Pre-Crisis Primer: Long in the Tooth

Batman 372

Detective Comics 539

“What Price, The Prize?”

Most exciting image from this story. Doesn't happen in story.

Dear reader, if one will recall, I admitted to being very excited to finally sit down and and read this run of Batman stories. While I'm not going to go all out and say I'm disappointed, because I'm not, several stories, namely the Deadshot and Joker stories have been bang-on. I've also enjoyed the Jason Todd sub-plot that's been the main push behind the characters action in these stories. I'm not blown away though, for everything good story, there's a horrible story. There was even one Catman (not a typo) story that was so bad I just up and decided not to even write an article about it. This is why we jumped from Batman #370 to Batman #372. And I like cheesy villains like Catman as I've gone on about numerous times in the past.

Long preamble all to say: I do not like this Dr. Fang sub-plot, Sam I am. I've mentioned before that Fang is a pretty weak creation, all cheesy gimmick but with no real characteristic. He's even a boring visual: bald, muscular white guy in a cape with some theater fangs in his pie hole. Yawn. 

Dr. Fang: Doctor, Mob Boss, Actor, and now...Boxer!

I was excited for this sub-plot when it started: Gotham City Detective Harvey Bullock learns through underworld contacts of a new up and comer in the mob business going by the name of Dr. Fang. Bullock pursues the case and eventually gets Batman involved who responds by punching the shit out of about twenty dudes. This is how Batman detects. It worked though, this attack from The Bat drove Fang back into the shadows and put a temporary stop on his designs to take over the Gotham crime scene. This is where we find Fang now on the eve of his fall.

How does Fang fall? What grandiose plan does he have up his sleeve to finally bring the Gotham underworld together under his wing the leads to his incarceration? Rigging a boxing match. Sure, crime, don't get me wrong, bad guys do it. It just seems so...anti-climactic. This is where the audience learns that not only is Fang an actor, but he was also a boxer in his earlier years. Boxer, actor, mob boss: at least the guy doesn't remain stagnant in his career. Fang's big plan is to prove that he is a rule-maker and rigging the championship match will be the way to do it. I think he's crazy anyway, so the crazy logic here makes perfect sense.

The boxing rigging goes poorly in that the current champ, the man who has been paid to throw the fight, refuses. He wins the fight in a decisive manner and is shot for his troubles. Fang, even though he's only proven that he can't even rig a fight correctly now gets Batman back on his ass because of the poorly planned murder.

Oh Batman's not happy now.

The kicker: Batman doesn't even take down Fang. No, instead it's the opponent of the rigged fight, the guy tricked into fighting the champ in a fight he wasn't supposed to win. He helps Batman navigate the boxing scene to find Fang (who used to be a boxer, ho ho ho) who's hideout is in an abandoned gym. Pretty anti-climactic, as I said, but at least Fang is finally down and out. In fact, he's predictably punched so damn hard that his fangs are knocked out of his stupid head. Whatever, at least this sub-plot is finally done. 

Batman just watches, Fang is beneath his contempt. Crazy honky takes him out.

As I mentioned earlier, I think this sub-plot did have some promise, and apparently so did the writer as he'd return to this sub-plot with a different character in a story almost ten years from this point. The stories from here on out will begin to focus more on Jason Todd and specifically the legality of Bruce Wayne's adoption of the boy, so I still have some level of excitement for these stories and we'll see how it plays out.

Pre-Crisis Primer: We Don't Need No Masks

Green Lantern 187 – 189

“Decent Exposure”

Oh yeah, take it off.

Hal Jordan did things his way, now it's time for John Stewart to shake things up a bit. First order of business: go public. What hero would be caught dead in a domino mask anyway?

'Decent Exposure' does a great job of comparing two men, Hal Jordan and John Stewart, both thrust into new roles, Jordan as a civilian and Stewart as superhero, and both struggling to live up to what has come before them.

Predator is really enjoying himself.

