [00:58:15] Speaker A: But not this ferLead. So in five year later, Legion, yeah, they had the SW6 legionnaires, which were clones. So Pharaoh Lad came back as a clone temporarily. [00:58:25] Speaker B: Okay. [00:58:26] Speaker A: And then after zero hour, when the Legion is back in time, so the Legion is in the 20th century, which. What's never putting the legion in the 20th century, I always thought was silly. But they meet a character named Pharaoh who has a twin brother named Douglas, who. [00:58:45] Speaker B: I thought you say name Lad. [00:58:47] Speaker A: Yeah, which. Which you'll recall when we read adventure. When we read legion of superheroes 300. [00:58:55] Speaker B: Okay. [00:58:56] Speaker A: We did read it, right? Or did we stop at Great Darkness? [00:59:00] Speaker B: I think we might have stopped at Great Darkness. [00:59:03] Speaker A: Legion of Superheroes 300 is one of my favorite standalone books of all time. Douglas was Pharaoh Lads twin, Andrew's twin, and so he's going crazy because he lost his twin, and Brainiac 5 is trying to heal him. So it's. [00:59:18] Speaker B: I don't recall. [00:59:20] Speaker A: It's an incredible story with all of these artists and flashbacks, and they brought together all these Legion artists. We're going to have to review it someday, even if I'm gonna have to give it to you, even if we don't do it on the podcast, because it's a fantastic issue. Just for the art alone, because they take all these artists from Keith Giffen all the way back to Kurt Swan and have them draw different pieces of the story. [00:59:40] Speaker B: That's cool. I like it. [00:59:42] Speaker A: So they have James Sherman drawing. They have Dave Cockrum drawing. They have Grail drawing. I think they had Girl drawing. I can't remember, but I know they had Cochrane drawing in there. Anyway, it's crazy. Anyway, they do a lot, but eventually after zero hour, they introduce this character called Pharaoh, and then he goes back with them to the 30th century. So that's how they sort of snuck Pharaoh back into the Legion but yeah, it's very cool. It's a. It's a thing. So. [01:00:11] Speaker B: Okay, there you go. I get. [01:00:17] Speaker A: But yeah, that was the. That was the fate. So we. We did some plugs out of order. I ended the podcast out of order, but everything's out of order. But that's ok. You're out of order. Do you have anything to. Did you. Did you have anything you wanted to plug? My. Fine, sir. [01:00:30] Speaker B: You know, I. We plug it all the time, but. Absolute Zeros, Camp Launchpad, a great book for summer reading. If. If you have any little ones or yourself that just wants to reconnect with your fun, youthful, youthful self that went to summer camp or wanted to go to space camp, pick it up, check it out, find it at local comic book stores, bookstores, Amazon, wherever you get books. Graphic novel. [01:00:59] Speaker A: Now I understand now, by the way, I was wrong. There was no Mike grell in this 300. But get this. How crazy this. Here's your pencil lineup. Ready? Keith Giffen, Kurt Schaffenberger, Howard Bender, Kurt Swan, Dave Cockram, Jim Sherman, and Joe Staden. [01:01:17] Speaker B: Wow, that's a list. That's a good list. [01:01:23] Speaker A: And to make it even better, Jim Sherman, Dave Cockrum inked themselves. [01:01:29] Speaker B: Yeah. [01:01:31] Speaker A: Malchat inked Giffen. So that was the art combo you liked during the great Darkness saga. [01:01:36] Speaker B: Yeah. [01:01:37] Speaker A: Schaffenberger inked himself, Frank Giacola, Ink Tower, Bender. Yeah, the only one. I don't know. I should know. Dan Atkins inked Kurt Swan, and Dick Giordano inked Jim Staton. [01:01:56] Speaker B: Well, makes sense. [01:02:00] Speaker A: It's amazing that that book, to me, isn't. I know. I know why books aren't worth more. But it's amazing with all of that talent in that book, why that book isn't worth, like, you know, a thousand bucks. [01:02:10] Speaker B: Yeah. [01:02:10] Speaker A: But anyway. [01:02:12] Speaker B: Million dollars. [01:02:13] Speaker A: Yeah. So if you want an easily accessible book that you can go find with crazy art in it, just go. There you go. Anyway, I got distracted with art and Legion and things like that, and so we probably should wrap this one up. But yeah, buy Absolute Zero's Camp Launchpad. Go visit the Retro Emporium. Utilize Jiu Jitsu lawyer Paul for your legal services and your Jiu Jitsu needs. And I'll give a shout out. Greg will be out in the community, but I am podcasting from the basement this year, so maybe you'll never see me, but whatever you say that, dude. [01:02:49] Speaker B: You showed up at the store just like all of a sudden, like two weeks ago. So you never know when you see Dan. Dan just shows sometimes what happens. [01:02:59] Speaker A: Hey, I've got an Alaska 2 for 1 companion fair ticket. Greg, there are comic shows around the country. We could show up anywhere. You never know. [01:03:06] Speaker B: We could show up anywhere. We can go visit Travis. [01:03:09] Speaker A: We could. We could shout out travis, by the way, take care of yourself, buddy. Yeah, and we'll. We'll get out of here. Talk to you soon, everyone. See you next week. We don't know what we're covering yet, but we'll advertise it. [01:03:24] Speaker B: It'll be awesome.