Comic Books 101

by Chris Ryall

  Mayer had little idea just how dedicated Marston was to the concept of the equality and supremacy of women when they met to discuss his potential advisory position and later his creating a new female hero character for All-American Publications. In the 1930s, Marston, a well-known psychologist of the time and creator of the polygraph lie detector test, had a prediction: the next one hundred years would “see the beginning of an American matriarchy.” He theorized that women's superior emotional development would lead them to develop the “ability for worldly success” and eventually “to rule business and the nation.”

  Marston came back to Mayer with a synopsis for a character called Suprema, the Wonder Woman. His intentions for the character were plain — to introduce a character who would be “tender, submissive, peaceloving as good women are,” combining “all the strength of a Superman plus all the allure of a good and beautiful woman.” Mayer wisely cut Suprema from the title character's name, sticking with Wonder Woman. Then, over Mayer's objections, Marston chose newspaper artist Harry Peter (credited in the comics as H.G. Peter) to illustrate the feature, claiming merely that “he knew what life is all about.” Marston undoubtedly had other motives in mind.

  WOMAN'S WORLD

  Wonder Woman made her debut in a backup story in All Star Comics #8 (December 1941), “Introducing Wonder Woman.” The comic is credited to Marston's sobriquet, Charles Moulton.

  The story opens with a U.S. Army plane crashing on Paradise Island, a mysterious, uncharted isle populated by the Amazons, a tribe of beautiful and scantily clad women. The plane and its injured occupant, Captain Steve Trevor, are discovered by Diana, daughter of Hippolyte, Queen of the Amazons. While Trevor is nursed back to health by the Amazon doctors, the lovestruck Diana asks her mother why she can't attend to the wounded airman, and thus unfolds the story of the Amazons.

  In ancient Greece, the Amazons were taken into slavery by Hercules, who defeated Hip-polytein personal combat through trickery. The goddess Aphrodite helped Hippolyte and the Amazons escape and vanquish Hercules and his armies, but in return, the Amazons had to agree to leave the world of man and establish a new world of their own on Paradise Island. If they remained on the island and did not permit themselves to again be deceived by men, then they would remain young, strong and immortal. Aphrodite also decreed that the Amazons wear bracelets fashioned from their captors' chains, “as a reminder that we must always keep aloof from men.”

  As Hippolyte finishes the story, Aphrodite appears before her and declares that one of the Amazons, the strongest and bravest, must return Steve Trevor to America and remain in the “man's world” to help defend America, “the last citadel of democracy, and of equal rights for women.” So, to determine the strongest and bravest, Hippolyte prepares a tournament, but forbids Diana from entering, unable to bear the possibility of her daughter leaving the island. She enters anyway, in disguise, and wins the contest. The masked Amazon is revealed, and Hippolyte has no choice but to name her daughter the winner and award her the uniform and title of Wonder Woman.

  Wonder Woman's first adventure continues in Sensation Comics #1 (January 1942). The Amazon princess returns the injured Steve Trevor to America in her invisible plane, dropping him off at Walter Reed hospital in Washington, DC. As she is exploring the “Man's World,” she finds herself foiling a robbery and her “bullets and bracelets” trick — deflecting gunshots with her bracelets — is noticed by a passing theatrical agent. He puts Diana on stage, enabling her to make some quick cash while Trevor recuperates. Then, in one of those “only in comics” coincidences, Princess Diana runs into a despondent nurse who laments that she lacks the funds to join her fiancé in South America. Because the princess needs a nursing job in order to be near Steve Trevor, and conveniently has a fistful of cash to spare from her theater gig, an arrangement is quickly made. Soon the nurse is off to join her fiancé, never to be seen again, and Princess Diana takes over the nurse's job and identity. The nurse's name? Diana Prince, of course.

  GIRL POWER

  Wonder Woman's golden Lasso of Truth would later be introduced, and is perhaps a direct correlation to Marston's real-life invention of the polygraph machine. He gives Wonder Woman the same power he felt he gave the world: the ability to determine truth from lies. The lasso is a weapon of submission that renders opponents helpless, a theme that Marston would return to again and again, such as the final twist revealed in the Wonder Woman concept: that she becomes powerless when bound by a man.