Jordan, continuing to poorly adjust to life as a non-superhero, professional test pilot and lover to aircraft-manufacturer president Carol Ferris, discovers that mysterious vigilante The Predator, last seen helping Stewart against Eclipso, has been attempting to court Ferris romantically. The Predator responds to Jordan's bravado by handing him a beating. Jordan's refusal to give up lead to the beating being quite severe. To add insult to injury, Predator steals a kiss from a distraught Ferris before walking past the bloody Jordan. Predator savored manhandling the helpless Jordan and not for the first time does Jordan curse himself for giving away his power ring and quitting the Green Lantern Corps.

Yeah, how can you not feel bad for the chump?

For the first time in a long while I feel myself finally finding a foothold on the Hal Jordan character. Here we have the alpha white male, the guy who's always had the power, a ring that can do whatever he wished, suddenly finding himself powerless. And while the oppressor now being oppressed is not exactly the foothold I was mentioning but instead Hal as a man who DOESN'T get what he wants and finally has a conflict that he can't smirk and punch his way through. Punching is what gets him into trouble. The old way of accomplishing tasks isn't working for Hal and he seriously has to rebuild himself. I'm eager to see where this story goes.

On the flip side, John Stewart is now Green Lantern. But where Hal is trying to continue and approach things as he did when he was a superhero, Stewart feels the need to live up to that same shadow and be the superhero as the previous Green Lantern. Victories against Major Disaster and Eclipso (he rules!) have definitely helped the neophyte hero's confidence as far as his status as Green Lantern is concerned. This confidence is completely shattered when Stewart attempts to help a shuttle stranded in orbit around the Earth and unable to return home. Stewart attempts to simply tow the ship back to Earth by using his ring to create rope and vise constructs. All his efforts simply lead to more damage against the shuttle. In the end, the astronauts are able to get back-up systems up and running and save themselves in spite of Stewart's efforts. 

What an ingrate.

The Guardians, leaders of the Green Lantern Corps, send a veteran GL, a woman from the planet Korugar. Korugar, apart from being the home planet of classic Green Lantern villain Sinestro, is also in the sector adjacent to Earth. In a way Katma and Stewart are partners and partners train one another.

Katma shadows Stewart and even helps him take down a minor villain, Sonar, master of sound. Katma less trains Stewart in the ways of combat but in subtle ways to use the ring to resolve conflict without always resorting to brute force.

Stewart continues to grow as a character and quickly establishes himself out from under the shadow of the previous Green Lantern in one major way. He quickly notices that Katma and the other Lanterns do not wear a mask. They do not hide their identities from the people they save and why should he? Stewart goes public as Green Lantern, basking in the adoration and glory of a gracious public. Again, like the Jordan story, I'm eager to see where this go and what consequences, if any, Stewart will endure because of his actions here.

Bosom Buddies.

Bonus story! Because older comics were all about bang for the buck and crammed full of dense story (such an old man statement) we get to also learn about the mysterious Green Lantern named Mogo. Mogo's story is brief: it concerns an intergalactic bruiser known as Bolphunga who's only heard whispers of the great and powerful Mogo. Being a simple man, Bolphunga decides to kill him and journeys to the planet rumored to be Mogo's homeworld. After some time on the planet, Bolphunga finally discovers the truth about Mogo, a truth so horrifying that it sends him fleeing the planet as quickly as possible. Mogo is not an individual, but the planet itself. Mogo is a sentient planet. Hello Mogo.

Mogo! He's an entire planet. Does he shit planetoids?

Mogo represents one of the cooler aspects of the entire Green Lantern mythos, completely different non-humanoid characters. Not everyone needs to be bipedal or even have a body. I'm going to try my best to showcase a lot of the cooler, weirder members of the Corps as we meet more.

Pre-Crisis Primer: Welcome to The Green

Swamp Thing 35-36

'The Nuke-Face Papers'

He's so hungover.

Swamp Thing finally meets his match. What Hell and Fear could not conquer, a deranged drifter with a penchant for toxic waste achieves.

