“Yesterday’s” Comic> The Blue Beetle #45

Dan’s been running a lot on these covers lately. Is he practicing for a marathon?

The Blue Beetle #45

Fox Features Syndicate (June, 1947)

We appear to be back to a monthly schedule for our armor clad hero. Or is he still using chain-mail armor? Consistency with the previous Fox run has been nonexistent. I know what we are back to: all Blue Beetle, plus the “Minit Mystery” and text story, neither of which involves Blue Beetle. We’re still on three stories, but two of them are Blue Beetle adventures and one is a Joan Mason solo story. Nice to see that back.

[Read along with me here]

“The Museum Murders” by Otis

It’s one of those stories. Joan resembles a woman in a painting who was supposed to be some ancient civilization’s sacrifice, and now they want to sacrifice Joan. It’s a plot that has been done in one form or another for years. Not that I expect much from Otis, who apparently didn’t get the memo than Blue Beetle and Mike are friends now. At least he was drawn almost right (right body type, no mustache, still barely an Irish accent). Not one of his worst stories, but about what I expect.

“Adventure In The Gobi Desert”

Wait, so is Joan dating both Dan and Mike at the same time? It’s the 1940s so I have…questions. I also have questions about why Arabs want to steal a Chinese treasure so bad (not believing it’s simply a bunch of history books left by Marco Polo) then go after a man in America whose brother was on an expedition to find the library. I thought I had geography troubles. It’s an okay story but only because I’ve long since given up on these guys remembering Blue Beetle’s original powers were just superhuman strength, a bunch of gadgets, and bulletproof chainmail armor. Also, Mike apparently went back to his diet and made friends with Blue Beetle again. Consistency? What’s that?

Joan Mason: Reporter> “Mystery In C Major”

You know what I miss? Weird nicknames for crooks. Like the two in this story: “Soupy” Mac Dougall and “Rat-Face” Regan. Of course, if this was Dick Tracy, Rat-Face would literally have a face like a rat and Soupy would…I don’t know, look like soup noodles were stuck to him or something. Five years ago crooks hid loot from a robbery but one of the boys who didn’t get arrested hid the loot that’s music related. (I linked to the comic, you can read the details. No major spoilers here.) Now Joan of course gets pulled into the case as they try to recover the loot. It start out okay but as we get closer to the end it looks like the writer was running out of time. Perhaps smaller panels would have helped? It’s like the size I use for Captain Yuletide, but that’s set up like a minicomic. It takes away from what started to be a good story.

final thoughts

It’s an okay issue. You’d think less stories would equal more time to tell them but apparently not. The stories are mid at best. And can we get Otis away from this book? I don’t any of his stories have been all that good.