Power of the Atom Podcast #605

Skulduggery

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• The Atom in DC Bonus Book #8!
• By Joe Calchi, Jim Balent, & Dan Schaefer!
• From DC Comics's November 1988 cover-dated Power of the Atom #4!

Comic books were pretty much all anthologies in the early days, and very nearly entirely staffed with new and unproven talent. After all, it was a new and unproven medium. Once the industry got some successful properties under its belt, they got a little pickier about who got to do what. A lot of art was produced by studios back then, so an assistant could train up to a larger role on a more successful feature. The price of comics stayed the same for decades, so they got smaller and smaller for the same dime, with fewer opportunities for younger, unpolished talent. Most typically, they landed in the oldest type of comics, the anthologies; usually horror, romance, or some other genre that allowed for short stories or rotating creative team on done-in-one tales. Truth to tell, the tendency to use less desirable creatives on anthologies probably helped destroy the viability of that format going into the 1980s. DC still wanted to have a farm team, but with anthologies dying off, they had fewer avenues to developing talent in house and in print. Ultimately, the '80s indie comics boom subsidized small press feeders where the Big Two publishers could cherry-pick from other publishers' best prospects. In 1988 though, DC still had that nursery club mentality, and tried to facilitate it through their Bonus Book program.

The New Teen Titans was arguably DC's biggest success story of at minimum the early '80s, and it launched with a 16-page original preview story given away as a bound-in premium with DC Comics Presents #26 at no additional cost. DC tried to replicate that hit formula throughout the first half of the '80s to no avail. Then DC took two failures and tried to mash them up with 1988's Bonus Book program. Put simply, they'd try-out green talent in the free bonus stories, and hope that the added value would help sales on a given book while potentially offering exposure to the next great talent find. Rob Liefeld was the biggest name to come out of the program, but he'd already been producing work for Megaton Comics, and was already booked for the Hawk and Dove mini-series the month after his Jennifer Morgan solo story ran in the low-selling Warlord title. The next biggest was Jim Balent, the oldest rookie in town. He'd been kicking around the industry since 1984, failing to catch on with back-ups in DC war titles. He spent most of the late '80s doing heavy metal inspired cheesecake and splatter covers for Malibu titles, and the odd assignment for First or Dark Horse; just another one of those guys who seemed to spend too much time on a gigantic stylized signature. He finally started getting traction with the 1990 vampire series From The Darkness, which survived multiple volumes and publishers on his now trademark blend of buxom babes and gothic fantasy adventure. That gave him an in for the Batman family of titles, which led to his 6 1/2 year run on Catwoman, his moonlighting at Chaos! Comics on Purgatori, and finally his self-publishing Tarot: Witch of the Black Rose for twenty-one years and counting.

In 1988 though, Balent was still lucky to do the occasional Ex-Mutants cover. No, I'm not taking a did at the X-Men franchise-- there was literally a franchise of post-apocalyptic titles that was the biggest hit Eternity Comics ever saw based mostly on infringing Marvel trademarks and the early work of Ron Lim. Marvel had the last laugh though when they stole Ron Lim and bought out Eternity's parent company. Like main series artist Dwayne Turner, Jim Balent was part of the generation who lost years of income in serve to the principles of the book How To Draw Comics The Marvel Way. In the 1970s, there were only three kinds of comics-- the good Marvel ones, Brand Ecch, and stoner comix with an x. Nobody wanted to drawn Brand Ecch, so scores of young artists tried to draw as much like John Buscema and John Romita as possible with an over-emphasis on realistic anatomy, perspective, and background. The Marvel house style was a more dynamic take on standard issue commercial art, and it was as rigidly applied in the Bronze Age as DC's clinical Swandersonization in the Silver Age. The alternative was '70s Jack Kirby, and nobody was buying that. The tyranny of the Marvel Way was so fascistic that every artist on the Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe was inked by Josef Rubinstein to make sure they looked uniformly "right." Neither Turner nor Balent garnered fans until they threw off those shackles and got jiggy with it, as was the fashion of the coming times.

