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Sunday, June 08, 2014

Detective Comics #296 - Oct. 1961

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Comics Weekend "The Mystery of Demon Island" by ? and Nick Cardy.

It's Adventure Sunday!

The fight you've been waiting to see--Aquaman vs. The Creature From The Black Lagoon! Well, sort of:
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Aquaman sends his two whale pals to attack the Sea Demon, but they are equally terrified of its power, and retreat. The Sea King notices something about the sparks coming from the creature's trident, and gets an idea. Ignoring the warnings of the island people, he hops on a whale and charges:
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...and so ends another adventure for Aquaman and Aqualad!


The industrious crook--who doesn't even get a name--was never seen again. By this point, Aquaman's Rogues Gallery was still pretty thin, so it might have been neat to see another crook steal the suit and become a super-villain. Nick Cardy's design--no doubt at least somewhat influenced by 1955's The Creature From the Black Lagoon--is fun as all heck to look at.

Aquaman next guest-starred in a smoocheriffic issue of Superman's Girlfriend, Lois Lane, then returned to Detective for another outing, which we'll cover next week!


5 comments:

Anthony said...

At least the idea of a giant sea horse got reused some years later (as a mount of Aquaman's)...

Elsewhere on Earth-1...

Re: Batman: the Dynamic Duo fight the Planet-Master, a crook whose costumes were, well, planet-based. While he never showed up again in the comics, Planet-Master did appear in the "Batman: The Brave and the Bold" TV series (where he fought Blue Beetle and... Aquaman!)

Chris Franklin said...

And he would have gotten away with it,too, if it wasn't for that meddling Sea King and his pesky sidekick!

The Gillman on a giant seahorse; what's not to love?

I think Planet Master did return (or at least a new version of him) in The Outsiders title in the late 80s. I think he was part of Strikeforce Kobra.

Chris

Russell said...

I had this issue! When all of the various Aquaman appearances was listed in the letters' page in DC Special I copied that and kept an eye out at old comic book stores. As soon as I saw this cover I remembered I *had* this issue...not sure where it went, though, haha!

bribabylk said...

Maybe Dagon stole that costume later.

Whatever the case may be, I think that rendition of it in the splash panel is adorable. Kinda looks like an aquatic cousin to the Zuni fetish doll.

JBS

bribabylk said...
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