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Sunday, June 28, 2009

Adventures in The DC Universe #1 - April 1997

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Comics Weekend "Now You See 'Em..." by Steve Vance, John Delaney, and Ron Boyd.

I've covered Aquaman's solo adventures in the sadly short-lived Adventures of the DC Universe previously, but he also got some "screen time" in the book as part of the JLA.

Not only is he prominently featured on the cover, but here he helps his fellow JLAers take on a whole team of super-villains:
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Some armed goons--under the command of Gorilla Grodd--kidnap an energy company bigwig named McKinney. The Flash manages to rescue him, bu Grodd escapes.

In Denver, Blockbuster tries to commit a robbery of a jewelry store by Martian Manhunter. Manhunter is equally successful in thwarting the crime, but, like Grodd, Blockbuster manages to escape into thin air.

Over on the California Coast, Aquaman confronts Major Disaster:
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(I like the "Sha-Mooo!" sound effect)

As you can guess, this happens over and over to the various JLAers: Parasite gets away from Superman, Cheetah with Wonder Woman, Dr. Light with Green Lantern, and Scarecrow with Batman.

The JLA all meet-up in the Watchtower, and share their experiences. Batman puts all the locations into the JLA computer, and comes up with a location as to where the energy burst needed to teleport all these bad guys is coming from: somewhere in the Southwestern Desert!

We then see all the villains, and of course they're squabbling amongst one another. The conversation is ended by a mysterious, shadowed person, who gave each of the villains they're teleportation devices. Now that they have all failed to accomplish their missions, their benefactor wants them back!

But before that can happen:
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The JLAers take on their respective foes, and rather easily defeat them. But as this is going on, a giant robot emerges from a compartment, and manages to blast Superman, Manhunter, and Green Lantern! Uh-oh!

Batman hatches a plan-he has The Flash and himself distract the robot, while Wonder Woman and Aquaman pool their strength:
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Superman and Manhunter, now recovered, rip open the robot to find it...empty! Well, not empty, exactly...there is a ticking bomb inside!

The JLA, with the unconscious villains in tow, clear out of the underground hideout just as the bomb goes off:
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...to be continued, though not in the next issue.

Yes, instead of moving directly into part two of this story, Adventures in the DC Universe moved on to highlight its omnibus format, featuring solo stories of other DC stars (like Aquaman!).

The JLA did reappear in futures issues of the title, which we'll get to in a few weeks!

4 comments:

David J. Cutler said...

I'm actually pretty intrigued to find out who that mysterious villain is, haha...

I love how this series looks like a style mix of Timm and Kirby. Going to have to start digging through bins for it.

Russell said...

I don't remember if we ever found out who it was...? Or maybe I missed that issue.

rob! said...

I do have the other JLA issues of AITDCU, so you'll find out who the bad guy is in a few weeks...BWA-HA-HA-HA!

D said...

I loved this short-run series!
I think there was a stand alone Aquaman issue too, if my memory is correct