GUNSMITH CATS PART 5

“ROLLING BEAN” | “SEEPER” | “V26” | “HOT MOTOR” | “WHITE OUT”
“MISSING WASHINGTON” | “N.Y. HIT” | “CROSSFIRE” | “GAME SET”
Presented by Kenichi Sonoda
Translation: Dana Lewis & Toren Smith | Lettering and Retouch: Studio Cutie

The early installments set up the characters and world of GUNSMITH CATS and provide an overarching storyline/antagonist via Gray. The next chunk of story introduces Goldie, who will go on, in the final set of chapters, to be the major villain of the entire saga. But it’s this run of material, which we’ll look at over this week and next, which I consider to be the peak of Kenichi Sonoda’s story.

It begins when Rally learns that Bean Bandit has agreed to travel to New York, pick up some drugs, and ferry them back to Chicago. Bean is given half of a dollar bill, with his New York contact having the other half to match up for confirmation of the driver’s identity. Rally, who has adopted a zero-tolerance policy on drugs since her run-ins with Goldie, challenges Bean—if she can prevent him from picking up his shipment, he will never run drugs again.

Bean agrees to Rally’s terms and initially, she attempts to steal his half of the bill by tailing him to his garage/apartment and sneaking in with Misty’s help, but the plan takes a turn when Bean departs unexpectedly and Rally is forced to stow away in his car.

WONDER WOMAN #1 & #2

“THE PRINCESS AND THE POWER!” | “A FIRE IN THE SKY!”
Pencils/Plotter: George Pérez | Script/Co-Plotter: Greg Potter
Inks: Bruce Patterson | Letters: John Costanza | Colors: Tatjana Wood
Editor: Karen Berger

The Plot: (Issue 1) The history of the Amazons is recapped as they are created on Earth by a group of Greek goddesses collectively calling themselves the Midwives. Some time later, Heracles is tricked by Ares into raiding the Amazons’ city of Themyscira, where he brutalizes and pillages them before moving on. Later, the Amazons are relocated to an island paradise, where their princess, Diana, is born. When the time comes for the Amazons to send an envoy into the world of man to save it from Ares, a tournament is held. Diana enters and wins, against the wishes of her mother, Hippolyte.

(Issue 2) Air Force pilot Steve Trevor is assigned a midnight mission to fly a stealth jet to an isolated location above the sea. Meanwhile, Diana is armed with a golden lasso forged by Hephaestus and then is taken by Hermes on a quest for clues to Ares’ location. She returns just as Trevor arrives at Paradise Island, where his co-pilot, Captain Slade, drops a bomb. Diana saves the island and the jet crashes into the ocean. Diana pulls Steve from the wreckage and, at the order of Athena, returns to man’s world with him. Meanwhile, Trevor’s commanding officer, General Kohler, is found dead in his office — both he and the deceased Slade having been agents of Ares.

Sub-Plots & Continuity Notes: Obviously these issues feature the post-CRISIS debut of Wonder Woman, though she hasn’t acquired that moniker yet. Also making their post-CRISIS debuts are a bunch of gods and goddesses, plus Colonel Steve Trevor and his adjutant, Lieutenant Etta Candy. We meet a few other characters on Steve’s Air Force base, though I’m unsure if they had pre-CRISIS versions.

I BOUGHT A FONT

Typically in my amateur graphic design endeavors, I use whatever free fonts I can find out in the world. Blambot is one of my favorite sites for this; they have a bunch of great freeware options to choose from, and I browse their wares often. But I've never felt the need or desire to actually purchase a license for one of their pay fonts until recently, when I stumbled across Might Makes Right while browsing their site. It's a font created to mimic the bombastic style of Bronze Age lettering, and I fell in love with it as soon as I saw it.

Image via Blambot.

So I bought it. $25.00, plus a 10% off coupon to make it $22.50 -- and I couldn't be more satisfied with the purchase!

Now at this point you may have noticed all the crazy colorful blurbs that appeared up and down the blog's two side columns earlier this week, and you've probably deduced that the above is my long-winded way of explaining that I used Might Makes Right to create most of them. After updating the masthead over the New Year, I decided to go one step further and renovate the entire blog. It now looks the way I always kind of hoped it could look in my head, but was never sure I could pull off. There's now some more color in this thing, which I've long wanted, and I even found space for a few more John Byrne heads (including a certain Trinity at right, to finally give this place some DC representation)!

Oh, and while most of this stuff is intentionally trying to evoke the Silver and Bronze Ages of comics, the "Table of Contents" at the upper right is a deliberate attempt to homage Marvel's "Comicraft Age" of the late nineties (though since Comicraft fonts are crazy expensive, it's done with some freebies that resemble Comicraft's work of that vintage).

(The links still work, too -- clicking on the "Written by..." box at the upper left will take you to my Blogger profile, clicking on the Twitter blurb below it will take you to my Twitter profile, and clicking on the Amazon ad at the upper right goes to Amazon.com.)

I'm extremely pleased with this new look, so hopefully it's appealing to readers, too. The idea was to make this blog look like the love child of John Costanza, Joe Rosen, and Richard Starkings, and I like to think I accomplished that goal with some degree of success. However I'm also happy to solicit feedback if anyone cares to drop in a comment below. If you like it, that's great -- but if you think it's too busy/cluttered, too colorful, whatever, I'd love to hear about it.

