Super-Bouf!

There are some topics so resonant with comic book lovers, so mytho-structurally significant, so controversial, that I been holding back from addressing them, fearful that my contribution would be of insufficient value.

But there comes a point where such fears and insecurities must be cast aside, in the hope that passion will prevail if intellect stumbles. And so, at long last, I approach the topic of:

Night Girl's Hairdo.

"Which of us is the highest? I'm dying to know!"

That's our Lydda! Mordru may menace, the Time Trapper threaten, and Roxxas rampage, but Night Girl's only thought is, "Is there anyone with a higher bouffante than mine?"

The public story is, Night Girl's got superpowers but only when the lights are out. I guess that's like being superpowerless except from the waist down. Pity she couldn't date Hal Jordan, but in her time all that's left of him is a small plaque (where H.E.A.T. meets weekly) on the site of the bordello where he passed away at age 63 from a heart attack while atop a 20 year old Asian girl in a plasticene Star Sapphire costume. But I digress.

The real truth is, Night Girl's power is her gravity-defying hair. Gargantuan. Monumental. Brodignabian. Night Girl could only exist in the 30th Century because it will take that long for human society to develop words to describe her hair, let alone the X-Serum-based transmolecular superstablizing salon-quality hair-care products to make it possible.

Look at poor Fire Lad, the flaming little poseur. "I've tried and tried," Hot Lips thought, "but even with my own 'club-kid' hair gelled up and spikified half way to Durla and back, I still don't get any attention as long as that pumped up prom queen and her grotesque hair hillock have all the boys staring at her! Oh, why don't boys love ME instead of her! *Choke*"

Think about it, Fire Lad! What idiot wants to go to bed with a guy who shoots FLAMES from his mouth? It's rather limiting, you know. Settle down with some nice invulnerable type; heck, Ultra Boy's game for anything, wink wink.

Regular citizens have no idea what to make of Night Girl's hair. Although they live in a world of miracles like the Potential-Factors Re-Organizer Complex and the Planetary Chance Machine, they are utterly mystified by the Superbouffante of Night Girl.

"Moons of Jupiter!" exclaims Inthefore Ground, gesturing futilely, "it defies even our 30th Century Science (tm)!"

"It's--it's a helmet," stutters his brother, Intheback. "J-j-just like ours! It must be. DEAR GOD PLEASE TELL ME IT'S A JUST HELMET....!"

Of course, these are just rubes from the Rimworld of Va-va-va-voom (hey...I think I rented that movie...!). But even the ultimate galaticky sophiscate, Superboy, is mesmerized by the follicular mystery of Lydda's massive hair-mountain:

"It defies analysis by my wide array of vision powers! It seems impervious to heat vision, Star Boy's mass-inducing power .... even the unfathomable energies of the Emerald Eye! I'm positive I saw it take a direct hit from Validus last week, and yet... nothing! It's some sort of ... super-hair! Is it more power than *gulp* m-mine? Gosh, I sure hope not! That would mean that tomorrow at sunrise, I'd have to shove my hand through her thorax and crush her heart till it fused into a diamond. I hope it never comes to that...!"

All the while, Lydda's owl-insignia smirks, knowingly, silently wise about the dark tonsorial powers of its mistress. At least, until an invulnerable fist wearing a Smallville High ring smashes through it at light-speed....

Sense-shattering Superbouffante Strikes!

It's not possible to talk too much about Night Girl's hair. It's like when you add 7 to infinity, you don't get something 7 more than infinity, you just get infinity. So it is also with Lydda's bouffante, whose physical and metaphysical dimensions and import are fathomless.

You know how all those comic book covers shout that the story inside reaches some "senses-shattering" conclusion? Right, as if. This is senses-shattering, people: seeing Night Girl crash through a floor, bouffante-first, her hairdo unaffected, unmoved, imperturbable, like...
like GOD.

That floor, by the way? Inertron. 100 % pure. Shatters my senses just to look at it; can't feel fingers; blinded, typing from kinetic memory.

