Per Degaton, Part 6: 1957/"Dazed But Still Intact"

Green Lantern arrives at Per Degaton's Colossal Caves hideout on his stealth mission to steal the Time Machine back so the JSA can reverse the damage P.D. did at the Battle of Arbela, which will then reverse The Change (which has been causing technology to vanish).

Alan's "ninja mission outfit" has a matte lining cape, rather than sateen.

"Just like at The Crew Club (a men's private health facility)!"

Did he... phase through the mountainside? Who knows?  The Golden Age operates on the Principle of Inverse Explainability: the Less Something Requires Explanation, the More It Is Discussed; the More Something Requires Explanation, the More We Pretend That It's All Perfectly Obviously And Nothing Needs To Be Said.

Note that, due to the Principle of Inverse Explainability, Alan continues to be dumbfounded by the concept of 'echoes', while unblinkingly nodding about time-travel and disappearing technology. And what is that echo he hears? It is the voice of reason!

And the voice of reason belongs, of course, to KALE.

Kale is trying to convince his shallow, short-sighted boss not to destroy the Time Machine, Humanity's Greatest Invention.  I'm not sure why Kale is surprised: Per Degaton's destroyed EVERY OTHER INVENTION (including pavement) .  He's not a scientist; he's just a brute.

OH MY GOD IT'S, IT'S SOME KIND OF ECHO, IT'S LIKE MAGIC

IT'S LIKE A HALL OF MIRRORS BUT MADE OF SOUND I FEEL LIKE I'M GOING MAD!

Poor Alan. If only he some non-technological device, immune to The Change, that magically could accomplish whatever he wanted. It might help him defeat the power of the Echo Chamber. It's like a maze on a children's paper restaurant placemat: "Can you help Green Lantern find his way through the Mountain Maze to the Time Machine?"

NO EVIL SHALL ESCAPE MY SIGHT.

Are we SURE Dr. Mid-Nite is the blind one?

So many things to say, but I'm just gonna go with:

DANG, Kale is FINE.

Somewhere in the multiverse there is an Earth where Kale just quietly shanked P.D. when no one was looking, and finished taking over the world and the JSA lived out the rest of their days, hunted in the woods and wastelands like an animals, and no more heroes (or villains) were ever born, and Kale led the world --forcibly at first but eventually through gratitude -- to everlasting peace and prosperity and personal fulfillment, and men still wear hats today.  

But, no, I am wrong; on any Earth, Kale is too supporting, too full of love and life, for such a betrayal. 

YES, Alan, I see, you found the Time Machine. Now, stop playing with your placemat and eat your French toast before it gets cold.

Or, Per, you could blow it up...now.  Because if a JSAer just shows up magically when it reappears they could stop it from exploding -- both of which are the kind of improbable things they do in between fistfights with thugs-- they'd have the machine and could come back and kick your butt (or more likely just FIX the Battle of Arbela).  But P.D. is a drama queen, and sending something 10,000 years into the future is more dramatic.  Speaking of drama queens...

Ladies and gentlemen: Alan Scott, Master of Stealth

Per Degaton, who is only good for hurtful things like undoing inventions and tearing down society, has to turn IMMEDIATELY to competent Kale for help when he needs anything constructive done.

Like machine-gunning people to death.

I'm sorry, Alan... did you just call Kale an UNDERLING?!  Look, I realize that you're repressing a lot of feelings in this decade but that's DANGED pompous and dismissive for someone who can fly and yet just TRIPPED ON AIR.

Hal Jordan did not start the fire, people.

Ah, whimsical Professor Zee! Sure, a Time Machine is cool, but he had to add fun, stylish touches like Compressed Air Shoots like a funhouse has and a solid wooden handle, because metal would be just too cold and impersonal.

"WE'RE running this city from now on."
Okay, P.D. can definitely be verbally abusive but... as a couple they are WAY more functional and mutually supportive than, say, Wind Pirate and Bosun.

Fortunately, Alan's Giant Head shaved 9,990 years off the journey into the future and pops out of the Time Machine 10 years later.  

"Dazed But Still Intact"-- The Green Lantern Motto

In the interest of story efficiency, the JSA are RIGHT there to greet him.  They tell him they defeated Degaton immediately after Alan got out of their way, then hired Kale as their manager, and therefore the world has been crime-free ever since, so he can finally take off that hideous costume.

"Your costumes look as though they haven't been dry-cleaned in YEARS!"

Oops.

Psych!  Without Alan Scott's absurd good looks (and magical wishing ring), they got their butts kicked and have been hunted, living in the woods and wastelands ever since.