Things are going well for the muck-encrusted plant who thought it was a man at one point but now knows it's a plant but still acts like a man anyway, because whatever. He revealed his love to Abby Arcane, who is more than willing to requite; Abby's uncle, Swamp Thing's nemesis Anton Arcane, has been consigned to Hell for eternity (this is comics, who are we kidding); and now the hero is content to laze about his days in the swamp, spending time with Abby and every now and again sharing a yam. Like a lover.

The rules of narrative unequivocally dictate that shit go massively awry and 'The Nuke-Face Papers' is more than willing to oblige. The story comes at the reader from several different angles. At one point we're following a young couple, Wallace and his pregnant wife Treasure, who are traveling from Pennsylvania to Louisiana because Wallace is receiving a new job within his company. Wallace has a secret, he was involved with some kind of industrial waste dumping disaster. Another angle is that of the titular Nuke-Face: less a run-of-the-mill nuclear-powered super villain, Nuke-Face is a drifter suffering from severe radiation exposure. Instead of being killed he's become sort of a Typhoid Mary carrier, infecting those he comes into contact with radiation sickness.

The friendly guy at the end of the bar.

To a lesser extent the story also introduces us to two workers illegally dumping waste in the swamp, as well as a group of children from Houma, the Louisiana town near where Swamp Thing makes his home, who witness Nuke-Face hiding among the trees and make a game of looking for him. At the center of this, the knot that ties all the story strands together, is Swamp Thing.

It is revealed Wallace really is a no-good kind of guy in that he was both responsible for some illegal waste dumping that led to some very bad things happening to some people, as well as the guy in charge of moving the operation south before anyone gets wind of what happened. What happened being that a bunch of homeless men and drifters up and disappeared near the dump site. Bad mojo. What Wallace is unaware of is that the results of this dumping led to more than death: it lead to Nuke-Face, a man who now survives by subsisting on the illegally dumped waste. He loves the stuff, and he's bound and determined to follow Wallace wherever he may go.

The resolution to the story is a bit unorthodox. The illegal dumping perpetrated by the unnamed company is not revealed. There are hints that with proper investigating, the dumping would be brought to light, but also hints that bribery will be the order of the day. Nuke-Face is not fought, nor even incarcerated. He disappears into the night, looking for more of the waste he loves so much. The only bit of traditional resolution is the poetic justice faced by Wallace when he realizes that his wife, Treasure, has had explicit contact with Nuke-Face and it's strongly hinted that the unborn baby will be affected negatively by this exposure. Poetic justice for Wallace maybe, but Treasure is the one who really suffers here. 

She'll give birth to The Toxic Avenger.

As for the Swamp Thing meeting his match? He plays a minor part in this story in terms of 'screen time' because he's one of the first characters to stumble upon Nuke-Face who, through purely accidental means, manages to burn the Swamp Thing badly with his radioactive touch. Swamp Thing is burnt so badly that his limbs dissolve and melt, and, in front of Abby, he begins to totally dissolve. Letting go of the man for an instant and realizing he is a plant and that plants regrow with the seasons, Swamp Thing has one last gamble. In front of Abby, the Swamp Thing dies. That's a pretty complete resolution there. 

What Etrigan and Arcane couldn't accomplish, a nice gesture does instead.

Rest assured, there will be a next issue, but for now the Swamp Thing is dead. 

That's all folks.

'The Nuke-Face Papers' is another winner in the Alan Moore and Stephen Bissette run of stories we've covered so far. Coming off the brilliant 'Rite of Spring' and emotionally-charged 'Pog', the series continues its streak of thought-provoking stories. Less a part of the over-arching story of the Swamp Thing and more a self-contained tale on the effects human beings can have on the planet and each other. The story is framed with photocopies of many articles written in newspapers and science journals on the horrors of waste-dumping, nuclear power, and other man-made toxic disasters. Every action by the characters is framed as some response to an environmental disaster changing both the Earth and, as not-so-subtly made allegorical with Nuke-Face himself, humanity. The story ends much like the real-life problem of environmental damage: without much of a resolution. In fact in the final scene nuke-Face brags about how's he going to see the whole of America by the time he's done.

All this and our mean, green hero lies dead.

Not the hero we want, but the hero we deserve.