But perhaps you're some sort of superbeing and have survived, senses dimmed but intact. Then, prithee, cast your remaining hypervision on this little vignette, pregnant with impossibility: Lydda intends to but THAT fishbowl on THAT hairdo.

Hearing ... gone! Aural faculties ... shattered!

It's okay. I can still recover. It's not like she's actually going to be able to get it...

to...

AHHHG! NO NO NO! THAT'S! NOT! POSSIBLE!!!!!

That helmet cannot be on head. Her head cannot be in the helmet.

Some sort of ... supertesseract power inherent in the hair itself? Are its myriad of curls and wavelets actually shifting fractal constructs that deform space around it?

I ... can't ... can't smell anything now. *sob*

It's her! That bewitching space-sorceress, Night Girl! She's doing it somehow. Is she actually Sensor Girl in disguise, warping my perception?

She ... but wait! There she is, in a wheelchair and dying from Crimson Virus ...
BUT HER HAIR IS UNAFFECTED.

Unaffected. Unmoved. Imperturbable. Like GOD.

Sense of reason: gone!
Sens of time: gone
Sense of self: gone!

My sense of identity shattered, I am now become Fire Lad. Crestfallen at Night Girl's blissful unawareness of her effects on others, on society, on reality itself. My wild tangle of unruly and severely over-colored hair matted down in contemplation of the incomprehensible complexity of the superbouffante's shifting moire' patterns of cold, unfeeling obsidian mass, a metaphysical black hole of meaning, so immense in its gravity and power that ...

it
even
eclipses

word balloons.

Character Request: Sun Girl

Who is this sneaking in the DCU's window? Is it... Sun Girl?


I'd never heard of this Sun Girl until recently when she was brought to my attention by the eminent Marionette of Dance of the Puppets.

Apparently she has gone utterly to waste in the Marvelverse, known to no one, out of place with her Golden Age styling, and (*sob*) unloved.

She's got no secret identity, no real name, no backstory (except for some monstrosity that Roy Thomas the Mad Retcon Artist shafted her with). And she has ... a Sunbeam Ray. GODS, we need her in the DC!

Perhaps she could be a foe or partner of Night Girl? But, no: even the blank cheery emptiness of Sun Girl would be no match for the Black Hole of Meaning that is the Super-Bouffante of Night Girl; the very thought is madness.

Ah, but what a marvelous partner for -- Phantom Lady! She could join the Freedom Fighters (I hear they're about to have some openings...) and she and PL could be like Apollo and Midnighter (well -- sort of like Apollo and Midnighter).

DC, offer Marvel some Hostess Fruit Pies (tm) for Sun Girl; the bad guys always fall for that trick!

Postcards from the Future: June 5, 3006

Dear Blockade Boy,

Thanks for loaning me the Time Bubble; you were right, I'm already loving my vacation in the future!

Staying at an impressive hotel overlooking the city. Neighborhood could be better but the pool is out of this world! And the postcards are free...

Welcome to ... your future!

You'll laugh ... I was waiting for night time to go out and party, but I forgot there is no night-time! It's always daytime in the future; probably some sort of celestio-arclighting to keep commerce going round the clock. Sucks to be Night Girl, huh, ha ha!

Night Girl's so cheery; I bet she knows Supergirl

Tomorrow I'll hook up with your friends in the Legion; thanks again!

TTFN, Scipio


P.S. Bringing the dog has worked out fine; he loves the future food!

The Beautiful But Lonely Princess

Once upon a time, there lived a beautiful, but lonely princess. The lonely princess, in constant need of external validation, kept in a special, magical jar the severed head of an obsequious friend much less attractive than she. The severed head's job was to make the princess feel better inside herself. Every night. But one night, the severed head said, "Not tonight, Diana; I have a headache." And the princess did not know what to do. So the severed head said, "Ask King Joss to put on a parade for you in his kingdom. A festive parade with hours of marching will lighten your woes."

