Unca Cheeks the Toy Wonder's Silver Age Comics Web Site!
COMIC BOOK CHARACTERS SO BLOODY LAME
AND AWFUL, YOU FEEL LIKE BLUDGEONING BABIES TO DEATH WITH A CLOTHES IRON
(PART TWO)
Oh, yeah. That's right. We'll be taking on that big, dopey
Fanboy Fav'rite, as well -- quite possibly the fannish Holiest of Holies, all
things being equal; their own mesomorphic Shroud of Turin -- a little later
in the proceedings. Festival seating. Reserve your tickets now.
"Animal"-type characters are, of course, one of the time-honored conventions
of the mainstream American adventure comics genre. The
Batman; Spider-Man; The
Black Panther; Black Canary; Robin;
The Blue Beetle... well. Just take my
word for it: it's quite the little list, once you get decently underway.
Just as all individuals are not born of equivalent mental capabilities and physical prowess, however... so, too, are not all "animal" heroes equally inspired in conceptualization and/or execution, in turn.
Take (just as a f'rinstance, mind) the Archie Comics super-hero of the early '60's known as: The Jaguar. [See cover reproduction, below]
I cannot possibly hope to improve upon the origin recounted for this character
within Mike Benton's invaluable SUPERHERO COMICS OF THE SILVER AGE: The
Illustrated History... so I won't even try.
To wit:
"While fleeing from a dinosaur awakened by a jungle earthquake, zoologist Frank Hardy stumbles into an Incan temple. He discovers a jaguar-skin belt filled with 'nucleon-energy.' The belt can transform its wearer into 'a human jaguar, with supreme power over animals everywhere in the universe.' Hardy becomes the Jaguar when he wears the belt and says: 'The Jaguar!' As the Jaguar, he has the strength of 'a million elephants,' and can fly through space."
I stand in hushed, respectful awe of any man who can so concisely sum
up the utter, mind-boggling imbecility of any premise such as that, without
then leaving the house and kicking stray nuns and orphans to death in the street,
immediately thereafter. ("... a million ELEPHANTS..."? "...
animals everywhere in the UNIVERSE" -- ?!?)
If we're talkin' the stone silliest-looking "animal" hero of all time, however... one would be hard-pressed, I venture, to effectively gainsay this contestant's claim to the title.
Ladies and gentleman... I give you: Gold Key Comics character... The Owl. [See cover reproduction, below]
This lycra'd lame-o actually has a "pedigree" (of sorts) connecting him, via
creative umbilical cord, to both Superman
AND the Batman, believe it or not. Written by former Superman
co-creator Jerry Siegel -- in between issues of the equally fowl (...
ummmm... I meant: foul) The Shadow,
for the Archie Comics group, one presumes -- the series concerned itself with
the costumed exploits of "special police investigator, Nick Terry."
(He's not just any "police investigator," you see; he's a special
one, is our clever little Nickster. All the other investigators
in his department dress up as really silly animals, I suppose.
Like dung beetles, maybe.)
"Inspired by a creature of the night," Nick resolves to tart himself up as a big, p-u-r-p-l-e owl. (An exceptionally rare avian breed of same which he discovered, doubtless, during one of his "special" investigations.) He then designs and cobbles up for himself such crime-fightin' necessities as a flying "Owlmobile"; an "Owlgun"; "OwlGas grenades"; the always-handy "Owlbelt"; the omnipresent "Owl Ray" (a "black light" device, much of a muchness with that of the Golden Age comics heroine Phantom Lady)...
... heck: he even goes out and recruits himself a similarly fashion-challenged sidekick (gibbering idiot of a fiancé, "Laura Holt"; a.k.a., "Owl Girl.").
Given that this title came out during the height of the mid-'60's "camp" craze
-- which was occasioned, in turn, by the jaw-droppingly popular twice-weekly
BATMAN television show, of said era -- I'd say that calling this character "inspired
by a creature of the night" understates the case rather significantly,
really. I'm just sayin', is all.
For sheer, unrelenting offensiveness, on the other hand... I've yet to see the mainstream American comic which can give Tod Holton: Super Green Beret even a halfway decent run for its money. [See cover reproduction, below]
Published by the same outfit (the embryonic Lightning Comics) which gave us the far worthier Fatman, the Human Flying Saucer, this distasteful little number comes as close to qualifying as hate speech, outright, as any adventure comic I've yet encountered. Or hope to encounter, for all of that.
High school student Tod Holton shares a sort of telepathic "rapport" (which is never explained; incidentally; he just... does, is all) with a nameless Tibetan monk, who -- in turn -- employs his vast array of psionic abilities to "monitor evil throughout the Third World." Whenever this wizened and wrinkled "holy man" detects trouble of a sufficient magnitude, he uses his uncanny mental abilities to make the Green Beret cap in Tod's bedroom glow, by way of signal.
Whenever Tod dons this creepy chapeau, he is instantly transformed into the cocksure and granite-jawed Super Green Beret: with enhanced strength; speed; stamina... and the ability to instantaneously teleport himself anywhere, by SALUTING. (!!)
(On one occasion, Young Master Holton even utilizes this whole saluting-while-wearing-the-cap
thing to travel back through time, as well. I hold back nothing
from the lot of you! Nothing!)