But Johnny did NOT lose that bowtie.

Yes, it's a dystopian heckscape!  The world is completely conquered except for SIX PEOPLE:

• a chemist who USED to be fast;
• a guy who flies;
• Wonder Woman;
• a 5'1" 20-something with no college degree;
• a doctor; and
• a congenital idiot who happens to have a magic genie that could fix everything with one or two wishes, which is the premise for his being in the JSA to begin with, but we must completely ignore that, as we do for ALL stories, because it would end all stories immediately.  

No, really.  Our favorite criminal couple, now FULLY functional and happy as the world's rulers, have been pioneering minimalist decorating and occasionally remembering "heroes" and "opposition".  

DANG: ten years and Kale STILL looks that good,
just like Anthony Carrigan.
Oh, Per; did you ever realize, on your mad path to global domination,
that you had the whole world all long...?

And, sure enough, in 1957 (which would have been the year of Alan's return) there was no JSA and as result the DCU had gone to heck:

No more evidence, your honor; I rest my case.

BUT, with Alan's return of the Time Machine, the JSAers now have the power to fix everything!

Of COURSE you can, Wonder Woman!

Oops.

Oh. Yeah.  I forgot: the bomb.  And maybe if Alan had been a little more focused, he wouldn't have forgotten. But he's very pretty!  It's good reminder that the real reason we make fun of Hal Jordan so much is because: Alan Scott's not around.

"SAY, YOU have a magical genie that can whisk us back to the Battle of Arbela, don't you, Johnny?"

Remember, it's just like I said; JSA stories are cleverly planned, it's just the way YOU expect.  The three heavy-hitters were saved to the end. Green Lantern, who did get the Time Machine, but to no avail, which gives Johnny Thunder, who can now use the Thunderbolt to take them to the battle of Arbela, where Wonder Woman, being in her element will win the ancient warfare battle. Observe, my insightful analysis of Golden Age plotting logic in action:

Oops.

Oh. Um. Okay.  So, they... could have done that... from Zee's hospital room?  And just ... didn't try? And the JSAers have been living in a hunted heckscape for a DECADE with the world under Degaton's thumb, because this didn't occur to Alan before?   Well...  that gives me a NEW theory:

Green Lantern rings, past and present, may be directed by willpower, but they are fueled by temporarily burning I.Q. points.  It explains much about GL behavior and why the more powerful they get, the stupider they seem to be. Their oath is the Guardians' litmus test: if you're stupid enough to recite that oath aloud, then there's no chance you're going to be generate enough power to be a threat.

Tomorrow (phew): The Battle of Arbela (331 B.C.E).   

Per Degaton, Part 3: "DEATH TO THE ATOM!"

When last we left Al “The Atom” Pratt he’d committed to roaming the streets of Gotham til he found Per Degaton and could simply shake the information he needed out of him about how to fix The Change.

‘Cuz the Atom’s a tough little macho guy and that’s how he rolls.

Sure enough, that’s exactly what he’s doing, and it’s exactly as ridiculous as it sounds.

Note the Atom is "on the street level above" outside the Gotham Insurance Co.;
above WHAT you will soon learn.

Sigh. I wish a 5'1" overly-muscled, aggressive Jewish physics student in a fetish get-up were roaming the streets looking to shake ME til I gave him what he wanted.

Aside for Modern Readers Who Don't Know Al "The Atom" Pratt.  I didn't make that description up; those are the Atom's stats.  Here's a point of reference:

That man is contemporary music's shortest male pop star, Bruno Mars.
He is FOUR INCHES TALLER than Al Pratt.

Meanwhile, underneath the street, Degaton's Diabolical Forces have grown tired of the tedium of world domination and are pressuring him to stop off for some good old-fashioned BOOTY-PLUNDERING.

The bald guy is Kale. He’s P.D.’s awesomely practical Human Resourcs manager, played with characteristic charm by Anthony Carrigan.

I'd swear Per Degaton was being played by Elon Musk, except that's clearly Elon in the foreground.

Kale knows how to take a wallop without blinking and convinces Degaton to see the wisdom of letting the troops line their pockets on the path to world domination.  What a man! So they break into the Gotham Insurance Building (right below where Al Pratt JUST HAPPENS to be stomping about angrily) to steal a million in gold, because I guess that's something insurance companies had on hand in 1947. 

It ain't called the Golden Age for nothing.

Kale’s booty-plundering is so palpably groundshaking that Al nearly does a Pratt-fall. 

Ordinarily I'd make some crack here, but there already is one.

Al investigates with his usual delicacy.

Al Pratt, Master of Deduction.