While Turner probably had more "correct" fundamentals in 1988, Balent had a lot more energy and fun going for him, even considering how dodgy and crude his work was on the Atom Bonus Book. Balent is really a poor man's amateurish version of his future self, but there's an enthusiasm that patches over the rough patch that is every single panel of this story. Low rent and basic as the faux cover is, it still betters most of the actual run's, and the splash page of a human-sized Katarthan Skul-Rider on a giant bird crashing through the window of the Palmers' former suburban home at least rivals any other in the series. Writer Norman Brawler isn't who the yellow-skinned barbarian is looking for, but it's immediately odd that his main concern is more about Jean Loring than the former Atomic sword-wielder best known in Morlaidh. I talked too much on the front of this episode to now explain to a highly hypothetical young listener what a Rolodex is, so just know that it was equally weird for the barbarian to figure out how to find Ray Palmer via the analog version of Brawler's email contacts. It all seems to turn out to be a nightmare Ray's having anyway, though he was oddly upset about having slit the barbarian's throat, which isn't the Ray that you and I know.

The only part of the nightmare that wasn't real was Ray's victory, since Brawler was being taken out of his rental by EMTs after the Skul-Rider's attack. Given the rider's ranting, Ray's most concerned with Jean's safety, but she's incommunicado at that moment. Cut to day drinkers at a first class hotel heading back to his room for favors. When the male of the two appears to shrink in stature, the soon to be murdered female gently mocks his sudden shrimpyness. As blood ran down her limp wrist in the next panel, I have to figure someone was influenced by such woman-killing luminaries of the day as "The Death of Jean DeWolf" and Major Force introductory arc in Captain Atom. They sure knew how to brutally murdered women to the furthest extreme the Comics Code Authority would allow in the '80s, let me tell you. These cold chops were to bloody for the refrigerator, y'knowahmean?

Cal Thornton is maybe five feet as drawn, but the poor little rich boy is still so homicidally entitled that when the ur-generically named Labtech Research Incorporated can't guarantee their ability to keep adding a foot in length indefinitely due to his increasing tolerance of the experimental size-altering procedure, he goes all White Boy Summer on the world. Oh hey, you probably thought I meant that he got rapey. I can't say for certain that didn't happen, too. There's a lot of bedroom action at play in this story, but I should specify that this will primarily be grievance-based mass murder. I myself am technically a white boy, and this is kind of our thing, especially lately, but also the entirety of human history with all the colonization and genociding and stuff. Cal Thornton is the one man Mickey and Mallory of last chance YOLO spree killing, starting with blowing the scientist's head off with a Magnum and turning the dial up to "11" on full body girth enhancement. It turns out that he was Jean Loring's stalker ex before Ray Palmer, which tracks, until Ray beat him bloody, which also tracks. Ray is the Chad of advanced theoretical physics, let me tell you. Even though Cal only adds about a foot, his raptor steed Deodata gets into Them territory when it gets hit with Vita Rays.

Cal Thornton rides his bird to the penthouse apartment of his ritzy parents, changes into a robe and pajamas, bursts into their bedroom, makes his being slightly below average height the cause of all the world's troubles, changes clothes again, single-handed bare-handed Menendez-Bro'd his folks extreme Mo Howard style. Next morning, smears himself in yellow greasepaint head to toe, cosplays as a Skul-Rider, flies to Ivy University where Ray is teaching a class under an alias unconvincingly before being called out by a student. Cosplay Cal crashes class, Ray somehow shrinks them both plus the bird, and they all tumble into a replica of Mayan temples Ray was using as a teaching aid. We're running on Golden Age, Fletcher Hanks logic here. Just go with it. Ray flips the bird with a power cable. The fake Skul-Rider literally pulls the plug. We're not going to get into Skul-Rider feeling like a double entendre but doesn't make sense as such. That's a Sword of the Atom joke and we're already running long here.

The Atom doesn't buy the Skul-Rider act for a second and immediately makes Cal Thornton. This is the most realistic thing to happen in the Power of the Atom series to date. No amount of body paint is going to render your ex's creepy stalker unrecognizable, and you never forget an ass you kicked. Those are Hallmark moments in life. The fight moves underwater, and the Atom has to punch a fish. I'm not going to lie, being more exciting than 1988 Dwayne Turner is not actual very good in the grand scheme of things, and it was at this point that I had to go back a couple of pages to be reminded that this was not a local Ivy Town lake but the model in the classroom. Also, isn't it some form of animal cruelty to keep a common aquarium fish in the tiny sliver of actual water within a scale model of Mayan civilization in a college classroom. Balent's a good man who makes a point of drawing the water filtration system for that poor fishy.

