Chapter By Chapter: The Death And Life Of Superman ch. 20

Chapter by Chapter features me reading one chapter of the selected book at the time and reviewing it as if I were reviewing an episode of a TV show or an issue of a comic. There will be spoilers if you haven’t read to the point I have, and if you’ve read further I ask that you don’t spoil anything further into the book. Think of it as read-along book club.

Last time it appeared that two supposed “Supermen” were flying around Metropolis. We followed one, for now dubbed “The Kryptonian”, but there’s also another one who thus far has only destroyed the plaque honoring Superman’s sacrifice against Doomsday. Also, one of these Supermen killed a rapist who showed up out of nowhere while Lois met up with the Kryptonian. He knows who Lois is and the name Clark Kent but states that he is only Superman now. So basically we have two Supermen who are nothing like Superman outside of some shared powers.

However, there are two more heroes to come out of this and we have yet to see them in action. Unless you count Bibbo dressing in Superman merchandise and running around helping others like superheroes in the real world. (Look up “real life superheroes” and discount the jerks making fun of people honestly trying to bring a bit of fun and joy to people’s lives.) What will befall Metropolis next and is Supergirl ready to share the skies with so many flying people?

Chapter 20: Reign Of The Supermen part 2

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“Yesterday’s” Comic> Nightwing Annual #1

The bride cuts the groom. The bride cuts the groom.

Nightwing Annual #1

DC Comics (1997)

“Forever Hold Your Peace”

WRITER: Devin Grayson (no relation to Dick…also, she’s from Connecticut)

PENCILER: Greg Land

INKER: Bob McLeod

COLORIST: Roberta Tewes

LETTERER: John Costanza

ASSOCIATE EDITOR: Darren Vincenzo

EDITOR: Scott Peterson

“Pulp Heroes” was a different kind of event. For one it was only in the annuals, unlike events today, but it wasn’t some overarching story of changing the status quo forever and ever until the next event. Instead it went to the pulp heroes, the precursor to the traditional superhero, for inspiration in crafting its tales. Devin Grayson would eventually take over the regular Nightwing comic, which some…interesting results. (I believe she wrote the story where Nightwing got raped. Because that always goes well in comics, we wrote sarcastically.)

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BW’s Morning Article Link: Flash Gordon–Bodyguard?

Sam Jones’ biggest break out character is as the title character of the 1980s adaptation of the comic strip Flash Gordon. While he’s had some minor roles since  did you know what he’s doing now? Well according to this 2012 article from Entertainment Weekly he does bodyguarding work, including in Mexico.

Jake & Leon #373: 200+ Subscribers

At this point even Max’s bad expectations are too high.

Yep, as of this writing I’m at 202 subscribers between email and WordPress Reader. (I don’t have stats on RSS feeds.) And while I still have trouble getting more commentors to the posts, I’m glad 202 of you at least are curious what topics I’m discussing. Now if you’d all read them all my stats would be through the roof, but I don’t read every article of every site I read either. Just remember, likes are nice, shares are better, and thank you for your patronage.

And because I’m not allowed to be happy my laptop isn’t booting up (some kind of memory read/write error and memory address line failure) so I had to do this comic on the desktop, where it’s a more awkward set-up than my art corner. That’s an older but recent Clutter Report link where I showed the corner off. This week I took the first breather I’ve had between weather, dentists, and other stuff to relax a bit. I’ll be doing some virtual clutter cleaning this week. And working on the laptop if I have time.

Coming up this week we have one of my favorite Batman and Robin comics in Scanning My Collection and Nightwing returns to “Yesterday’s” Comic. I’m hoping to do a Finally Watched this week, and of course more Superman being dead and Star Trek TNG being born. And we’re beginning the regular Marvel run of Doctor Who. All this and trying to find a source of income. Hopefully there are no distractions this week (especially the part where another loved one is lost…I’ve had enough of that, thank you) so I can focus on these tasks. Maybe I’ll even sneak in one last BW Panelling before the week is out. Now that’s wishful thinking.

Saturday Night Showcase: The Shadow

The Shadow as depicted on the cover of the July 15, 1939, issue of The Shadow Magazine. (image source: Wikipedia)

Who knows what evil lurks in the hearts of men. The Shadow knows.

Between comics, movies, and pulp novels, the Shadow has used his psychic abilities, especially the power to cloud men’s minds, to strike at the criminal element. But The Shadow began on radio. Just not how you might think. Yes, there was a radio show, which we’ll be looking at in tonight’s Showcase, but he actually started as a narrator for a series of advertisements for a series of crime books by Street & Smith Publications. The voice, provided by James LaCurto and later Frank Readick Jr., introduced adaptations of their stories for The Detective Story Magazine Hour. And people asked for the magazine with the Shadow, so they knew they had a potential hit here. And obviously they did.

The Shadow would return to the radio voiced by the late great Orson Wells. While his team of agents in the pulps was reduced to just his fiance, Margo Lane, and Lamont Cranston (for simplicity) would be his only identity, the series would continue on from 1937 to 1954, and would have other actors in the role of the Shadow. Tonight we listen to the first episode, “The Death House Rescue”, which features his origin in exposition, as the Shadow and Margo help clear a framed man of bank robbery and murder. And it’s the only bit of good luck the man and his wife has had lately. So turn down the lights, sit back in your favorite chair and see what evil gets up to. The ShadowWING knows. Because I already listened to it. 😀

What, you knew I had to get that pun in somehow! I chose this screenname and I have to work with it! (And know The Shadow had no influence on my screenname.)

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“Yesterday’s” Comic> Batman: Gotham Adventures #17

Linkara is wrong about rock & roll. Batman’s real number one hatred is windows.

Batman: Gotham Adventure #17

DC Comics (October, 1999)

“Daddy Dearest”

WRITER: Scott Peterson

PENCILER: Tim Levins

INKER: Terry Beatty

COLORIST: Lee Loughridge

LETTERER: Tim Harkins

ASSOCIATE EDITOR: Joseph Illidge

EDITOR: Darren Vincenzo

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Star Trek: The Next Story Bible–The Set-Up

Now that we have the backstory for the writer’s guide let’s dig into the backstory of the show as created by this point in the season one guide. “These Are The Voyages” sets up the world the writers will be creating. Next week we’ll get into the early concepts for the characters (which will be expanded on later) but this week I’m going to focus on the similarities and changes between the original and the sequel.

By this point in time Star Trek had only existed in two TV series, one created for Saturday morning, and a series of movies. (Novels and comics are not canon and while the SatAM cartoon’s canon status is debated I count it and some aspects did make their way into the show and spinoff media.) In fact the movies were still going on as The Next Generation was airing. All we really knew at the time was that the show was set after the original crew, but the writers and directors needed to know more than that, and so this section was to update creators who grew up with the original series what they would be doing differently in this updated approach. So what was planned?

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