Note that Al’s adventure is following same pattern as Jay’s, but in Al’s case, encountering Degaton is actually part of his agenda.

Jay had the presence of the Special Metal from which to deduce why Degaton's weapons are unaffected by the Change and Al does not.

Al atomizes the PerDegagoons and then manhandles P.D. himself.  

I think if we translated Al Pratt into modern terms, he'd be an MMA fighter; just one of those tough little monkeys whose power is beating the CRAP out of people any way he can.

The Flash’s assignment required speed. Atom’s required a confrontational rage-monster.

Who better to confront a would-be Napoleon than someone with a Napoleon Complex? Gotta admire Atom’s resolve to simply BEAT the info out of the man who’s brought modern civilization to a standstill.  And it almost works.

IF NOT FOR THE AWESOME KALE.

Look, we all know Degaton winds up in the rubbish bin.  But I want to learn that Kale went on to second-banana for ALL the great villains of his time, all of whom lost because they didn’t listen to him.

For example:

DEATH TO THE ATOM!
Such verve! Such enthusiasm! The man’s a gem.

Behold the Genius of Kale:

Probably because The Atom is a small target
and Degaton won't admit what a terrible shot he is.

An excellent point, Kale! The Atom is just a diminutive college student in a stupid costume, with no powers or abilities other than GRIT and possibly an extra Y chromosome.  He really doesn't merit anything other than a bullet.

But, no.  Degaton, vainglorious and pompous, has to pretend to be a supervillain rather than what he is: a mere thuggish world conqueror.

MY way: elaborately and unsuccessfully.

"I AM DEGATON." Pfft. Like that means something. Do you need TP for your bunghole? What a poseur. If you learn nothing else from this series, learn this: Per Degaton is a ****.  It is absolutely his most consistent character trait and the real reason he always fails.

Instead of following Kale's sensible suggestion OR crafting a truly supervillainous death trap, he cobbles one together out of the safety exhibits at the insurance company that looks like Mousetrap from Hasbro (or Ideal, if you're old enough). 

What is this? Final Destination: the College Years?

Hey, Per; Rube Goldberg's lawyer's on the phone... .

Okay even the Hooded Claw would find this laughable.
Then again, he has a pretty active sense of humor.

"HA HA YOURSELF."
Look, Al’s a macho hunk and a physics expert.
Expecting wit would be asking for too much.

Wasn't this scene in the SAW: Jigsaw Babies cartoon?

I’m not even going to show you his escape because the trap is unworthy. Al simply ATOMS his way out. 

Unlike Per Degaton, if I had a time machine, I wouldn't try to conquer the world. I'd go back and set down for a series of long talks with Ben Flinton about the thought process behind the design of the Atom's costume, which somehow remains counterintuitive and uncannily OFF even if you've been staring at it for 82 years.

While the Atom didn’t get ALL the information he’d hoped, he did learn it was a BATTLE that Degaton changed. And, as we the readers know, it was obviously the Battle of—

Hawkman always had the pulpiest splash panels.

WHAT?! Tanks emerging from the subway?! Degaton’s attack on Gotham’s civic district is already underway! Join Hawkman tomorrow for his fight against Degaton’s Diabolical Forces to protect the Mayor!

Per Degaton Part 4: "A bed?"

As you may recall from the Assigning of the Assignments that Hawkman leapt to the conclusion that Degaton would attack the Mayor of Gotham, and so decided to go protect him.

Perhaps "flitted" to the conclusion would be more apt in Hawkman's case.

Naturally, this is what happens, because Golden Age Hero Hunches are infallible.  

Before Hawkman can help the Mayor, he's got to save some people threatened by with more effects of The Change.

The effects of The Change are...  
haphazard at best.

As predicted, Degaton's Diabolical Forces emerge from the subways we saw them lurking in during Atom's assignment, poised to take over Gotham's civic center.

Secretly, even Per Degaton longs for Kale's approval.

You may be wondering by now: if this is Gotham where's Batman? Well, sweetie, this is Golden Age.  Things don't have to make sense the way you are used to. Also; this ain't Marvel.  There are no other heroes in the world other than ones in the story you're reading. Besides, it's June/July 1947, and I know exactly what Batman is doing: fighting aliens.

I know you THINK all the goofy/crazy stuff didn't happen until the Silver Age.
You're just really really wrong.

Per Degaton's first tactic is to establish a base of operations for himself in an antique shop, because (a) he's knows it will be unaffected by The Change and (b) he's a big old closet queen.

No WONDER he cast Anthony Carrigan.