And so the princess did.King Joss put on a wonderful parade, and the princess's chariot was drawn by beautiful girls marching in chains, and the people cheered for the lonely princess in constant need of external validation, and there was marching, marching, marching. The princess's spirits were raised as high as the legs of the marching girls, and her woes were lightened.

After the parade was over, the princess ordered her servant girl to bring her some refreshing tea. So the servant girl did. Noticing that her boots were dirtied by the day's marching, the princess ordered the servant girl to brush them till they shone as the morning sun. So the servant girl did.


But as she watched the servant girl brushing her marching boots, the beautiful princess grew lonely again. And so she asked the servant girl for something more.

Much more.

"Mais non!" said the servant girl. "Let me be or I shall trumpet your secret desires throughout the Kingdom of Hollywood and other major media outlets!"

But the princess was not afraid, for she was as wise as she was beautiful, and as brave as she was lonely. "I am sorry," said the princess. "Let me make you a cup of tea, so we will be as sisters and all will be forgiven."

And so the princess did.

After the princess gave many sacks of gold to the king's court physician, he declared it a suicide. And so, the princess lived happily ever after, because the servant girl did not live at all.

The End.

Publishing House of Mysteries

As I mentioned yesterday, CBR is constitutionally, DEFIANTLY wrong, so this latest bit should be no surprise.  I suppose none of what CBR does along these lines should surprise me. The whole clickbait/generic lisicle style is pervasive on internet topic sites of any kind; it's just the one that algorithms shove in my face most frequently, due to the topics.

It's not that I merely disagree with any of the opinions implied, but rather that there ARE no opinions really implied. These are not lists or positions taken by, say, an actual blogger/vlogger with their own vision.  Those might be interesting or engaging. Rather, CBR's articles might as well all be titled "Most Publicly Recognizable Examples of X" or "Assertion that Throwaway in Recent Issue is a Permanent Continuity Change" or "Everyone Has Forgotten An Important Thing That Is No Longer Even Remotely In Continuity If It Ever Was".  

But the linked article, "10 Biggest Mysteries in DC Comics", is just face-punchingly mislabeled, when it is, at best, "10 Most High-Profile Reveals That Were Actually Retcons."  It did, however, jog me into considering the legitimate question: 

What are the 10 "biggest" mysteries in DC comics? And by "mysteries" I do NOT mean "unanswered questions" like the Joker's real name, the Phantom Stranger's origins, or how DID the Giant Penny in there, anyway. 

[Any replies addressing those issues will be deleted.]

I mean, you know, ACTUAL MYSTERIES.  

Like the kind Ace Investigator SPEED SAUNDERS used to solve.

Things that are mysteries to us and to some of the characters, things that they and we are challenged to solve (fairly or not). You know, real Kay Daye, Christine Ariadne stuff. 

I'll concede, I doubt I can even LIST ten, so I'm asking in advance for YOUR help. No matter how years later you may read this, please add any good ones you think of. Because otherwise all people will think of BS like "Hush". P.S. Don't list "Hush", which not merely some BS, but some ****.

I can think of plenty of crappy DC "mysteries": Identity Crisis, Long Halloween, Hush, Zero Hour (Who is Extant?), Every Silver Age Story With A Mystery Hero, Terry Sloane's Murder, The Joker's Daughter, The Wild Dog Mystery.  But what were the good ones? And why aren't there more of them?  I mean, DC does stand for "Detective Comics", after all.

Our nation needs Ace Investigator Speed Saunders again.

Here are some that I remember as definite positive stand-outs.

Who Killed Myndi Mayer?

This was certainly among the most affecting mysteries I have ever read in comics (don't spoil it for anyone).  Myndi Mayer wasn't a disposable walk-on or side character.

Myndi Mayer was a substantial supporting character, an ongoing, vibrant, and unique member of Wonder Woman's cast at the time.  She was a Strong Female Character of a sort, in the sense that she was an independent, successful businesswoman (she was Wonder Woman's publicist), but she was no angel, which was refreshing for a WW character.  She was grounded in a way that innocent Diana, new to "Man's World" in those days was not, and she made helped her transition from Paradise Island possible for Diana and believable to us.