Cal Thornton isn't as good a marksman as he thinks he is with a bow and arrow, plus when it comes down to swordfighting, the Tiny Titans does that density shifting thing that allows him to shatter Cal's blade. The Mighty Mite even breaks dude's arm in the same blow. Ray Palmer then threatens that he could execute this mother-murderer and no jury would convict him, but he's a civilized man now. That's code for they're both white guys. Cal Thornton was just having a really bad day, ya'll. Besides, it's not like he's literally an extremely rich madman who can hire the finest lawyers to get him the lightest possible sentence. He's only been nursing a homicidal grudge against Jean Loring and Ray Palmer since college. Why would the Atom see this Caucasian man as a more immediate and indefinite threat than a six-inch yellow guy from an opposing tribe who was probably only raiding New Morlaidh for rations whose body Atom dumped on a pile of corpses he personally delivered to Katarthan Hell five issues back.

Wow, the art has gotten really bad by this point. Like, printed locally so you have to buy a few pity copies to collect dust on the most poorly lit and remote part of the comics rack bad. Yet somehow still better than looking at Dwayne Turner's creepy weird disproportionate talking heads on supporting characters. Also, this is scripter Joe Calchi's second and last Bonus Book and also book full stop which operates on sometimes literally dream logic and I'd still rather read his Power of the Atom over what Stern's offered so far. I'll take insanity over numbing predictability, plus the only flashback is actually necessary and provides new information. File "I wish this mainstream comics series had the creative team from Ex-Mutants instead" under sentences never before uttered. I bet Ron Lim would have been a blast on the Atom.

Random fact, I think Joe Calchi went on to become General Manager / Advertising Director for Southern Jersey's Daily Journal and the Courier-Post. All thanks to his DC Bonus books, I'm absolutely certain. Sword of the Atom,Ray Palmer,POTAcast,Power of the Atom,Jean Loring,Power of the Atom Podcast,Post-Crisis,

Power of the Atom Podcast #604

15 Minutes of Fame!

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• The Atom versus Strobe!
• By Roger Stern, Dwayne Turner & K.S. Wilson!
• From DC Comics' October 1988 cover-dated Power of the Atom #3!

What looks to be a middle aged white dude with a chip on his shoulder managed to get a golden armor described as "looking like a high tech football player" starts robbing armored cars and such. Despite making off with half a million dollars, he's ticked because his time in the regional news is squeezed by the return of the Atom. Like an old west gunslinger, Strobe decides to make his name by taking out Ray Palmer, whose identity is publicly known. Consequently, Palmer and people associated with him are being hounded by a host of hyper-aggressive press. Despite checking into a hotel under an assumed name, the press were banging on Ray's door at six in the morning. Later, he has to rescue his old friend and mentor Professor Alpheus Hyatt from the same. But who will save the readers from a page-&-a-half of recapping the first two issues in some old man's kitchen?

On pages 6-7, the press gets to Jean and Paul Hoben on courthouse steps, and it's only then that they even learned Ray was back from the Amazon. You can tell on these pages that the artist is losing interest, because the already middling quality is going to an early Valiant WWF Wrestling comics place. It's page ten and we're still checking in with the C.I.A. spooks who have been surveilling Atom and jerking his chain. Comics like this are the reason the Chromium Age happened. Bland drawing of dull people in plain clothes talking about how they feel about stuff that happened in other bad comics. This is why comic books gave up on secret identities and supporting characters and lifelike subplots in favor of speed lines and Bondian villains with spikes and speedos. We were collectively so tired of comics like these that the only response was to demand hyperstimulation from kinky sexualization and extreme violence.

So halfway through the book, the Atom finally gets in a fight with a lameoid named Strobe on a suburban lawn. The dude create bright light bursts and concussion blasts. The Atom beats him twice, because while he was getting tied up the first time, he blinded everybody with a, y'know, his thing. Then Atom shrunk to climb into his equipment to disable it. The Atom couldn't just sock a guy named Strobe and be done with. He had to get extra with Strobe. Oh, and an older middle-aged guy getting a massage watches on TV and plots his own attack against the Mighty Mite. To the degree that the artist can do likenesses, which is not up to the standard of early Valiant WWF comics, I guess he vaguely resembles Richard Nixon if you're not wearing your glasses and are a little tipsy. Excited yet?