  This detail further underlines Marston's feminist agenda in the series, by subtly reinforcing his premise that women in American society must free themselves from male domination if they're ever to be truly strong and independent. It also provides a convenient excuse for Wonder Woman to be tied up, chained, shackled, gagged and otherwise restrained literally hundreds of times over the course of the series, all lovingly illustrated in Peter's pulpy, disturbingly adult style. This, we contend, was the real reason for Marston's insistence on Harry Peter as the Wonder Woman artist: to infuse the comic with highly suggestive imagery to help keep the attention of male readers, particularly young adolescent males, who might otherwise hesitate to buy a “girls' comic book.” Once Marston had pulled in a large, captive audience with Peter's lurid bondage art, he was able to proselytize his enlightened, feminist agenda.

  At least Kryptonite was hard to come by. Wonder Woman's weakness? Being bound by men.

  WONDER WOMAN #2 © 1942 DC COMICS. WONDER WOMAN™ & © DC COMICS. ART BY H.G. PETER.

  After the death of William Moulton Marston in 1947, the Wonder Woman strip entered a new phase of its publication. No longer single-mindedly focused on issues of gender equality and submission, Wonder Woman instead took on a straightforward adventure style, being handled primarily by writer Robert Kanigher and artist Ross Andru. Andru's clean and traditional style departed from that of artist H.G. Peter and more closely resembled DC's general output. A minor revision was made in Wonder Woman's costume, replacing her red-and-white boots with red Greco Roman-style lace-up sandals.

  The only significant change to the character (other than when the series briefly returned to a World War II setting to synchronize with a CBS television series during the 1970s) was when Wonder Woman's costume changed in Wonder Woman #288 (February 1982), when the eagle on her chest plate was replaced with a stylized double “W” symbol.

  EXTREME MAKEOVER

  By 1985, it was decided that Wonder Woman would be completely revised by the end of DC's epic miniseries Crisis on Infinite Earths (intended to simplify and refine DC's complex universe of characters and timelines), and so the old Wonder Woman was wiped from existence, erased as if she'd never existed.

  SCOTT SAYS

  Robert Kanigher's stories took a lighthearted, almost fairy-tale approach to the Wonder Woman narrative, one in which logic and continuity often flew right out the window. Kanigher made use of Queen Hippolyte's Magic Sphere with a vengeance. This television-like device introduced in Wonder Woman's first appearance allowed Hip-polyte to see any place or time in the world, and Kanigher used it to tell tales of Princess Diana as a girl, and even as a toddler, known as Wonder Girl and Wonder Tot, respectively. The adventures of young Diana often involved innocent flirtations with mythological types such as Bird-Boy and Mer-Boy. Even stranger, sometimes Wonder Woman would travel back in time through the screen of the Magic Sphere to have adventures with Wonder Girl and Wonder Tot, despite the fact that they were all three the same person.

  This even resulted in the accidental creation of a new character. When the creative personnel at DC (who apparently were not steady Wonder Woman readers) were putting together their new Teen Titans series, they took a look at issues of Wonder Woman and said, “Hey, there's a Wonder Girl! Put her on the team, too!” They failed to realize that Wonder Woman and Wonder Girl were one and the same. When the mistake was eventually discovered, a backstory was hastily constructed for Wonder Girl, and she became Donna Troy, an orphan rescued by Princess Diana and ra
ised on Paradise Island as Diana's sister.

  The problem was that DC hadn't finalized its plans for its new, post-Crisis Wonder Woman. In his foreword to the trade paperback collection Wonder Woman: Gods and Mortals, writer/artist George Pérez recalls that there had been many proposals submitted for a new Wonder Woman, some that changed everything but her name. The editors at DC, however, were intent that the basic character remain recognizable as Wonder Woman. When Pérez expressed interest in handling the Wonder Woman revamp, all current plans in place were changed, and Pérez came on board as both the artist and writer, with longtime collaborator Len Wein lending a hand on the script.