Pre-Crisis Primer: A JLA For the Eighties

Justice League of America 233-236

“Rebirth”

The old Justice League is gone. Long live the Justice League. 

For better or worse, Vibe is the mascot of the new JLA.

It's been a while since we checked in with the Justice League, but as far as stories and membership is concerned, this is where Post-Crisis continuity really starts. While it's not officially Post-Crisis yet, the stories from this point forward do not have the caveats of continuity discussed previously. From here on out, what's in the story is what actually happened. That really shouldn't be too much to ask in the first place, but if continuity wasn't complicated, there wouldn't be a need for this blog. Continuity Alerts aside, what did happen to the old team?

Pre- and Post-Crisis continuity incongruities not withstanding, what happened is simple: The JLA became too big and unwieldy for its own good. With Superman as a reserve member and official membership stretching upwards of twenty different heroes, the team grew unable to efficiently handle credible threats. With this in mind, as acting chairman, Aquaman took it upon himself to both disband the JLA and then immediately seek to rebuild it as a smaller fighting force populated with heroes dedicated to the team and able to respond quickly if called upon.

While Aquaman, Martian Manhunter, Zatanna and the Elongated Man (along with his partner-in-crime-and-marriage, Sue) are the only veteran members to remain on the team, they are joined by a motley crew of new blood. Vibe is an Hispanic man from the inner-city who, because comics can't leave any cliché well enough alone, used to run with a gang but has since reformed his ways a bit. Not only is he a break-dancer (it is 1984, of course) but his powers involve focusing and targeting waves of seismic force. Vibe's followed by the more straight-laced Steel. Steel's interesting in that on the surface: he's a legacy hero, son to the World War II masked avenger Commander Steel, who took the fight to Hitler back in his day. Steel lives up to his father's legacy in a different way in that he's actually part machine: most of his skeleton replaced with steel, his muscles bionics and his flesh bullet-proof plastics. The kicker is that Steel did not require these 'enhancements' because of an accident or harm done to him: his grandfather, eager to continue his son's legacy, forced these surgeries and procedures on his grandson to literally build him as a hero.

Vixen has a less gruesome and drama-ridden origin: she's a fashion model who inherited a mystic relic, 'The Tantu Totem.' Comics can never let go of alliteration. The Totem gives Vixen the ability to mimic animal traits: speed of a cheetah, skill of a fox, strength of a gorilla, so on and so forth. Finally, there's Gypsy, a mysterious girl with the convenient ability to turn invisible who tags along with the League but doesn't appear to be a full-time member just yet but she does have a growing relationship to the Manhunter. 

Aquaman had his moment upstaged by a lame bad guy. Poor Aquaman.

While the injection of new blood adds new life to the League, it also brings with it all sorts of drama-rife interpersonal problems. Steel and Vibe predictably are often at odds; Zatanna thinks Aquaman is pushing the new Leaguers too hard and generally being a dick about it; Elongated Man feels left out of the new team, eager for camaraderie with the new members that is slow in coming; and Gypsy plain doesn't trust anyone, opting to remain in the shadows when around the others. Aquaman may have wanted a team of Leaguers able to dedicate all their time to the cause, but he was a ways to go before their the fighting force he envisioned.

In direct contrast to the old League's base of a satellite in geosynchronous orbit above the Earth, Aquaman decided that the League needed a more grounded approach. He took himself literally by basing the team in a warehouse in Detroit. The team also takes a break, at least temporarily, from cosmic menaces and alien invaders to take on some local gangs and other terrestrial menaces such as putting a stop to street gangs in Detroit and Vixen going rogue from the team to take out a dictator named Maksai, someone with a connection to Vixen's past, and a claim to the Tantu Totem, that goes unexplained for now.

She broke both his damn arms. Pretty sure she doesn't like the dude.

By the last chapter of this story, the League faces their first major menace in a return to cosmic adventure: The Overmaster who kidnaps the team to his mountain base in Antarctica to decide the fate of the human race. In the DC Universe, the Antarctic continent is dotted with hidden alien bases.

