Little Barda?

When Jack Kirby drew Big Barda, she was, well, big!!

Well, when DC resurrected the Mister Miracle series 3 years after it was first cancelled, well, Marshall Rogers drew her...not so big.

Yup, she was now clearly shorter than Scott Free.

She could still bring it, though, as witnessed in this knockdown, drag out brawl on the moon:

Before anyone objects, A) She had just been brainwashed by Granny Goodness, so she was surely not at the top of her game, and B) a dying Mother Box had just unleashed Scott's inherent "New God" strength and such.

Still, no way should Barda be shorter than Scott...

From Mister Miracle #5 (1971) and #19-20 (1977)

Meet The New Gods,Same As The Old Gods!

On New Genesis, everyone is a comedian:

We really do need a "Lower Decks" type story about those minor nobody-has-ever-heard-of-them gods on New Genesis or Asgard or wherever...

From Mister Miracle #6 (2018)

Manic Monday Bonus--Don't Deny Big Barda!!

It's not easy to be a new messiah--especially when your wife is feeling..ummm...needy?

Mister Miracle and company have just gotten back from a little adventure on Apokolips. 

While there, Scott was whisked away by some cosmic being who gave him a very trippy lecture on how to save the universe (long story short--Scott has to set himself up as a new messiah on Earth to free it from the New Genesis/Apokolips struggle).

Well, they get home, but Scott is still processing his mind blowing revelations...

This goes on for many panels...

Many, many panels...

That's an Apokolips mating ritual...

Lesson: when your wife is a god, don't neglect her needs!!

From Mister Miracle #24 (1978)

The Haneyverse, Chapter 3--Spielberg & Lucas Owe Bob Haney A Lot Of Money!

It is one of the facts of the universe that every single pop culture idea of the past 60 years has been ripped off from Bob Haney. Haney did it first, folks.

Let's take Indiana Jones And The Last Crusade.

Our hero is approached by a gorgeous blonde archeologist...

(Dr. Ingrid BORG?!?! Great, now Star Trek is ripping of Haney...)

...and, thinking with his nether regions, our hero joins her on her quest...

......to get into an impenetrable fortress and claim an artifact that grants eternal life.

So, nothing at all like Haney's story here.

Also, Lois Lane in Man Of Steel talked just like she does here:

"I'm a Pulitzer Prize-winning reporter!" "I am a noted archeologist!" Haney women (and the women in movies that rip off Haney) don't do humble brag--they go straight to "gratuitous résumé blurt"!

Anyway, to continue our story, Indiana Jones Scott Free obtains the immortal life-granting totem for Elsa Schneider Ingrid Borg, and then it comes time to turn on him:

Ladies: make sure you ask your high school guidance counselors why they never told you that "hired adventuress" was a career option...man, even Tomb Raider ripped off Haney...

So she kills him...

...except Haney just makes up a new super-power for Mister Miracle:

So "lightning reflexes" means "moves as fast as The Flash"???

Which of course leads to...

Ah, well. The irony of dying just as you've obtained the item that grants eternal life is not at all like what happened in the third Indiana Jones movie...not a thing.

Disney, get those royalty checks in the mail...

BONUS: Indiana Jones And The Kingdom Of The Crystal Skull makes a hell of a lot more sense if you think of it as a Bob Haney story...

From The Brave And The Bold #112 (1974)

The Haneyverse, Chapter 2--Reporters Have All The Pick-Up Lines

Let's be blunt--Bob Haney knew how to smooth talk the ladies.

As Mister Miracle prepares an audacious escape atop the Eiffel Tower...

...a reporter takes the opportunity to hit on Miracle's fiancee:

You know that guy was up all night working on that line, right?

Sadly, that's all we see of the "journalistic gnat" (Oberon's term) in the issue. Presumably, Barda killed him between panels, as much for the puns as for the effrontery...

From The Brave And The Bold #112 (1974)

Manic Monday Bonus--The REAL Reason Not To Store Our Nuclear Waste In Yucca Mountain

I just wanted to revisit the story from last week's Friday Night Fights, because even by DC 1970s standards, this story is so batsh^&* insane that you really need to know about it.

Long recap short: In DC Comics Presents #12 (1979), Mister Miracle has learned of an Intergang plot to kill Superman, but is "hypnotically blocked" from warning him or even mentioning the plot to anyone.

His solution--goad Superman into a highly publicized pay-per-view fight in Las Vegas, to induce Intergang to attack Superman there; and then trick Superman into flying the wrong way home, so Miracle can take out the crooks and their evil machines himself.

Seriously.