Agent Bailey, an even older late middle aged white guy with white hair, where he has any at all, gives Ray Palmer a call at Professor Hyatt's house. Making no connection, Ray happily shakes the hand of the C.I.A. creep who's secretly been messing with his life as he's offered a new identity and position within the agency...

Ray Palmer,POTAcast,Power of the Atom,Jean Loring,Power of the Atom Podcast,Post-Crisis

Power of the Atom Podcast #603

"Just Like Starting Over"

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• The Atom returns to super-heroing!
• By Roger Stern, Dwayne Turner & K.S. Wilson!
• From DC Comics' September 1988 cover-dated Power of the Atom #2!

We all agree that Ray Palmer would have hated John Lennon, right? I figure Ray's one of those "I'm not into music" people, or maybe a jazz guy, like Julie Schwartz. Anyway, the C.I.A. is put out by how the vast majority of information they have on Palmer came from his biography, and how those Justice League guys are really good about hiding their identities. Meanwhile, three-foot-Ray got checked out by family doctor Alvin Jeffries, who gives him a half-sized bill of health, excepting the shrinkage. Ray had a lens sizer that he'd developed with the Hawks secreted into a wall, but it didn't work in his current predicament. With a bit of time to kill, Ray perused Norman Brawler's leftover magazines to catch-up with the times. He was surprised to learn about the Legends event where a demagogue temporarily turned the population against their super-heroes. Also, the Hawks' identity had been publicly exposed, but their whole existence would get retconned soon, so no big loss there.

The next day, Ray and Norm visited Ivy University to meet with the newly named Associate Professor of Physics, Dr. Enrica Negrini. She had once been Ray's lab assistant, and the envy of all the ladies on campus, but Ray only ever had eyes for Jean. Ricki ran some tests and determined that Ray's body had been impregnated with white dwarf matter and the remains of his old costume. Ray stayed in her lab alone overnight to work on his problem, and determined that he could use intense bio-electric activity on his brain's frontal lobe via an encephalo-cybernetic web in a revised costume to merge with his old one and regain his lost mass. It's weird that they would specifically reference a method that would require that Ray wear a skullcap mask when they new his new costume for this series would air out his top. The other ill-considered alteration to his classic suit was explained by Norm messing up the dye pigments, and Ray not caring if it was pink and green so long as it fixed his powers. Part of what made the original suit so great was that he was the rare hero who wore full pants and that the points on it indicated forward motion for an always acrobatic character. The new suit emphasized his crotch in panties that now seemed to point all the way up his chest. Seriously, the worst thing about this book forever shaking DC's faith in the Atom as a solo character is that the best thing about the entire property is the costume and they haven't stopped messing it up for a fourth straight decade and counting.

The revised suit work in restoring Ray's height, but he immediately passed out from being up for something like 36 hours straight to get it done. Ricki volunteers to sit watch over this handsome man while he slept, until he was roused by an alarm. Quraci terrorists had taken hostages in the library, and the campus was being evacuated. The Atom reflexes went straight there, and because these are swarthy Middle Eastern types, he tries to manipulate them by pretending to be Allah and a genie, in that order but interchangeably. It doesn't work on all the terrorists, but it does on some, so go ahead and shake your head at the Bill Maher of it all. At least the Tiny Titan managed a decisive victory against numerous men with sub-machine guns, even if this is the second issue of the Mighty Mite fighting plain dudes.

In the end, it turns out the C.I.A. had tipped off the terrorists that Amir Lashgary, nephew of the late President of Qurac, had been pursuing a graduate degree at Ivy U for two years under an assumed name. The spooks had endangered all those lives solely to draw the Atom out of hiding, and none of us batted an eye. Later, to help sell the dud duds, we learn that the new costume will remain visible at full height, can disappear or reappear at will, and the Atom's neurological connection to the costume makes his powers more responsive than ever. He'll needed it, since the Amir respected Atom's request for discretion regarding his rescue, but the C.I.A. leaked Atom's return to the media to put pressure on the hero...