That really should be the function of WW supporting cast-- grounding her -- whether they be an Etta Candy, an I Ching, or a Hoppy (not the bunny, the fast food worker).

But Myndi was found one night with a bullet in her head and the mystery was:

And quite a mystery it was.  It was AWESOME because it was the LAST thing you expected from WONDER WOMAN. But there she was: stuck in a murder mystery, the victim a close friend of hers, and she was unable to punch something or just magically lasso everybody into confessing. Eventually she DID solve the mystery and because of all those things it was incredibly impactful. And for other reasons, but you deserve to read it yourself.  

I can honestly say there is no mystery in comics that affected me more. There are still occasions, forty years later now, where some real world happening will prompt me to say: "Hm; Who killed Myndi Mayer, indeed?"

Who is Sensor Girl?

Although this mystery probably OBSESSED me (and everyone else) more.  I assured you nobody obsessed as much over all of the things on CBR's list COMBINED as they did over this. People LOST SLEEP over it!

I know because I kept them up talking about it.

It's a Legion of Super-Heroes' mystery and LSH LOVES mysteries, almost all of which have the form "Who is?"  But this is the greatest LSH "Who is?" mystery of all time.

Sensor Girl was a character who joined the Legion but kept her identity and the precise nature of her powers secret.  This violates, like, 47 of their little Constitutional Rules, about which they are quite fussy. But Saturn Girl says "I vouch for her", which immediately ENDS that subject, because nobody-but-nobody in the Legion crosses Saturn Girl.

You... do not want to cross Saturn Girl. Or doubt her.
Or suggest that that costume makes her look trampy.
(from Legion #90, a very memorable issue from Tom Peyer's very memorable run)

Sensor Girl was a mystery that stumped the most intelligent person in the DCU: Brainiac 5.  

Who has a 12th Level Intelligence, in case no one has mentioned it yet this issue.

Most people thought she was Supergirl. Her demonstrated variety of powers did seem consistent with that theory, but she seemed to have weaknesses inconsistent with it.  I knew it wasn't Supergirl because she had this flair about her that Supergirl could never have. Supergirl was a sad sack; Sensor Girl was a big old drama queen.

With a wicked pimp slap.

Eventually, Brainiac DID figure it out because, well, he's the most intelligent person in the DCU and that IS his power in the Legion so, how else could the story end?

He also pointed out that the answer was obvious and that you were an idiot for not figuring it out, because making you feel stupid is his other power.

But the real story is: with no internet hive-mind to solve it, this mystery OBSESSED anyone who knew anything about the Legion and was a high-point for Legion obsession and if you know anything about the Legion, you know that obsession is, um... well, knowing anything about the Legion and being obsessed with the Legion are pretty much the same thing, aren't they?

The Geoff Johns' Mysteries 

Geoff Johns is basically Nancy Drew or, if you prefer, a Solo Hardy Boy.  Geoff tells a very particular type of mystery, one especially designed to reward comic history aficionados.  A Big Event is building in one book or across many (or perhaps... on a television show); it's got lots of players and several appear to be driving the events. But it doesn't QUITE all add up.  

And you can't quite tell whether that's just, you know, how it's written or whether ... there's something else.  So MUCH comic book writing has big plot holes that we accustom ourselves to not questioning too much. Comic book roads are full of plot holes, so we've equipped our mind-cars with such extra shock-absorbers and heavy tires that it's easy to overlook it when we really DO run over a dead body.

Unlike Ace Investigator Speed Saunders,
who ALWAYS notices these things.

Geoff Johns takes advantage of that and ALWAYS hides things right in plain sight...right in our blind spots.  There is always Something Else, and that Something Else is always a Piece of DC History He Remembers Which You Forgot.

Blackest Night?  Nekron, refugee from a blacklight poster. Who even READ that first story?!

JSA: Darkness Falls? Ian Karkull, who fought Dr. Fate. Twice.