The Overmaster is an alien menace who claims to have been responsible for several extinction events on Earth going back to the birth of the planet. Who killed the dinosaurs? This guy. At least that's what he says, like most comic book villains, Overmasters recruited a band of like-minded bad dudeds to do his fighting for him. His unnamed team consists of Black Mass, who can open black holes; Fastball, who throws objects so fast, they explode on impact; Shirke, a winged woman with a nasty set of claws; Crowbar, a guy with a crowbar; and Shatterfist, he who shatters things with his fists. 

Overmaster and his lame-ass team. Just look at Crowbar. The guy with the crowbar, FYI.

These guys are so inconsequential, The Monitor, dutifully monitoring the events of the story, wonders where a being like The Overmaster has such power to recruit and create new superhumans. He eventually decides that investigating the matter is not worth his time and moves on to bigger and better. Not even The Monitor, the guy who hired out Javelin, can be bothered with the members of Overmaster's new bad-guy team. They're all universally lame and aside from Black Mass and Fastball, I don't think a one of them is seen again after this story. The next time we see Fastball again, he's killed. Spoiler.

While the two teams enter into the obligatory battle royale, Aquaman uses his powers of aqua to deduce that any being, Overmaster or not, who claims the power he does would not need this band of losers to do his fighting for him. Stealing away from the fight, the orange-clad hero discovers that Overmaster may not be who he says he is (a villain lie?) but instead an alien parasite with delusions of granduer who's been lying in wait and observing the League, deducing them to be the greatest assemblage of heroes in way of his dominance of the planet. When Aquaman jettisons the hidden bases command center, blasting it into space, Overmaster disappears and take his motley crew of lame henchmen with him. Another day, another dollar for the JLA and the first big victory for the neophyte team.

Overmaster is a disappointment in this story. Every chapter opens with a scene from pre-history with new forms of life struggling for existence and some narrator, presumably the Overmaster deciding its not yet time and extinguishing said life. It's quite a nice build-up but the conflict and resolution fail to deliver, with the extinction events being lies told by a boasting alien menace and the conflict being the sort of rote beat-'em-up comic books are known to peddle. Basically, new JLA team does not equal new conflicts at all. The Overmaster as presented here is someone the original team could have wrapped up in much the same way.

The League takes on street crime.

This era for the JLA team is much maligned by fans, but it's not something I've read before. I know the character of Vibe is subject to much derision from comic-book readers. Given this reputation, I can't say the story of 'Rebirth' did much to sway me from this team not being a stain on the history of the Justice League. Admittedly, stain is a bit harsh; while the larger conflict and plotline for this particular story was a failure, I am interested in seeing the various interpersonal conflicts among the team members play out, specifically if any kind of resolution occurs regarding the origin of Steel. A legacy character who has this legacy forced upon him is an interesting twist in the 'son taking up the fathers mantle' story. This story may be a muddled failure, but the characters have promise. It will be interesting to see where everything goes as we approach the Crisis.

Pre-Crisis Primer: Flash Takes On Six Guys

The Flash 337-340

“Trial of The Flash Part 4”

Gang-bang gone wrong.

While the lawyers convene at court and jury selection begins on the murder trial of the Flash, the scarlet-clad superhero concerns himself with other things, namely an attack by an army of villains. The thing to remember with these villains is that they are far from the silliest Flash has faced. No, these are the serious guys.

The Pied Piper, who aided in the destruction of the FlashMuseum, as well as trying to kill the mayor and frame Flash wants to take advantage of Flash's murder-trial situation just to cause the hero grief. This is what villains do, so it's hard to really fault him this. Flash finds fault with it though and after a ludicrous sequence in which Piper reveals that he can use his pipes to open a rift to a hidden dimension and summon what are, for lack of a better term, sound demons, pummels Piper into brain damage. Really, he's left a gibbering, grinning loon after all is said and done. Going along with the old adage of 'honor among thieves,' some of Piper's friends in the rogues business don't take too kindly to this turn of events.

Piper's big plan. Turn Flash into a fucking yo-yo.