Ray Palmer,POTAcast,Power of the Atom,Power of the Atom Podcast,Post-Crisis

Power of the Atom Podcast #602

Home Is the Hero!

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• The last Ray Palmer Atom ongoing series begins!
• The destruction of Morlaidh!
• The conclusion of Sword of the Atom!
• By Roger Stern, Dwayne Turner & K.S. Wilson!
• From DC Comics' August 1988 cover-dated Power of the Atom #1!

Ray Palmer's last bid to star in his own ongoing series is launched off the back of the bird he was riding before colliding into three nondescript men with handguns. He's still in a variation of his classic costume, aside from having the open hair mask from his Sword period, though we know from the Secret Origins cover and promotions that he will soon duplicate Superman from the waist down. I suppose it's a dynamic cover for what it's depicting, but it doesn't seem like readers were buying what was being sold here in 1988. Actually, it wasn't selling in '68 or '78 either. In POTA's defense, nobody's out there swiping Jackson Guice's Flash #1 cover, either.

The splash page has more punch but less fanboy-friendly detailing, as Atom burst out of a rotary phone in an explosion of plastic and speaker parts. Ray then grows to about half his normal human size and his costume disappears. The call answerer was Norman Brawler, the author of Ray Palmer's authorized biography, who is to Norman Mailer as this comic is to the books it was being sold as emulating. Theoretically, Ray had gotten messed up be traveling through a satellite signal rather than his usual land line, but he was a short, sweaty mess who swiftly passes out.

A few hours later, Ray gives Norm the first chapter of his next biography. Well, given that this is Ray's last solo series, probably just a updated and expanded edition of The Atom's Farewell. They should also add an "s" to plural "Farewell". In case you missed it, they recap the present day material from Secret Origins #29 where Ray finds the white dwarf matter in the Amazon Jungle. Ray discovers that the material is "psycho-sensitive" at close proximity, and that was how Ray had "willed" himself to survive size-changing where the objects he tested in his early research just exploded.

Soon, full-sized human Don Brice stumbled into the shrunken barbarian kingdom of Morlaidh where the Atom's been swording and promptly died. Ray knew Brice as one of his C.I.A. contacts from the old days, and took seriously his warnings of a coming threat. I bet the dying part really sold it. Anyway, the Atom mounts a birdy and flies off to survey the area, and finds a base camp where random dudes are planning to napalm the rain forest. It's night time, so nobody's going to be doing anything until daybreak, at least. The Atom wisely, sabotages the napalm supply, returns to his kingdom, and swiftly crafts a device that uses the white dwarf particle to grow himself and the alien Karathan race that he's been living amongst.

Oh, that's not what happened? The Atom just landed on a meeting room table in a sweaty tent at six inches tall and yells at Portuguese-speaking workers in English? They can't understand his intent and react especially badly to his chopping at them with a sandwich sword? The Atom decides to investigate the napalm launching device while he's being actively pursued by a cowardly and superstitious lot with itchy trigger fingers? The napalm supply explodes and consumes the entire area? The Atom is knocked out and survives by landing in mud? He wakes up hours later to find New Morlaidh razed, with no survivors and a bunch of Karathan remains unidentifiable as, say, his comrade Voss or his lover Princess Laethwen? Is the titular "Power of the Atom" the ability to get everyone you know killed indirectly as a result of your actions while you do literally nothing to help and aren't even an active participant in your singular, personal salvation?

The one thing the Atom is able to salvage after days sifting through the physical evidence of his abject failure is the white dwarf matter, which he shrinks to tuck into his glove. It takes him days at six inches to reach civilization, which leaves him in a delirious state akin to that "Tales of the Black Freighter" dude. In the second most unlikely coincidence in human history, the Atom accidentally walks into a police station where the main guy from the rainforest clearing camp is the first person he sees. Ray picks another fight with a bunch of armed Brazilians that only leads to his wrecking havoc and fleeing the business ends of their pistols. This time, he finds a rotary phone in an office and calls the first number he can think of-- his biographer that he only met in the first Sword of the Atom Special. Also, Norm bought Ray's old house from Ray's ex-wife at a good price when she moved to Shopton after Ray lost it in the divorce settlement that Ray triggered when he completely abandoned his wife for the Princess that he also just lost. I'm thinking Roger Stern learned a lot of wrongheaded lessons from "Born Again," not the least being that we already knew that he wasn't Frank Miller from how laughable it was when they tried to sell Power of the Atom as being on a par with Batman stories we're still talking about decades later. Actually, the ironic part is that even DC knew better, because they left "Year One" off the Atom ads.