 

I mean, only ROY THOMAS remembered Ian Karkull.

Doomsday Clock? Dan Didio.
Oh, I mean, "Dr. Manhattan". Dr Manhattan screwed up the DCU.

You can think of others; you get the idea.  I love 'em, but they are all sufficiently similar that I lump them together.  I'm not being dismissive; it's the kind of thing that a Brad Meltzer tries to pull off but can't.

Watchmen

Speaking of Watchmen, it is ... a lot.  So much to think about. It's been part of our comic book history for so long that it's easy to forget--especially if you weren't alive when it came out--that it was, first and (at least apparently) foremost, a MURDER MYSTERY: who killed The Comedian?  But I still remember discussing the theories with my boyfriend at the time.  

I remember keeping him up all night talking about it.

I don't remember whether I or anyone else was surprised at the time. It's not like there were any 'bad guys' to choose from after all.  

Australian Lex Luthor Junior

I wasn't sure whether to count this as a mystery per se, but "Who is Australian Lex Luthor Junior and whose side is he on?!" was a definite PUZZLE of GREAT power during its time. 

And it's time was LONG.  It was SO long. That was what sold it.  No one could believe that DC had the attention span to hoax us that long. But in those days, the glory days of The Superman Triangle Comics, they did indeed.  They convinced their entire readership that Lex had died and been replaced by his illegitimate son from Australia. Over time it was impossible to believe this person

was this person

There was so much to like about the new Lex.

Possibly more than we can imagine.

In a way, he was still a challenge to Superman, even though he was a GOOD guy, not a bad guy. He was a challenge by BEING a good guy. Supergirl became disenchanted with Superman and became Lex's girlfriend, enchanted by seeing what he could do without even any powers.  Superman, with his minimalist approach to intervention, looked like a slacker compared to Junior's proactive approach to improving Metropolis. It seemed as though DC had decided that was a new, mature tack for the concept of "Lex Luthor" and really had throw out the scheming greedy egoistical big-brained madman of the past.

But in fact...

THEY SAVED LUTHOR'S BRAIN

Still one of the greatest panels in comics.

The whole thing was just so damned... COMIC BOOKY. In a GOOD way. They just WENT THERE. And it was GLORIOUS to realize you had been lovingly duped for OVER TWO YEARS.  DC can't even go two years now without a crossover that reboots the entire mutliverse, let alone stay the course on this sort of thing.

Can you image DC doing anything like that now? :-)

But enough of my remembrances: what are YOUR favorite mysteries from DC comics?

Supergirl #4, Part 2: The Gang's All Here

Well, when last we left literary pinball Supergirl (in Paul Kupperberg's 1983 Supergirl #4), she had recently been retconned to be a 19 year old psych major in Chicago.

Looks like Supergirl's not the only one who got retconned.
Apparently, 1983 Chicago's been attacked by the B13 virus. Or Frank Gehry.

In Chicago, Supergirl, in her secret identity as Linda Danvers, lives with her wacky supporting cast, The Oppressively Square Parents (Mr. & Mrs. Danvers), The Ethnic Stereotype Landlady Who Seems to be Comic Relief But Who Suffers from Secret Poignant Sorrows (The Widow Berkowitz), and The Irresponsible But Lovably Trouble-Prone Actor-Neighbor (Real-Life Person John Ostrander).

It would all seem like some Young Women On Her Own sitcom, a "That Girl" for the '80s, were it not for pesky supervillains like...

THE GANG.

Yes, they are really called "The Gang". What did you think the "G" stood for?

When I showed my friend Noah "The Gang" and told him what they were called, he slapped his forehead and said, "That's imbecilic. The only way a group like that-- or any group-- would call themselves 'The Gang' would be, I dunno, if they'd hung out together as kids in school."

Perceptive on Noah's part, then, since that is exactly their origin. Four kids from the Southside of Chicago wanted to avoid falling into a life of criminal desperation like their schoolmates, so they focus on sticking together, and working their tails off to become... supervillains. Well, that makes sense!

