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Welcome to episode 14 of SUPERMAN & BATMAN, featuring your two favorite heroes in one podcast together!
The show’s premise is simple: Each episode, host Michael Bradley celebrates seven decades of the World’s Finest heroes by looking at stories featuring the Man of Steel and the Dark Knight, chosen at random mostly from the pages of World’s Finest Comics.
“The Superman-Batman Split!”
ORIGINAL PUBLICATION: World’s Finest Comics #176 (cover date June 1968)
WHAT TO EXPECT: Superman and Batman … World’s Finest enemies!
ALSO FEATURING: Supergirl, Batgirl, Jimmy Olsen and Robin!
PLUS: A rundown of the book’s other contents and a look at what else was on the stands!
DOWNLOAD: Directly or via iTunes
Subscribe to the show via iTunes or the RSS Feed! Got questions or comments? Additions or corrections? How about a story suggestion? Drop a line! Share your thoughts on the episode and the issue. Seriously, I want to hear from listeners. You also can connect with show on Facebook and Twitter to send feedback and get show updates!
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Wow, I didn’t expect the harshness here! Thanks to its multiple reprints, I’ve always had a soft spot for this one. I first encountered it in that DC digest you mentioned, and then in WF #302 at full-size. That had to be a scheduling snafu coverup, as DC didn’t run reprints in their regular titles at the time. You would think they had an inventory story ready to go.
I think the story is typical Silver Age tom foolery, but there is some clue that there is more to the aliens than meets the eye. Why introduce an actor at the beginning of the story only to basically forget him later? I think that was Bates telegraphing the twist somewhat. It’s certainly not clear, but there is something there.
Endangering Supergirl and Batgirl AND gassing Robin and Jimmy is just another example of the dickery these two would go to, to move a plot along. Again, nothing new.
Maybe it’s the combination of a more “modern” artist in Adams, combined with old Silver Age tropes that’s throwing this one off for you? If Curt Swan or Dick Sprang had drawn it, maybe the Silver Age silliness wouldn’t have stood out in such stark contrast to Adams’ hyper-realistic art. Just a thought.
Oh, and don’t forget, Cary Bates was only about 16 or so at the time this was published! 🙂
I will agree, the cover is VERY weak. Ed Hannigan and Klaus Janson’s cover for WF #302 reprint is much more powerful, with him channeling Adams as best he could.
We’ll just have to agree to disagree on this one. Still enjoyed the show, as always!
Chris
Wow. This was a stunner of an episode. Firstly, it was a stunner that a suggestion of mine would get this kind of a response. Secondly, it was a stunner of an issue, which really made me think there is truth in the adage: “Be careful what you wish for.”
I listened to the episode while weeding our yard. It was a perfect episode for this chore, and I listened to the episode three times in the time it took me to finish cleaning out the yard. I had a lot of time to think about the issue presented as I methodically chewed over the metaphorical dish you’d presented me. I made sure I chewed up every bite before I wrote back. So here we go….
I think the main thing I came away with from this episode was disappointment. Not disappointment in you, Michael, because you once again crafted an excellent podcast episode; your podcast releases have been something I really look forward to. My disappointment came from the many missed opportunities and misdirections and mishandlings of some of my favorite comic characters. Once again, Superman and Batman reflect a ridiculous sentiment of “father-figure knows best and knows all” as they humiliate the younger generation with their “superior knowledge and intellect”. I call baloney on them. Based on the stories I’ve heard about Mort Weisinger, I wonder if he exerted a heavy amount of editorial manipulation to get this message across. Instead of a caring depiction of the World’s Finest team, we get a depiction of them as two jerks who shouldn’t be crossed as they get their message across that they’re in charge. No wonder DC lost ground to Marvel in the 60s!
All I saw were missed opportunities. I mean, we have a team of Jimmy Olsen and Robin. If I recall, this isn’t the first time they were together. I mean, who wouldn’t sympathize with a couple of teenage boys who might commiserate about their overbearing mentors? If Jimmy thought it’d be cool to introduce Robin to the Legion of Superheroes, who would blame him? And if Robin returned the favor by introducing Jimmy to the Teen Titans, so much the better! Jimmy was always being yelled at by Perry White, so Speedy might have had someone to talk with about his mentor. And together, Jimmy and Robin could have figured out Donna Troy’s origin that much faster by pooling their reporting and detective skills. And maybe the Titans could have convinced Jimmy to drop the bow tie for something more modern. And once you add Supergirl and Batgirl to the mix, the range of stories increases even more dramatically.
See, for me, this story is about the generation gap, and about maintaining that illusion that the older generation has it all under control. It’s really just kind of sad and makes me wish that it’d been better. I mean, the weird dichotomy is further evidenced by the Neal Adams artwork. Neal Adams, who was known for bringing Superman and Batman into the 70s, essentially shows why this kind of Silver Age story just wouldn’t work anymore. In a funny way, it was like a mini-precursor to The Watchmen because it held some of these old tropes to the light and showed that they weren’t really viable anymore. Another sad takeaway is that it gave future generations the idea that Batman could take Superman if he had his Kryptonite gloves with him.
So, Michael, thank you for this episode. I really enjoyed it, even if I was disappointed in the issue. I still hold out hope that there are some cool Jimmy/Robin/Supergirl/Batgirl stories out there somewhere.
Thanks again.