Doug: Happy Monday, friends. If you're fortunate enough to have Easter Monday off work, congratulations and enjoy! If you have your nose to the grindstone as usual, well then -- you have our pity! If you're coming by to catch the finale of Karen's and my thoughts on
Marvels, we apologize. Travel, real life, the NCAA tournament... all those things conspired to push us back a week. But rest assured that you're in good hands today, as our buddy Mike W. is going to shepherd us through a very timely story. It's the beginning of baseball season here in the States, and Mike has a comic book oddity to spring upon you. So kick back for a few moments and enjoy!
DC Super-Stars #10 (December 1976)
"The Great Super-Star Game!"
Bob Rozakis-Dick Dillin/Frank McLaughlin
M.S. Wilson: Okay, this review is a little different ...
not really weird, but a little off
the beaten path. The comic in question is DC Super-Stars #10,
written by Bob “Babe” Rozakis, with art by Dick “Duke” Dillin and Frank
“Catfish” McLaughlin. As you can probably guess from those nicknames, the story
is about baseball. (My apologies to any non-North Americans who find baseball
either boring or incomprehensible; I’ll try to find a comic about cricket or
rugby sometime, just to even things up.) I was a big baseball fan as a kid, so
I’ve always had a soft spot for this story, though I lost interest in the game
a long time ago. I first read this story as a reprint in DC Special Blue Ribbon
Digest #13 from 1981 (titled "Strange Sports Stories", and believe me, it lives
up to the name), but I recently got my hands on the original comic. There’s no
difference in the story, but the original has the actual boxscore and an
inning-by-inning description of the game, and I’m enough of a nerd to want that
extra information. I know other blogs have covered this comic, but hopefully
I’ll be able to bring a fresh perspective to it. So, without further ado... Let’s play ball!
We start out in suburbia, with a typical (?)
couple, Sportsmaster and Huntress. This isn’t the Helena Wayne Huntress, this
is the original one, a villainess who’s married to another bad guy, the
Sportsmaster. It’s a little weird to see super-villains living in the ’burbs
(their house is a very modern looking A-Frame). What I find even more strange
is that they’re wearing their costumes
around the house; you’d think they’d be a bit more casual at home. Anyway,
they’re fighting, which married people sometimes do, but this fight is about
something a little surprising: Huntress is ready to drop the villain biz and
become a crimefighter! Sportsmaster is opposed to this, of course, but Huntress
says it’s simple logic ... villains always lose, so why not switch to the
winning side? Finally, (after destroying their nicely-furnished living room)
Sportsmaster proposes a contest: Huntress will gather a team of heroes,
Sportsmaster a team of villains, and the two sides will play a baseball game.
If the good guys win, Huntress becomes a crimefighter; if the bad guys win, she
stays a villainess. She agrees, and they start putting their teams together.
They start a week later in Gotham, at a
bowling tournament. (In fact, all of their “recruiting” is done at various
sporting events, a detail I didn’t notice the first time I read this story.)
I’m also not sure about the whole setting ... Huntress and Sportsmaster were
always Earth-2 villains, as far as I know. But everything here takes place on
Earth-1, and all the heroes and villains we see (except Uncle Sam) are from
Earth-1; so I’m not sure if Sportsmaster and Huntress were living on Earth 1,
or maybe just travelled there to have the game? Anyway, the bowling tournament
is giving away $250,000 (in cash!), so of course Joker and Matter Master show
up to steal the money. Matter Master gives the bowlers a taste of their own
medicine when he uses his magic wand to make the pins attack people. Luckily,
Bruce Wayne, Oliver Queen, and Dinah Lance are on hand (Bruce put up the cash prize
and Ollie did the PR), so they do a quick change and attack the villains. The
good guys seem to be winning handily, when they’re spirited away by some kind
of teleporter machine. It’s weird that Sportsmaster and Huntress have this kind
of technology; where did they get it (especially if they’re not even on
“their” Earth)? And if villains have access to such a powerful device, why
aren’t they using it all the time? Seriously, they have a monitor that can
apparently tune in on any location they want, and they have the technology to
grab people remotely and teleport them away. It reminds me of the Tantalus
Field from the Star Trek episode “Mirror, Mirror”; that kind of tech should
make them almost invincible. Maybe we can assume the machine was one-of-a-kind
and the superheroes destroyed it at the end of the story?