Because we haven't made Ray Palmer look bad enough so far and robbed the story of most of its impact by telling it in flashback, the Atom costume and white dwarf material get lost in the carpet somewhere Ray and Norm can't find it. Also, it looks like maybe the C.I.A. engineered this whole thing, and the Atom predictably jumped through every one of their hoops. Ray is still at child size like Scott Lang in that lame Ant-Man sequel and gets mad at how badly he's screwed everything up that he breaks the fireplace with his otherwise futile punch of frustration. So hey, the not-as-Tiny-as-usual-Titan got super strength. You totally want to buy this guy's book because he's got the totally unique power of super strength now, right?

Ray Palmer,POTAcast,Jean Loring,Sword of the Atom,Power of the Atom,Power of the Atom Podcast,Post-Crisis

Power of the Atom Podcast #601

The Secret Origin of the Atom

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• Soft launch of the mild old direction Post-Crisis Atom!
• Debut of new creative team of Roger Stern, Dwayne Turner & K.S. Wilson!
• From DC Comics' August 1988 cover-dated Secret Origins #29!
• Longer take with Ryan Daly on Secret Origins Podcast #29!

We pick up where we left off in the Sword of the Atom mini-series and specials with Ray Palmer trapped at six-inch size in the Amazon Jungle. By the least convincing coincidence in human history, the Atom happened upon an alien kingdom made up exclusively of a yellow-skinned but otherwise perfectly humanoid race of exactly the same relative dimensions! And we know they're anatomically correct because Ray has been serving as consort and protector of Princess Laethwen, with both jobs clearly involving sword-wielding. The kingdom of Morlaidh is stuck in barbarian times, so Ray Palmer will have to cut a b* just to get by. Ray is in that "Big Chill" phase of his life, so he gets all Richard Dreyfuss in Stand By Me, recalling pivotal moments in his childhood. His passion for science and adventure were both sparked by his reading the famous Edgar Rice Burroughs Carson of Venus and the obscure yet highly relevant Gardner F. Fox "Alan Morgan" series of books. Ray's parents supported his love of exploration, and even when his daddy died young, his surrogate father was famed archeologist Ted Ralston.

Ray's barbarian buddy Voss finds a bit of the white dwarf matter from the alien starship that theoretically shrank his race. The Atom performs a feat of strength in picking up the rock through density control or something. Ray gets it back to his makeshift lab and enbiggens the rock, assuring himself that he could grow himself and potentially even Morlaidh to regular human size. This causes him to think back to the first episode of this podcast, but with worse writing and art. There's a few unnecessary tweaks that grate, plus we keep seeing the neophyte artist go back to the same basic, static layout of Atom recounting his origin to Laethwen and Voss.

Ray reminds everyone that he never became a super-hero to help people, but just to clear away an obstacle in talking his girlfriend Jean Loring into finally marrying him instead of focusing on her law career. He's self aware enough to recognize the fallacy of their yuppie "I can have it all" ambition, but not enough to realize that he still treats women like prizes to be won. Let's be honest, this whole reverie is because he's getting bored with going native among the yellow-skins in a jungle, which gives me '80s media flashbacks of 'Nam flashbacks. Also, the Atom got off on the super-hero action more than his eventual wife, which is why he deuced on her the minute she was found in the arms of the other man Ray's neglect drove her to in the first place. The whole Conan shtick was his divorced dad midlife crisis.

While the Atom continues to tell the two people who will listen all about how awesome he was in the Justice League of America, a bunch of aliens indistinguishable from the ones Atom hangs with attacks. Because they're on the opposing side, Atom still regards them as savages and stabs them in the neck. Seriously, the sword of the Atom aims for the jugular again and again on-panel, almost as if he has no regard for these people's lives, at least not until there's a pile of gross bodies that he asks his yellow people to cleaning up for him. Former super-hero, yes. "Good guy" maybe not so much, unless you're using the term euphemistically.