Flash is an expert about sending people to the mental house, so while he's slightly remorseful, about as remorseful as he is regarding his wife-to-be's stay in the hospital, Piper apparently had it coming. At least Piper has friends who give a damn about what happens to him in the guise of Captain Cold, bank-robber extraordinaire who wears a parka all year-round and wields a cold-gun; Trickster, maniac anarchist who uses weapons disguised as practical jokes; Captain Boomerang, Australian mercenary who uses, survey says, trick boomerangs; Weather Wizard, would-be criminal who can control the weather; and finally, Mirror Master, an assassin who has a gaggle of trick mirrors at his disposal. Together, with the Pied Piper, as well as The Reverse-Flash, when he was alive, these villains comprise The Rogues, Central City's greatest assemblage of crime.

I came up with that phrasing myself and it's not bad.

They're really trying to hide Big Sir. With a ground-level rain cloud.

Put these masterminds in a room and what comes out is a fairly round-about, fairly stupid plan to finally kill The Flash. Thinking The Flash meant to kill both the Reverse-Flash as well as incapacitate Piper, The Rogues begin fearing for their own lives and agree to dress up a super-strong man with the mind of a child as a villain and set him loose on The Flash. They also have the gusto to engage The Monitor to provide the dangerous armor and armament that will make the deranged man-child Big Sir an unstoppable killing machine. Monitor's spent enough time arming and providing super-villains with work and weaponry all under the guise of averting or perpetrating some forthcoming disaster (Crisis, duh) so he goes along with their silly plan. 

Just remember they had to strip him to dress him.

Of course this doesn't work, not only does The Flash not die, but he ends up making friends with his would-be assassin, the moronically-named Big Sir. The Rogues are able to make their escape and Flash is able to make it to court on time...for his trial to begin.

My praise from Part 1 of this story seems to have been premature. 'The Trial of The Flash' drags in this middle section, with Flash's supposedly impressive rogues gallery proving themselves to be just as stupid as they look. There's none of the real kookiness or Silver-Age charm here, just a bloated story that feels like its buying time, stretching itself thin just to make it to the next milestone issue (350) and the moment to finally put this story out of its misery. With the titular trial finally happening, I hope things look up, if not for The Flash, then for the reader.

These are the crazy things I love about The Flash. Batting away an RPG with a protestor's sign.

Pre-Crisis Primer: Happy Endings For Most

Tales of the Teen Titans 49-50

“We Are Gathered Here Today...”

Kory (Starfire) kind of stands out. Big 80s hair!

 It must be romance week at the Post-Crisis PostScript, because we've just transitioned from one happy couple revealing their flora/fauna love for one another and now it's time for long-time couple Donna Troy and Terry Long to tie the not. Considering the absolutely shitty year the Titans have had, I think these kids have earned themselves a bit of a party.

Before the festivities begin, there's still the standard super-villain to put out of commission: Dr. Light. Unlike most comic-book weddings, Dr. Light does not bust up the festivities instead he mostly screws up Kid Flash, Wally West's, semi-retirement. 

Dr. Light, as badass as he's ever looked.

Dr. Light is an interesting character at this point in DC Comics history. He first appeared as an early Justice League villain; Arthur Light was a brilliant physicist who built a suit capable of manipulating light in the visible spectrum. Instead of using this technology to help mankind, win a Nobel Prize and become a rich, respected man of science, Light decided to become a criminal and prove himself better than the super-humans of the Justice League. This went poorly for him. So poorly in fact that Light soon become a joke even within the comic book stories. Failing to best the JLA on several occasions and even Green Lantern without his teamates, Light was soon finding himself up against the Teen Titans. And he kept losing. Here, possibly the nadir, acting buffonish and pompous, Light is easily dispatched by two ex-Titans; the aforementioned Kid Flash, retired from the Titans because use of his speed powers could kill him, and France Kane, Magenta, magnetic mistress and current sweetheart of one W. West—superheroes who don't even have the decency to switch from civilian clothes to halt the villain in the middle of a bank robbery. 

Hauled off like a chump. I wasn't kidding.