Their next grab is in Metropolis, where they
net Superman (playing tennis against himself at super-speed ... show-off),
along with Lex Luthor and Amazo, who’s much more articulate than I remember
him. Next, we go to a United Nations soccer match, with a solid platinum trophy
as the prize (Is it any wonder there’s so much crime in the DCU, when they’re
giving away $250,000 cash prizes and platinum trophies all the time?). Wonder
Woman is at the soccer match, and it’s a good thing because Weather Wizard and
Chronos show up to steal the platinum prize. Wonder Woman seems outnumbered
(although she really should be able to wipe the floor with these guys in her
sleep), but Plastic Man has been masquerading as her lasso, so he helps her
against the villains. I can’t help wondering how long Plas has been disguised
as Diana’s lasso ... knowing him, probably at least since she got dressed that
morning. Before much can happen, the heroes and villains are spirited away.
Next we see a horse race between the top two horses in the country, but instead
of regular jockeys the horses are being ridden by Tattooed Man and Dr. Polaris,
and chased by Kid Flash and Robin (with Kid Flash acting as Robin’s “steed”). I
guess Tattooed Man and Dr. Polaris are trying to steal the horses, since
they’re said to be the best in the country. The horses are named “Bold Force”
and “Foolish Pride”, which I assume refers to real-life horses “Bold Forbes”
(1976 winner of the Kentucky Derby and the Belmont) and “Foolish Pleasure” (who
won the 1975 Kentucky Derby). Before the villains can ride their stolen horses
to a clean getaway, their mounts are stolen out from under them by Felix Faust.
And just to top things off, Uncle Sam shows up and the whole lot of them are
zapped away by Huntress and Sportsmaster.
Sportsmaster and Huntress explain the contest
to everyone (and the villains seem very confident they can win without their
powers... the arrogance of evil, I guess?). The heroes are reluctant to play
along, but Huntress says she’s somehow hypnotized (“I cast Mass Charm!”) 66,000
people and brought them to a baseball stadium in upstate New York, and they
won’t be released until the game is played all the way through. So Huntress
apparently can hypnotize huge crowds of people and turn them into virtual
zombies... Between this and the teleporter machine, why isn’t she ruling the
world?! Incidentally, the baseball field is called Crandall Stadium; I couldn’t
find any real venue in upstate New York by that name, so I’m assuming it’s
fictional. I’m wondering if it was named after artist Reed Crandall? He wasn’t
doing much (if any) comics work by 1976, but he and Dick Dillin both worked on
Blackhawk at various times, so maybe Rozakis named the stadium after him. Or
maybe Dillin came up with the name? With the hypnotized people at stake, the
heroes have no choice but to play. Since each side has ten players, they each
choose an umpire. The heroes choose Uncle Sam because of his unfailing
honesty (I’m wondering if that’s the
reason he was included in the first place?) and the villains choose
Amazo (“... since he’s an android, he’ll have to call them as he sees them.”).
Yes, Luthor, Amazo may be destructive and homicidal, but a liar... never!
The first eight innings of the game are
glossed over on one page, which shows a few highlights and the changing score.
After eight innings, the score is even, 8-8. The crowd is just staring, like
zombies; it would freak me out to play in a stadium where there’s just complete
silence... I don’t know how the Cubs stand it! Ohhhh, below the belt I know,
but all in fun; as I said, I haven’t paid attention to baseball for years, so I
have no idea what kind of team the Cubs have nowadays ... apologies to any Cubs
fans out there, I really didn’t mean anything by it. I was going to say
“Washington Senators”, but I thought that might date me too much! [Doug: Well, Mr. Smarty-pants, the Cubbies are supposed to have a great team this year and next, with aspirations of breaking their 107-year drought as World Series Champions. This may be the last guest post by M.S., kids! :) ] Sportsmaster
tells the villains to cheat and use their powers; I’m surprised they actually
held off for so long! Actually, I’m not sure about the whole “no powers” rule;
how does someone like Superman not
use his powers? Would he really be able to hold back when he hits the ball?
Same goes for Wonder Woman. And what about Kid Flash? If he runs to first base slightly faster than any normal human
being could, is he using his powers, or is he just a little faster than
everyone else?
Anyway, as the ninth inning starts, the
villains come out cheating. Tattooed Man uses a tattoo of a baseball glove
(which he conveniently happens to have) to catch a short fly, but he doesn’t
catch the glove, so Black Canary goes to first base. Sportsmaster then beans
Superman intentionally, sending him to first and Canary to second; why the heck
would you deliberately throw a beanball when there’s no outs and a runner on
first? And why would you bean Superman, of all people (the ricochet almost
takes Sportsmaster’s head off!)? Wonder Woman gets a hit to load the bases.