GUNSMITH CATS PART 4

“MINNIE-MAY” | “INJECTION” | “BAD TRIP” | “PSYCHADELIC” | “ROY”
“HAMMER RELEASE” | “POISON OF THE SCORPION” | “LOST GAME” | “COOL DOWN”
Presented by Kenichi Sonoda
Translation: Dana Lewis & Toren Smith | Lettering and Retouch: Studio Cutie

The next segment of GUNSMITH CATS opens with a one-off chapter exploring the secret origin of Minne-May Hopkins as she flashes back to her earliest meeting with Ken while on the way to a date with him — and, almost impossibly, yet another layer of weirdness is added to their relationship when we find that May initially posed as a young boy when she first encountered Ken, and that he took her on as an apprentice without knowing her true gender. Then, after she finally revealed herself to him as a thirteen year-old girl, they started to knock boots.

So… ick.

Following this chapter, it’s a solid eight installments devoted to the war with Goldie. The drug queen lures Rally into a trap and has her injected with her organization’s new drug, Kerasine — a potent narcotic mixing the worst aspects of heroin, angel dust, and LSD, with the added bonus that anyone high on the stuff becomes susceptible to post-hypnotic suggestions. Goldie then captures Rally, along with Misty, who’d joined her on a stakeout, and proceeds to brainwash our heroine to serve her. To test the hold of her suggestion, Goldie dispatches Rally to assassinate Roy.

ADVENTURES OF SUPERMAN #424 – 425 & ACTION COMICS #585

“MAN O’ WAR!” | “GOING THE GAUNTLET”
Writer: Marv Wolfman | Artist: Jerry Ordway | Inker: Mike Machlan (#424)
Letterer: John Costanza | Colorist: Tom Ziuko | Editor: Andy Helfer

The Plot: (Issue 424) A terrorist group called the Freedom League attacks a building in Metropolis. At the Daily Planet, Clark Kent meets new hire Cat Grant, a gossip columnist. Cat tags along when Clark receives a call from someone looking for Superman. The reporters meet with Professor Emil Hamilton, who reveals a defense system he’s created, but Clark ducks out when City Hall comes under assault by the Freedom League, changes to Superman, and fights back.

(Issue 425) Professor Hamilton describes to an unseen party how Lex Luthor told him his device was LexCorp property since he partially developed it on company time with company computers. Luthor’s men stole the plans and Hamilton was unable to get the police to help. Soon after, he was approached by a company called Complicon, who financed further development of the device. Henderson perfected it, but unseen sabotage caused it to kill a man during his demonstration.

Hamilton then caught up with Superman during his fight with the Freedom League and used the device to shield Metropolis from harm, but no one noticed his contribution to the battle. Next, Hamilton called out Superman, threatening to murder a hooker unless the Man of Steel faced his “gauntlet” within the confines of his device’s force field. Superman beat the gauntlet, saved the girl, and Hamilton went to prison, where we learn he’s been telling his story to an inattentive guard.

GUNSMITH CATS PART 3

“HAMMERLESS” | “BIG GAME” | “SIG-SG550” | “LOST” | “SLIDE TOP”
“MISTY BROWN” | “DECOY” | “HANDICAP” | “FAST BURNING”
Presented by Kenichi Sonoda
Translation: Dana Lewis & Toren Smith | Lettering and Retouch: Studio Cutie

The next eight chapters of GUNSMITH CATS are split between wrapping up the story of the major villain to date, and introducing the next major villain going forward. To start off, Rally gets wind that Gray is planning a prison break with Bean Bandit set to shuttle him out of the country. Rally appeals to Bean to ditch Gray, but the driver considers himself an honorable professional and refuses.

Rally’s plan to thwart the breakout is complicated when when the big night arrives and Gray grabs May, who’s spying on Bean’s car, on his way out. A chase across state lines ensues, ending with Bean, Gray, and the captive May escaping. Rally, having deduced that Gray plans to exfiltrate through New York via boat with a massive amount of cocaine he’s stolen from the mob, travels to the Big Apple. When Bean tries to take May with him as he departs Gray’s service — he won’t abide kidnapping young girls — Gray turns on him.

A firefight at the harbor ensues, with Bean working alongside Rally and May to defeat Gray, who Rally ultimately kills in self-defense. Bean gets away, and Rally’s and May’s lives return to normal at long last — for a brief time, at least.

ACTION COMICS #584 & SUPERMAN #2

“SQUATTER!”
Storyteller: John Byrne | Embellisher: Dick Giordano
Colorist: Tom Ziuko | Letterer: John Costanza | Editor: Andrew Helfer

The Plot: Superman goes on a rampage, drawing the attention of Cyborg from the Teen Titans. Superman defeats Cyborg easily, but Wonder Girl and Changeling soon arrive to back him up, followed shortly thereafter by Jericho. Jericho seizes control of Superman’s mind as a man with crutches arrives to reveal that he is the real Superman.

Superman explains that he was tricked by a man named David Gundersen, who switched their bodies with a machine he had built. The same machine swaps them back to normal, and Superman lectures Gundersen on his behavior.

Sub-Plots & Continuity Notes: The story takes place in a location referred to in dialogue as “…the largest city in the nation,” “renowned in song and fable,” etc., etc. The city is never referred to by name. Knowing the Titans reside in New York makes me assume this is it, though I’m unsure why Byrne is playing coy.

Cyborg notes that he’s met Superman a couple of times, supporting SUPERMAN #1’s idea that the Man of Steel has had run-ins with heroes other than Batman since his debut.

Wonder Girl somehow exists. (I’ll have more to say about this when we cover LEGENDS in a couple weeks.)

Lex Luthor wonders how Clark Kent seems to get all the exclusive Superman stories, and decides there must be a connection between the two.