  Of the three major revamps undertaken by DC in the post-Crisis days of 1986 (Superman and Batman being the other two), Wonder Woman's was the most successful creatively, and it catapulted the character back to a level of importance and significance that had not been seen in decades. It shook off the detritus of years of neglect, and combined the strongest elements of the original concept with a modern sensibility. Pérez strengthened the series' ties to Greek mythology, using all the Greek names for the deities, renaming Paradise Island Themyscira and even giving Diana more traditionally Greek features. Retained from the original is Steve Trevor's crash-landing and convalescence on Paradise Island, although wisely, this time the creators don't have Diana fall madly in love with the first man she sees. As always, Perez's art on the series is gorgeous, and his redesigns of villains like Ares, as well as new characters like Decay, Deimos and Phobos, gave the series the brand-new spark it had long needed. As for characterization, here Perez gave us a strong, confident and powerful woman, still uncertain about her role in Man's World, innocent yet not naïve.

  4 The Flash

  A most memorable runBy 1940, the rampant success of Superman was obvious. Publishers were tripping all over themselves to get the next superhero comic out the door. However, creators were cautious. National's successful legal action against Fox Comics had recently ended the derivative Wonder Man feature from Eisner and Iger Studios. So, what to do? Specialize! Before long, every superhero was more than, well, super, and had a distinct and legally defensible niche. Timely Comics introduced the Human Torch and the Sub-Mariner, while National's sister company All-American headlined its new series Flash Comics with two of its own — Hawkman and the Flash, the first of the speedster characters in comic books.

  The Flash has been a remarkably long-running character, with only a five-year gap in publication since 1940, second only to Superman, Batman and Wonder Woman, who have remained continually on the stands since their inception. The Flash concept is also the best example of one of DC Comics's great strengths: a sense of legacy. The tradition and title of the Flash is passed down from generation to generation through the decades. Let's take a look at the men who have carried the lightning.

  THE FIRST FLASH

  The original Flash's first appearance was in Flash Comics #1 (January 1940), courtesy of writer Gardner Fox and artist Harry Lampert. We meet Jay Garrick, an “unknown student at Midwestern University” who's getting absolutely nowhere with co-ed Joan Williams because of his lack of skills on the gridiron. After all, she says, “a man of your build and brains could be a star… a scrub is just an old washwoman!!” Ouch. No love for Jay.

  In the lab, however, research student Jay is a brilliant scientist who's been studying the gases of “hard water” for three years. Working in the lab late one night, Jay decides to relax with a cigarette. (Comics in the 1940s were a whole different animal.) As he leans back to take a big drag, Jay knocks over the bottles containing the mysterious hard-water fumes, and they quickly render him unconscious.

  After weeks in the hospital, Jay eventually recovers, and the doctors discover that the hard water elements have permanently affected his reflexes. The doctor drops some slightly dubious science on Jay: “Science knows that hard water makes a person act much quicker than ordinarily… by an intake of its gases, Jay can walk, talk, run and think swifter than thought!” If you say so, Doc. Jay is now the fastest man alive, and in a burst of self-interest unusual for superhero comics, he uses his newfound abilities to win the state football game and score a date with the scrub-hating Joan. After college, Jay finds himself using his new powers to fight crime; no great motivation or anything, he just feels better about himself using his speed to help humanity.

  The Golden Age Flash stories in which Jay Garrick uses his speed to fight common criminals and gangsters were written primarily by Gardner Fox. Original Flash artist Harry Lampert departed after the first two issues, and was replaced by E.E. Hibbard, whose rough, basic style became the trademark of the series. However, when the superhero trend died out in the late 1940s, most of the heroes went with it, and only Superman, Batman and onder Woman maintained respectable sales. After a healthy eleven-year race, the Flash's run came to a sudden stop.

  The Flash of the Golden Age as depicted by the strip's original artist/creator, Harry Lampert.

  FLASH COMICS #1 © 1940 DC COMICS. THE FLASH™ & © DC COMICS. ART BY HARRY LAMPERT.

  EVERYTHING OLD IS NEW AGAIN

  When DC editor Julius Schwartz was looking for a new feature for his anthology series Showcase, a revival of the Flash seemed to fit the bill. After all, it had been roughly five years since the last Flash comic in 1951, and the general belief at the time was that kids only read comics for about five years, so therefore a whole new audience would be ready for more of the fastest man alive. Schwartz turned the Flash revival over to writer/editor Robert Kanigher and artist Carmine Infantino, who had both worked on the first Flash series toward the end of its run. This time, Schwartz instructed them that everything for the new Flash series had to be different — secret identity, origin, costume, the works. In Showcase #4 (October 1956), Kanigher and Infantino delivered.