The "stories" (let's just agree to the term, if only for the sake of sweet convenience) in this title's two published issues were both jingoistic and unabashedly racist, with the title character given to spouting such vile aphorisms as: "You Viet Cong are all just dirty little monkeys, aren't you?", and: "Let's see if a white fist can knock some of that yellow from your hide!"
It is -- quite simply -- the only comic ever covered on this site which I've felt compelled to handle with a pair of leaden tongs. It shall not be mentioned again.
On a less disgusting (although no less gape-inducing) front, on the other
hand... I suppose we could always discuss Harvey Comics' G. I.
Juniors, for a moment.
[See cover reproduction, below]
This was a sort of quasi-"spin-off" title from the immensely (if inexplicably)
popular sub-franchise of SAD SACK titles which Harvey was putting out at the
time. They were: Mosquito Boy; Robotboy; Rocketboy;
and Rubberboy. (I'm reasonably certain you can all match names
to costumed countenances yourselves, in this particular instance.)
Students at a particularly ineptly-run military academy (the "G.I. Juniors," of the series' title), these four pre-adolescent counterparts of the adult characters in the SAD SACK comics, this quixotic quartet referred to themselves as The Super Kids, and spent the overwhelming majority of their time engaging in exploits which were every bit as enervating as they were, ultimately, pointless and inane. Their (sometimes) adult "chaperone," in such instances, was the decidedly non-powered (not to mention brain-dead) Super Sarge: their perpetually fretful and befuddled commanding officer/instructor.
It was from the same comics company which gave us Bee-Man,
folks. That should serve as warning enough, right there.
I suppose this next contestant qualifies handily as: "The Single Comics
Character Whose Non-Stop Whining Most Makes Me Want To Throttle the Life
Out of Newborn Kittens."
There will now be a brief intermision, while all the hard-core "Surfer"
fanboys out there set to composing scurrilous e-mail messages with my online
name and address on 'em.
Lookit: I'm as unapologetic and inveterate a Jack Kirby booster as you're ever, ever gonna find anydamnedwhere online. (A quick perusal of the gratifyingly well-received "God Save the King" pages, elsewhere on this site, should be all it takes to establish my personal bona fides in THAT regard.)
Still: let's all just drop any fond, fannish pretenses and own up to the indisputable, here. The Silver Surfer is one of the most plain ol', flat-out ridiculous comics characters ever conceived of by anyone... much less the artistic and creative juggernaut we all (rightly) acknowledge as: The KING.
He's a naked bald guy. On a surfboard. Flying through outer space. And he's... like... virtually all-powerful, right? Only he breaks out into frenzied, hysterical sobbings if you even give him so much as a really mean look...
... and: He. Talks. To. His. Surfboard.
If this colossal goober had debuted in the pages of -- oh, say -- ROM: SPACE
KNIGHT, rather than those of the venerated THE FANTASTIC
FOUR... we wouldn't even be debating this point.
Finally: I suppose it's just about time we gave this particular
waste of perfectly good paper stock the extended verbal "finger" he's so richly
deserved, for the past two decades or so.
Oh, good golly... where to begin with this: The Fanboy's "He-Man"
Wish Fulfillment Wet Dream...?
This singularly unsavory and unpleasant character -- created by the otherwise estimable Len Wein, within the pages of THE INCREDIBLE HULK; and later explicated by the rather less estimable Chris Claremont, in turn, in latter-day UNCANNY X-MEN -- is almost single- handedly responsible for the decade-plus-long "blood and darkness" period which rendered so many comic books all but utterably unreadable throughout much of the 1980's (and the better half of the 1990's, as well).
His monolithic popularity with the more blood-and-guts-enamoured segment of the comics readership caused other writers, elsewhere, to seek to "ape" the character's nihilistic riffs in their own works, leading to such verminous and despicable "anti-"heroes as (among others) Venom; Lobo; Deadpool; Deathstroke; Artemis; and Elektra... as well as opening the door wide for harsher, uglier versions and/or revivals of such studiedly bleak and violent fare as the '80's/early '90's versions of Guy Gardner (brain-damaged and jingoistic berserker) and Hawkman (a patricidal drug addict).
I... dislike this character.
I dislike him a whole lot, quite frankly.
When (and how) on earth did we ever reach the conclusion that such wildly misconceived characters as these were better for (or even equivalent TO) inspiring and ennobling four-color dreamstuff such as, say, Captain America; Black Lightning; Thor; or Green Lantern, anyway...?
Well. All right, then. I got just the teensy-weensiest bit "worked up," there, at the very end.
That's okay, though. You've all been hectoring me and hounding
me for another one of these "feeb fests" for bloody months, now.
And you all know darned good and well how I get in such circumstances,
after all... so: none of those eyesbrows-cocked-in-quizzical-astonishment, if
you please.
Now: off to bed, the whole scruffy, adorable lot of you. Unca Cheeks will be upstairs to read you your bedtime story, directly.
This [holds aloft a well-worn copy of GREEN EGGS AND HAM] if you're good...
... or this [thrusts issue #1 of TOD HOLTON: SUPER GREEN BERET into
their terrified faces] if you're NOT.
The All-Time Lousiest Super-Hero Comic Ever Made
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