The story ends with Ray Palmer paternalistically weighing the fate of Morlaidh and decided that everyone can stay shrunk until he decides otherwise, since they don't entirely believe his stories and he's not offering them a choice anyway. At least the hypersexualized Laethwen offers this sword a scabbard, as it were. "This is not the end! Watch for the further adventures of The Atom in an all-new series... on sale next week!" DC Comics pushed the new series pretty hard in house ads, trade magazines, and a store poster that compared it to its recent successful reinventions of Superman by John Byrne, the Flash by Baron & Guice, Wonder Woman by George Pérez, and the Justice League by Giffen, DeMatteis, and Maguire. Boy, I'm sure that direct comparison to watershed books will not end up biting the Tiny Titan's little red butt... Ray Palmer,POTAcast,Jean Loring,Sword of the Atom, Power of the Atom,Power of the Atom Podcast,Post-Crisis

DC Comics 1993 Editorial Presentation: The Atom Special

I've been blogging for eleven (non-continuous, obviously) years, and I decided to do a simple crossover to remind everybody that these pages are alive (if only of a sort, to varying degrees, least of all here at POTA.) It's a nice one to discuss too, because this is little seen promo art from possibly my favorite Ray Palmer comic. I believe this Steve Dillon piece was colored for one of those DC Universe advertorials that ran in comics of the period, but it was (appropriately?) reproduced at about the size of a postage stamp, so the presentation here is easier on the eyes.

DC Comics 1993 Editorial Presentation

• Overview @ DC Bloodlines
• Justice League Task Force @ The Idol-Head of Diabolu
• Justice League America @ Diana Prince is the New Wonder Woman
• Justice League International @ Justice League Detroit
• The Killing Machine @ ...nurgh...

Silver Age (July, 2000)

In Central City, early in their careers O.G. science bros Barry Allen and Ray Palmer double date with Iris West and Jean Loring at a local diner. The nerds dominate the dialogue, leaving the lassies to pass out in each others' arms. A radio broadcast is interrupted by word of a Mr. Element sighting in the diamond district, giving our heroes another excuse not to deal with their issues with women. The Atom and The Flash suit up, and the Tiny Titan is swiftly playing punch face with his foe Chronos. The time bandit marched on, however, and joined Mr. Element in crafting a particularly nasty hourglass-themed trap for the Scarlet Speedster that the Mighty Mite had to smash like a bullet. It all proves to be a distraction, as the Atom is immobilized by a pair of tiny energy bubbles. "What's the matter, Atom? Can't reach your glove controls? How do you make a clock ineffective, little man? You take away its hands!"

The aliens Sinestro and Agamemno were also party to this villain shindig, all part of a plan to swap bodies between members of the Justice League and their best known antagonists. The champions are briefly jailed at the Secret Sanctuary, but soon escape to plot against themselves to prevent the compromised Justice League from using their revered status to infiltrate global powers. The Atom/Chronos is the most on board with Batman's plan to frame the "Justice League" and smear their reputations, specifically pointing out the resources afforded to Superman/Lex Luthor in that department. (Silver Age #1, by Mark Waid, Terry and Rachael Dawson.)



Chronos/Atom proves himself among the least polluted ersatz Leaguers. He vomits on Element/Flash's back after a super-speed jaunt, and peeks under the mask to learn Atom's secret identity, but otherwise is fairly well behaved. Chronos/Atom locates Jewel Kryptonite sought by Agamemno in a shrunken Daxamite city held by a deactivated Briainiac on an underwater ship. "Three-time loser David Clinton" is distressed by his being hero-worshiped by the Daxamites, who see "The Atom" as their last best hope to return to normal. Chronos/Atom is unwilling to abandon them once he's served Agamemno's plot, as he's "a thief-- not a monster!" However, Lex Luthor/Superman has no qualms about massacring the entire city under his boot of steel to prevent any other super-beings showing up on Earth, and Clinton is ultimately shamed into joining in on the stomping.  
(Silver Age: Justice League of America, by Mark Millar, Scot Kolins and Dan Panosian.)