Aside: It may seem like Degaton's plan is silly and grubby-- robbing insurance companies, lumbering around in tanks, sequestering in antique stores, roughing up mayors. But I remind you it's 1947, and people were quite aware that when painter Adolf Hitler set up to re-make Germany, and then Europe, into his own "artistic vision", that plan seemed silly and grubby, too, and the world paid dearly for not taking it seriously enough soon enough.  

Well, this is the G-D Gotham City and its Mayor is no Neville Chamberlain; he's ready to gun down any costumed psychopath who comes after him, because that's just part of the job.

Oops.

Unfortunately, the Mayor Theodore E. Bare is caught flat-footed by The Change like a cabana cougar with a poolboy.  As much as I love Kale (particularly after his gentlemanly insistence that the Mayor wear a hat outdoors), I confess I'd love to have seen Mayor Ted E. Bare here unblinkingly pump a lead pellet into Kale (or whatever flintlocks fire), because it's Gotham and he was already practicing in case the Gentleman Ghost showed up.  But the Mayor's hesitation lost him the moment and the gun simply disappeared before he could fire off a shot.

Just as in the Atom did, Hawkman streams in the window from the left like sunlight to hit upon the Diabolical Forces threatening someone with Unaffected Weapons.
Who's drawing these? Vermeer?

A fight ensues. Hawkman loses, because KALE.

"WHY does he want to hurt me?"
DUDE, you're the MAYOR OF GOTHAM.  What comic book universe have YOU been living in?!

Kale brings them to Degaton, as if to say, "Remember when a guy four inches shorter than Bruno Mars was kicking your *** and I had to save you? Yeah, well, I just kidnapped the Mayor AND beat up HAWKMAN. Personally, I think I'm the one with the big "D" around here."

"GOOD WORK, KALE."   Gee, thanks, Per. And what were you doing here at the antique shop while I was gone all day? Waxing the what-not shelf?

I appreciate Hawkman's smack talk. "So... you conquered an ANTIQUE SHOP with your army. Oooo, impressive.  Ever consider joining C.A.W.?"  

Degaton is too dull to perceive irony, however, and after quickly abandoning his half-hearted attempt to get the Mayor to sign his Machtergreifung document, he rushes to what he's been dreaming of while polishing the furniture knobs: 

tying Hawkman to a certain bed.

"A bed?"
Even Hawkman, who refuses to wear a shirt, is surprised at this blatant objectification and bondage fetishization, just because he's wearing a leather harness and an animal mask.
"Excuse me, you must have me confused with MY SECRETARY."

Well, now we know what Degaton's been planning all day.  He's delighted at the Mayor's refusal to cooperate, because now he has an opportunity to be a ****, which is truly his only goal in life.

"Ye-heh-hessss. Tie them down SLOWLY. I want to record this for my Onlyminions.com channel; it will get me thousands of followers!"
Is that saliva spewing from Degaton's mouth as he instructs his "boys"  to tie his "friends" to the bed?  I think it is.

If you thought Hawkman didn't get freaky until Hawkgirl came around, you thought wrong.  Flash's assignment was about racing against the clock. Atom's assignment was about roughing up the villain for info.  Hawkman's assignment is about antiques and freaky cryptokinky situations.

OMG, this is literally the crushing canopy-bed from William's Castle's 13 Ghosts (which won't be made for another 13 years) . I can't believe my Illusion-O glasses!

Per Degaton really IS a time-traveller!

I admit this a classier death trap than the last two. But, c'mon, this isn't the first time Hawkman's been tied down to an antique bed with somebody he just met and a limited amount of time to get out of the house.  It's like throwing Br'er Rabbit into the Briar Patch.

"Can you stop making those squealing noises, Mayor? I miss Hawkgirl right now enough as it is."

Having learnt his lesson from previous experiences, Hawkman warns his bed-partner to brace themselves, because he's going to give a final burst: "Hit the ground: this is going to be oomphy!"

But for Hawkman, it was a Tuesday.

Like all good Hawkman adventures, it ends with him breaking a bed.

"I'll untie you later; can't risk any chance of a fight now, you're too precious." Sigh. Why can't ALL men be as romantic as Hawkman?

Sorry, Mayor, this is Gotham. In the time you've been tied up,
Penguin has probably already gotten himself into office via emergency election.

Well, that was ... very Hawkman-y, although not a lot was accomplished other than his limited mission of "protect the Mayor." Maybe tomorrow's assignment will be more action-packed?

Dr. Mid-Nite? Oh, definitely not, then.

Get some for some pulse-pounding paper-citing action tomorrow with Dr. Mid-Nite & The Scientists of the World!