  “Mystery of the Human Thunderbolt” opens with police scientist Barry Allen chuckling over an old issue of Flash Comics. Back at his lab, Barry is standing in front of a cabinet full of chemicals when a bolt of lightning strikes through an open window, drenching him in chemicals.

  Later, Barry heads off to meet his girlfriend, Iris, and watches in horror as a bullet slowly makes its way toward her head. He knocks her out of harm's way, while fully realizing that the combination of the lightning and the chemicals have granted him unthinkable reflexes and speed. (The bullet heading for Iris? Just a stray from a getaway by the Turtle Man, the criminal known as “The Slowest Man Alive,” and a rather unremarkable villain.)

  Inspired by the old Flash Comics, Barry resolves to carry on the Flash identity and soon devises a costume for himself made from the same material as a Navy life raft, which can be stored inside a ring and swells to full size with the touch of a button.

  Carmine Infantino's re-design of the Flash costume was truly inspired. Streamlined and slick, the lightning bolts on the costume's forearms, belt and boots serve as the perfect visual cues for Infantino's illustration of super-speed. Flash would streak across a panel, and his blurred crimson figure was followed by highlighted, yellow streaks of movement. Infantino's style became the generic model for illustrating speedster characters in comics, and the Flash's costume is one of the few Silver Age designs that has remained unchanged for more than sixty years.

  Writer John Broome took over when the new Flash got his own magazine in March 1959 (The Flash #105, picking up where the original Flash Comics series numbering had left off). Month after month, Broome and Infantino introduced new supervillains, each more outlandish than the last. Flash's rogues' gallery is one of the best in comics, with villains such as Captain Boomerang, the Trickster, Captain Cold and Mirror Master. The genius behind the Flash's mob of villains is that they all hang out together. They hold competitions to see who can bust out of jail first, have the best heists or devise the best deathtrap for the Flash — they even go to the same tailor! Something of a homicidal family.

  Many of Barry Allen's adventures involve time travel. In fact, one of John Broome's greatest concept
s is the Cosmic Treadmill. Follow along: If the Flash runs at near light-speed, then what happens when he runs in place on a treadmill? Time travel, obviously. Pure scientific gibberish, yet perfectly satisfying comic-book logic. One of Barry Allen's far-future foes is Abra Kadabra, a miscreant from the sixty-fourth century whose technology is so advanced, his antics look like magic to all us twenty-first-century types. Not satisfied with merely killing Barry, Kadabra delights in torturing him, often subjecting his body to bizarre transformations such as a living marionette. Transmutation is something of a running theme in The Flash, with Barry Allen being transformed into a mirror, into pure electricity, into a video-game character, and the list goes on and on, so much so that it is eventually explained that Barry Allen has complete control over every molecule in his body, thus allowing him to survive all of these bodily traumas.

  THE FLASH'S ROGUES' GALLERY

  PROFESSOR ZOOM, THE REVERSE FLASH Obsessed with destroying Barry Allen's life, Professor Zoom's appearances only mean one thing: something bad is about to happen.

  CAPTAIN COLD Len Snart uses his patented “cold gun” for crime, but more often gets distracted by Barry Allen and winds up on ice.

  MIRROR MASTER Flash has to beware all reflective surfaces — he never knows when this murderous crook could emerge from the mirror.

  GORILLA GRODD Exiled from the secret Gorilla City, this super-intelligent ape plots to use his mental powers for conquest.

  CAPTAIN BOOMERANG Master of the trick boomerang, Digger Harkness repeatedly bedevils the Flash. And like his namesake, he always comes back.

  THE TRICKSTER Circus acrobat turned practical-joking supervillain James Jesse uses “air shoes” of his own invention in his battles with the Flash.

  WEATHER WIZARD Thanks to a wand invented by his scientist brother, Mark Mardon can control the weather, sending plenty of dark clouds the Flash's way.