Robin strikes out (Really, Robin? Remember how he used to get knocked out all
the time? Robin was the Tonto of superhero comics). Kid Flash sends a ground
ball to short and Black Canary is thrown out at home (the villains seem to play
better when they don’t cheat), but the bases are still loaded. Batman draws a
walk, which brings Superman home (Score: 9-8 for the good guys). Green Arrow
slams a double, which scores Wonder Woman and Kid Flash (Score: 11-8 heroes),
but Arrow is tagged out when Felix Faust uses his magic to transport the ball
from the outfield into his hand.
Now it’s do or die time for the villains.
Luthor rigs his bat to give off “vibrations” that keep the ball from ever
crossing the plate, and he gets a walk. I’m not sure what sort of vibrations
the bat could be giving off that would affect a baseball; plus, the ball’s trajectory
is pretty erratic, so you’d think the heroes would’ve known something was up.
Weather Wizard hits a single and whips up a blizzard to blind Wonder Woman, but
she uses her lasso to redirect the storm into Luthor’s face and he’s put out
before reaching second base. Joker bunts and uses his laughing gas to make
Green Arrow miss fielding the ball. The first time I read this, I didn’t notice
the laughing gas (the way it’s drawn, it’s kind of hard to see) so I thought GA
was actually laughing at Joker’s idiotic joke. So now the villains have men on
first and second. Chronos hits one to shortstop and slows down time for the
heroes while speeding it up for his teammates, thereby breaking every law of
physics in the cosmos and sending the multiverse into instant heat death.
Seriously, when did Chronos get that kind of power? I know when he was first
introduced, the “time” thing was just a gimmick, then later on he actually did
gain the power to affect time; but this kind of selective control? He should be
one of the most powerful beings in the universe. Anyway, Kid Flash strains his
super-speed to the utmost and manages to tag Chronos out before he reaches
first. It’s all very heroic, but kind of stupid too; why didn’t Kid Flash (who
plays shortstop) just go for the force out at second? It’s a lot closer. For
that matter, why not go for the force at first, instead of tagging Chronos? Matter Master is next up, and he gets a fly ball... literally, since he gives the ball wings. Green Arrow shoots it down, but a
run scores (Score: 11-9 heroes). I guess there’s nothing in the rule book
against giving a ball wings. Sportsmaster gets up and whacks a double, scoring
another run (Score: 11-10 heroes). Sportsmaster’s feeling pretty good, but not
for long as Plastic Man tags him out. Apparently when Sportsy rounded first, he
didn’t actually step on the bag but Plastic Man’s foot (which was shaped like
the bag). Sportsmaster protests, but Amazo upholds the play (there’s that
honesty again!) and gives Plas quite the compliment: “He tricked you in a
grandly villainous manner!” Talk about praise from Caesar.
So, the game ends with the heroes winning
11-10; the zombified people leave and the super-heroes and super-villains pop
right back where they came from, leaving Sportsmaster and Huntress still
bickering. The villains are all shown being defeated very perfunctorily, in
three-quarters of a page. Maybe losing the game took all the fight out of them.
I’m not sure what the moral of the story is, since the heroes only won by cheating.
Of course, the villains cheated first, so many the moral is “It’s OK to cheat
as long as the ther guys do it first”? And we never really see any follow-up on
Huntress becoming a crimefighter; her next appearances (along with
Sportsmaster) were in All-Star Comics #s 72 and 73, where she was still a
villain as far as I know (although I haven’t actually read those comics). So
maybe we can just consider this an apocryphal story, or a continuity blip.
As I mentioned at the start of this review,
the original comic included the boxscore of the game and an inning-by-inning
description of the action, which I think is pretty cool. But you might notice
some of the plays are questionable, and even downright illogical ... and why so
many bunts? Well, I first read this story in a Blue Ribbon Digest devoted to
"Strange Sports Stories", and on the inside back cover Bob Rozakis explained how
he figured out all the play-by-play stuff throughout the game. His father had
taught him a simple game (which he called “Baseball with Cards”) and Rozakis
actually played out the whole superhero vs. super-villain game using playing
cards. I’ve tried it myself and it’s fun enough, though there seems to be an
inordinate number of outs. So that explains why some of the plays don’t make sense... because they were basically random. Of course, I’m sure there was a bit of
fudging in places, like when a batter hits a single and the runners advance two
bases; that happens quite a bit in real baseball, but there’s no provision for
it in the rules for Rozakis’s card game. So we can assume there was a certain
amount of improvisation taking place... especially in the ninth inning, since
we knew the heroes would win, but couldn’t be sure exactly how.
So
that’s my take on this story; it’s a bit weird when you really think about it,
but hey, it was the Bronze Age! I love it!
Art: Jose Luis Garcia-Lopez
Story: Peter Gillis
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