So, who do you think "The Gang" would work for, huh? Who...?

Um... Terry Thomas?

The Gang works for... "The Man". Yes, really. I'm not sure whether Kupperberg was actually trying to write a story, or whether he was just composing the first draft of the "TV Tropes" wiki while awaiting the eventual invention of the internet. The man was a visionary.


The Gang are classic "crime groupies", and true to form, each one is a uni-dimensional cut-out character. Specifically, the Goliath, the Bruiser, the Brains, and the Mentalist (two strong stupid guys with physical powers and two clever women with mental powers).

The "Goliath" guy pictured above is Kong. Yes, like the canine chew toy. If Superman were around he'd just stuff him full of peanut butter and throw him to Krypto. I'd buy that comic!

The "Brusier" guy is named Bulldozer. Why...?

Another satisfied graduate of the Benjamin Grimm School of Elocution.

Really, what kind of idiot power is being able to run at stuff and crash into it with your head? Maybe that makes you an A-class villain in the Marvel Universe, but in the DCU it just makes you the head-butt of a lot of jokes.

People do not talk this way, nor should they. "The Name's" is another Sure Sign of Bad Comic Book Writing. If you are reading any piece of literature and you see a sentence that begins with "The name's...", put it down immediately. Preferably in the garbage can.

The "Brains" of the Gang is named "Brains". But you probably guessed that already.

Apparently, her power is speaking pretentiously, since that seems to be all she does. That, and hair-modelling like she's in a Wella Balsam commercial. No, really, her hair is this ... this thing in and of itself. At first, you think you're just perceiving it in mid-swoosh as she's moving, as in the panel above.

No crime in that. Why, '90s characters regularly relied on their swooshing ponytails to counterbalance the weight of, well, whatever was in those pouches on their thighs.

But that's not it at all. It actually just juts out from her head, stiffly. All the time. Like... like a giant glob of saltwater taffy.

Okay, I desperately want to see this woman fight Night Girl.
Dueling extensions at 20 paces!

Not only does she have amazing Gumby-hair,
but each of her breasts is a commissioned Army Captain.
Eat yer heart out, Power Girl.

And the "Mentalist" character is "Mesmer". Have you ever heard anything so painfully obvious...?

Flash Fact: you can hypnotize anyone if you connect a mini-fan with a color wheel!

"You want I should"? What native Chicagoan talks that way? Nu, what are you now, Mrs Berkowitz's daughter? By the way, Mrs Berkowitz's daughter is, in fact, a supervillain, but a different one (the cosmically powered Blackstarr); but that's another story entirely.

"Mesmer" is another example of Bad Comic Book Writing: "Painfully Obviously Codenames". If I were a supervillain with, say, super-bulldozing-with-my-head powers, I would codename myself something vague and obscure like "Doktor Planiermesserundeckmesser", or "Captain Jordan", or just plain deceptive like "Diaphanoso". While the hero was trying to puzzle out my high-fallutin' mystery powers, I'd sock him in the gut with my cranium. But super-head-butting-powers characters rarely go in for the element of surprise and this one is no exception...

THIS PANEL IS NOT SUGGESTIVE AT ALL

HONI SOIT QUI MAL Y PENSE!

Eyes wide, fanboy; this is what it's like to "boff" Supergirl. For me, it's the sound effect and the expression on her face that really make this panel. Ordinarily, this is the place where I'd offer some kind of crack... but it looks like Supergirl's already got that covered. At least, I hope she has it covered; hard to tell with hotpants.

So, anyway, the incredibly generic foursome of stock figs from the crime groupie box manage to defeat Supergirl, with her god-like Kryptonian powers, twice in the same story, courtesy of Mesmer's mind-whammy.

Not that Supergirl can believe it. Frankly, neither can I.

Wow, Supergirl's nearly infallible, just like her cousin. And just as modest.

Oh, and just in case you were thinking ill of me for my corny title for this post...

IT'S THE ACTUAL TITLE OF THE STORY.

Honi soit qui mal y pense!