“Yesterday’s” Comic> Adventures In The DC Universe #4

Kyle tries out for American Gladiators.

Adventures In The DC Universe #4

DC Comics (July, 1997)

WRITER: Steve Vance

PENCILER: John Delaney

INKER: Ron Boyd

COLORIST: Bob LeRose

ASSISTANT EDITOR: Frank Berrios

EDITOR: KC Carson

Green Lantern: “So This Lady Walks Into An Espresso Bar…”

LETTERER: Tim Harkins

Mister Miracle: “Escape From The Slab!”

LETTERER: Gaspar

In our main story, Amazing Grace comes up with a plan to steal the last Green Lantern ring, but Glorious Godfrey wants to be the one to gain Darkseid’s favor and interferes. While this gives Kyle a break from creating a restaurant mascot for kids, he still has to use their sibling rivalry to defeat them, with Darkseid ready to punish them for their failure.

What they got right: Kyle uses that creativity that makes him my preferred Green Lantern. Grace starts a fight in Radu’s espresso bar to drawn Green Lantern out (probably not realizing he lives upstairs) and he stops the fighters by trapping them in mugs. Godfrey uses Kyle’s dislike of working on the mascot to trap him, so he uses little kiddie versions of Godfrey and Grace to capture them. It’s why I like him so much. Also, the scene on the cover almost completely matches a scene in the book itself.

What they got wrong: But come on, Kyle, is a kiddie mascot for a happy family restaurant really “stupid” because your boss misunderstood what you meant by cartoons? I’d blame the 90s but that nonsense still goes on today. Kids cartoons are only “good” if they make older viewers happy. Honey Bunny is a cute little thing and I wouldn’t mind working on it.

In our back up story, gangsters take over the prison and force Mister Miracle, who is there to perform an escape as part of a promotional event to promote a movie about a prison break, to break out their boss, “Winky” McCoy. (He’s called that because of his twitch in his right eye but he wants to be called “Mad Dog” now.) With the guards, camera crew, and the host who stars in the movie all hostages, Mister Miracle has no choice until he can arrange a situation for Big Barda to take down the crooks and lead McCoy into a trap. It’s a fun little story.

Recommendation: These were good, fun superhero stories that was made for kids but any adult who can get over themselves might enjoy it too. Give it a read.