But even better, is how Scott Free decides to trick Superman into flying the wrong way home. You'd best be sitting down for this...as Superman arrives for the fight:

Got that? Superman just has to follow that mountain range to get back to Vegas. And after Kal-El puts Miracle down:

See...he's following the mountain range back to Las Vegas.

So what's the trick? How did Superman get lost? Well, get ready for the end-of-issue explanations...and please, put down any sharp objects:



HE SANK AN ENTIRE MOUNTAIN RANGE INTO THE GROUND, AND SUPERMAN NEVER EVEN NOTICED!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Wow, I guess Scott Free really was raised by Darkseid, because that is an Apokalyptan approach to a problem if ever there was one.

Of course, there is never any follow up to the suddenly absent mountain range...nothing on the environmental, geological, or even the navigational consequences. No legal repercussions, or congressional hearings. No Nevadans ticked off at a self-declared "New God" radically altering their landscape. Nope, in the pre-Crisis DC Universe, you're allowed to do stuff like that, without recrimination or reprisal!! (Of course, maybe Superman just "put it back" afterward...)

I just have the following questions for author Steve Englehart:

A) How likely is it that Superman, with all of his super senses, would not notice AN ENTIRE MOUNTAIN RANGE BEING SUNK INTO THE EARTH BY A SERIES OF HUGE EXPLOSIONS, even if it was during a fight and a storm? This is a guy who can hear Lois scream while a continent away while fighting Metallo...and he can't hear AN ENTIRE MOUNTAIN RANGE exploding right behind him?

B) How dumb is Superman, really?

C) There's no less convoluted way Mister Miracle could have used to get Superman to fly the wrong way after the fight? Really, major geological upheaval is the only way you could come up with?

D) Do you know what a mountain range is, sir?

Friday Night Fights--Houdini Style!!

It's Friday Night Fights time, Slay Cadets, and that means fun!!

Now, usually I stick the "please vote message" at the end of the fight. But numbers have been dwindling on Friday Night Fights of late, and we really, really want to get those numbers back of there. So Spacebooger is having a side-contest to help attract new participants.

And yeah, there's a gift certificate involved, but man, it's not about the money. It's about the fun. One of the reasons I started this blog is because I wanted to participate in the Fights every week. It's fun to show off your love for comics, and for audacious fight sequences.

So when you go to vote for the winner each week, don't just vote--leave a comment in the forum discussing the why of your vote. If you participate all 12 weeks of voting, you're entered into a contest to win 20 bucks.

And don't be shy--if you're a regular here, you've probably got some comic books, and maybe have access to a scanner. Do your own Fight, and join in the the fun!!

OK, now on to the show. One of the lame yet endearing things about team-up mags are the incredible contortions they went through to have the hero and the guest star meet, fight, bust up the bad guys, and part on reasonable terms in 22 pages. A lot of work for a (usually) a one-off story.

Such is the case in DC Comics Presents #12 (1979), by Steve Englehart, Rick Buckler and Dick Giordano. Through a series of events too stupid to repeat here, Mister Miracle has learned of an Intergang plot to kill Superman...but is "hypnotically blocked" from revealing that plot in any way.

So, for reasons that made sense only to Englehart and Scott Free, Miracle figures that the only way to help Superman is to trick him into a pay-per-view fight in Las Vegas. Sigh...

Anyway, the New God goes about this by setting himself up as the "New Hero Of Metropolis." Superman, in an odd bit of characterization, is really jealous of the attention Mister M is receiving, and even admits this to Jimmy! So Kal-El meets up with Miracle and politely suggests that he go find some other town to hero in. Miracle refuses, so Supes promptly challenges Mister Miracle to a fight, and agrees when Miracle ups the stakes to a TV fight "with all the hoopla money can buy."

I told you it didn't make any sense.

A week later, in the desert outside Vegas, Mister Miracle gets in the first punch:

And it's on:







Until Superman goes completely bananas:



KA-BOOM indeed.

Now, it turns out that Mister Miracle lost this fight on purpose (so he says) so that Superman wouldn't notice when the New God made a mountain range disappear (don't ask) so that Superman would follow the wrong mountain range back to Vegas and get lost (again, don't ask) and Miracle could bust up Intergang and their super-science gizmo before they could fry Superman (really, asking is contra-indicated here).

Yeah, it's silly, and dumb, and Superman is pretty well of character here, if you ask me. This issue demonstrates why most of DC Comics Presents is best taken only under guidance from a physician or a licensed comics blogger.

But then again, it's preferable to JMS' Broody Superman.

Now go vote. And do a fight.