Snapper Carr alerted contemporaneous heroes about the Secret Sanctuary jailbreak, as the "Justice League" was preoccupied with completing their nefarious missions for Agamemno. Word reached Challengers Mountain, where its defenders used the internet and closed-circuit cameras to locate the Flying Sundial of "Chronos" as he's breaking into Ivy University. Ray Palmer was looking to use Professor Hyatt's time pool, which would require shrinking himself, but he inadvertently shrank the Challengers when they crashed into his lab. Even at doll size, the team prove a headache to "Chronos," until the Challengers' brain Walter "Prof" Haley determines through his delicate resistance that they had actually been fighting The Atom! Ray declares Haley the smartest person in the world, and they'll need it. The Challengers had only 15 minutes to return to normal size or else they'd explode, plus creatures from the future had begun crawling out of the time pool! The latter problem is resolved, but not with enough time to fix the former. Yet, the time pool is on their side, as "Chronos" lowers the Challengers into it to buy time. The heroes are restored, but not before seeing visions of their (sometimes dire) future selves, as well as the strange, unfamiliar heroes who will help them combat the body-swappers.
(Silver Age: Challengers of the Unknown by Karl Kesel, Drew Johnson & Randy Elliot)



Chronos in the Atom's body joined the majority of the "Justice League" on a trip to Thanagar to acquire the Absorbascon. They were attacked by "Sinestro," who managed to use the Oan central power battery to cause the heroes and villains to revert back to their original bodies. Unfortunately, this also provided the Injustice League access to connect the Absorbascon to the power battery, which through the engineering of Lex Luthor and Chronos, allowed the villains to overcome Hal Jordan and the entire Green Lantern Corps.
(Silver Age: Green Lantern by Kurt Busiek, Brent Anderson & Joe Rubinstein)

Dr. Light joined the majority of the "Injustice League of America" on a trip to Rann to bind their acquired artfacts into a new body for Agamemno. While Rann suffered their presence, on Earth, Deadman gathered a team of previously unaffiliated period heroes into a 7 Soldiers of Victory revival to address this building crisis. Arthur Light was seen taunting and shattering the shield of Gardner Grayle during his lone adventure billed as "Shining Knight." Metamorpho came to the rescue, replacing Grayle's shield and activating a freeze ray built into his unfamiliar power armor that incapacitated the cowardly Light. However, Chronos and friends continued to utilize the artifacts to thwart capture and to betray Agamemno, claiming his power as their own.
(Silver Age: Showcase by Geoff Johns & Dick Giordano)



Flashback: Prior to the start of the event, Agamemno watches the Justice League of America on an alien world to determine their mettle. The Atom was paired with Aquaman, who was concerned about leaving Earth protected in the League's absence. Ray offered the Doom Patrol as at least a temporary substitute, but Aquaman dismissed them even more quickly than he did Atom's concerns that what Arthur was about to dive into might not be water as we know it. Aquaman soon went missing, leaving the Mighty Mite alone to locate another Leaguer. He finally found Black Canary, who attacked him until she realized Despero doesn't change sizes. For the record, she's not a natural blonde. Soon enough, the real Despero was located, a Canary Cry destroyed his means of teleporting away, and the Tiny Titan delivered the knock-out punch. None of this is particularly relevant to the larger story, but Atom doesn't have much to do in the resolution of that, and I wanted to add another nice picture before we wrapped this up.
(Silver Age Secret Files & Origins #1 by D. Curtis Johnson, Michael Collins & Vince Russell)

The nigh-omnipotent Injustice League threatened our heroes' loved ones, so among others, Jean Loring was rushed to Gorilla City in Africa for hiding. When that failed, the heroes went on the offensive, but a miniaturized Elasti-Girl & the Atom couldn't even overcome a mouse trap constructed by Catwoman's new purple power ring. Near defeat, the vision of future heroes finally came true, as Martian Manhunter brought Robby Reed and his magical H-Dial to transform the League into new identities. The Atom became the robotic Mod-Man, and Thanagarian Wingmen also joined the fray, but the day was mostly won by J'Onn J'Onzz, Deadman, and a revived Green Lantern Corps.
(Silver Age 80-Page Giant #1 by Mark Waid & Eduardo Barreto)