Hauled off to jail, Light is quickly forgotten as the rest of the Titans prepare for Donna's upcoming wedding.

In an effort to take his mind off of Terra's recent death and betrayal of the team, Gar Logan, Changeling, who'd been having problems coping, depressed and succumbing to bouts of rage, is put in charge of coordinating guests, caterers, and bands. In essence, the little green kid is the wedding planner. Logan had little interest in the wedding beyond hosting it at Dayton Manor, home of the rich, schizophrenic superhero who's taken it upon himself to raise Logan (comics). The fact that he takes so well to the job just shows how integral Donna Troy is to the Titans: she recognizes the hurt her friend is in and opts to give him an important position what could arguably be the best day of her life. Gar felt alone, betrayed by a woman he might have loved, and Troy is a kind enough person to give him the spotlight on a day traditionally meant to be celebrating her.

The little green guy gets to take charge at least for one issue.

As I mentioned before, the wedding goes off wonderfully. Troy and her husband-to-be, Terry Long exchange their vows as friends and family look on and no one dies. No villain attacks. Long isn't revealed to be Deathstroke the Terminator in disguise or anything. The issue consists of 40+ pages of friends and teammates both mourning and coming to terms with their recent losses as well as celebrating what may come in the future.

In the end Troy and Long fly off into the sunset, headed to the Greek Isles for their honeymoon and some well-deserved relaxation given the hardships of the past stories. 

Donna's all kinky with the 'Greek goddess' roleplay.

The one bit of unhappiness left over is the absence of Raven. Missing since the battle with H.I.V.E., she's secluded herself in another dimension, far from the grasp of her father Trigon, a malevolent evil bent on finding her.

Not EVERY ending has to be happy. 

This won't end well.

 

Pre-Crisis Primer: Love is in the Air...

Swamp Thing 33-34

“Rite of Spring”

Swamp Thing and Abby finally reveal their true feelings for one another. Given this story is very low on plot and very high on psychedelic art, I think I'll let a series of gorgeous pages from the artist, Stephen Bissette do most of the communicating.

Cain offers his choice.

 In a bit of a nightmare sequence, Abby discovers some pertinent information to the main, over-arching plot of the Swamp thing series thus far: the fact that Alec Holland, or the swamp muck that thinks it's Alec Holland is not the first Swamp Thing to appear. Meeting the DC Universe analogues of Cain and Abel, they of the Biblical persuasion, two men doomed to lord of the House of Mystery and House of Secrets respectively, Abby chooses to hear of a secret from Abel, thinking it's a dream and nothing will come of it. When Abel reveals the secrets of previous Swamp Things (Thang?), he tries to skew the rules of secrets by rigging the dream so Abby will remember what he's told her.

The trouble with secrets is that if the information is shared, then it's no longer a secret. Mysteries may be shared and pondered, but secrets go to the grave. Just as Abel is prepared to shunt Abby back to reality, Cain appears and murders his brother for trying to subvert the rule stheir both punished to protect and act upon. Cain is punished for being the first murderer and Abel punished for being the first victim. Not fair if you ask me. It's a cycle the two play through again and again for eternity.

When Abby awakens, she forgets all she learned and only the reader is the wiser in this case.

What happens when you tell a secret.

 Abby's day gets substantially better from there when she and Swamp Thing later talk. She talks of Matt, her husband that was rendered catatonic by her insane, demonic uncle (comics!), and the guilt she feels because she is in love with another man. Swamp Thing goes on for a couple of pages about how it's ok if she loves another and she should approach this charming, handsome, dashing fellow. It takes him a while to realize that it's him to whom she's referring. While Swamp Thing may not be the most eloquent with words, he's able to express his love for Abby in other ways. Words may be nice, but it's the images that really express the love Swamp Thing feels, and has felt for a long time, towards Abby. I've mentioned before, the maturity of the characters and their relationships in this mag is far and away more mature than anything else occurring in comics at the time and this sequence is one that solidifies this fact. Comics as a story-telling medium rarely gets better.

Why Can't Hal be this open with Carol. She doesn't know what she's missing.