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Saturday, July 09, 2011

The Flash #158 - Feb. 1966

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Comics Weekend "The One-Man Justice League!" by John Broome, Carmine Infantino, and Joe Giella.

Inspired by last week's guest appearance in The Flash, F.O.A.M.er John Lijewski III sent in scans from another issue of the Scarlet Speedster's solo series that featured the Sea King as a guest star, this one from the book's heyday of the 1960s.
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In "The One-Man Justice League!" (which is the second story of the book), Barry Allen is sitting at home, enjoying (for once) a quiet night at home.

Of course, the quiet is disrupted by a police report of a gang of super-villains robbing the Central City Bank. Barry does his thing by opening the secret compartment in his ring, only to see...the uniform of Green Lantern pop out!

Having no time to figure this out, he dons the Emerald Guardian's uniform, and then discovers he now has Green Lantern's powers, too!

As Green Lantern, he intercepts the Land-Sea-Air Gang as they are making their getaway. He forces their helicopter to land, forcing the gang to make a break for it by hopping into a nearby car. As the car takes off, Barry finds himself transformed again...this time into Hawkman!
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Now in the form of The Atom, Barry is knocked out by one of the gang, just as Ivo--also in the form of The Atom--wakes up inside his own power-switching machine. He then turns it towards replicating Superman, but the Man of Steel's invulnerability overloads the machine, causing it to explode.

The Flash awakens, as himself, and makes quick work of the Land-Sea-Air Gang. He heads home, not knowing why he underwent such a mysterious set of transformations. Meanwhile, Professor Ivo lays unconscious, amid the rubble of his own failed experiment. The End!


Definitely an unusual story, in that The Flash never learns what happened to him. Professor Ivo must have been unconscious a long time; he didn't appear again for over a decade.

I guess you could argue Aquaman doesn't really appear in this story; its merely The Flash in the guise of the Sea King. Nevertheless, its a fun story and cool little footnote to Aquaman's (and the JLA's) career. Thanks for the scans John!

1 comment:

Wings1295 said...

Definitely an interesting "appearance". And Ivo would go on to do some major League damage in the 80s.