The Challengers of the Unknown

First appearing in Showcase #6 1957, the Challengers of the Unknown were four ordinary men. Test pilot Kyle "Ace" Morgan, daredevil biker Matthew "Red" Ryan, Leslie "Rocky" Davis and Walter Mark "Prof" Haley were all traveling on the same plane and survived a crash that no one should have. They banded together and formed the Challengers of the Unknown, going on many adventures, facing strange monsters, creatures and other things. Soon after, they based their headquarters in a hollowed mountain they named Challenger Mountain. Eventually, they added a fifth member, June Robbins. The team has survived over the years, always facing new and bizarre things along the way. Their adventures have been collected into reprint volumes, but if anyone who reads this blog manages to find any of their comics at a decent price and in great shape, do not pass up that opportunity! So get out there and read up on the adventures today!

The Metal Men

Today I'm going to talk about a team of superheroes that are as human as human can get and very unusual. They are the Metal Men. Artificially intelligent robots created by Dr. William Magnus, these robots personalities and intelligence are the product of "responseometers". The robots mirror the characteristics of their namesake metals in behavior and personality. The members of the team are Gold, Lead, Iron, Mercury, Platinum and Tin. Over the years these fantastic robots have appeared in various DC titles, also being rebuilt many times by Doc Magnus due to being damaged or destroyed in their adventures. The characters made an appearance in a recent episode of the cartoon show Batman: The Brave and the Bold in the episode Clash of the Metal Men in which they, along with Batman and Doc Magnus, go up against the Gas Gang, a series of robots the team fought in the comics which use the various gases they are named for as weapons. The Gas Gang is reimagined here as the former research colleagues of Doc Magnus prior to his building the Metal Men. 

Smallville Season 10 ending: Darkseid and Superman?

With the buzz about the eventual ending of the Smallville series and for comic book fans the chance to see Superman baddie Darkseid on television and actor Tom Welling in a Superman suit, it has me wondering, will the final episodes be able to propel the series into retirement glory? Think about it people, this show has been on the air since 2001, and now 10 and 1/2 seasons later they've introduced pretty much all the main supporting characters in the Superman group, from Lana all the way to Lois in terms of girlfriends, brought in practically every super-villain the Big Blue Boy Scout has faced, and a few from the mainstream DC Universe, and even brought in Green Arrow, Aquaman, Cyborg, Impulse and Black Canary, the Justice Society of America, and now they are even bringing in Booster Gold and Blue Beetle in terms of heroes. This show has pretty much turned into one giant live action comic book. So again the big question is, can this series end on a high note instead of a low? We'll just have to tune in come May 13 and find out.

The Flash: Three Generations

The Flash has always been one of my favorite super-heroes, because even though people always just write him off because he has the most obvious in superpowers. The Flash title has always been held by men who have upheld it with honor, courage and valor. The first Flash, Jay Garrick, fought crime during the 1940's, when the "world" was at its darkest and needed champions. Forced into retirement along with the other masked mystery-men by the government. Years passed, and the new heroes came. Barry Allen became the second Flash, taking his cue from a man who he had grown up respecting. After a time, he took on a sidekick, his nephew Wally, who became Kid Flash after going through the same accident that gave Barry his powers. When Barry died during Crisis on Infinite Earths, Wally became the new Flash, with Jay there to help and mentor him. Years later, Barry returned during the Final Crisis, to a new world. And now all three run forward, three generations of Flash, righting wrongs, saving the world, together.

Astro City: The Samaritan

When I picked up a copy of the first Astro City trade paperback, what drew me to the cover immediately was the image of Samaritan. The costume was unlike anything I'd seen before and yet it was so cool. The second reason the cover drew me in was that it was done by Alex Ross. This guy has the most simple origin ever. He is sent back from the 35th century back to the past to correct a problem which has catastrophic repercussions on the world. As he is traveling back through time, he is bombarded by empyrean fire, the energy that makes up the time-stream. He crashes near Astro City in 1985 and spent the remainder of that year mastering the new powers that he had been given by the bombardment. When he emerges at last costumed, he performs his mission and saves the space shuttle Challenger from crashing. Besieged by reporters, he says he is simply a "good samaritan". So the papers dub him Samaritan. After a time he decides to become a super-hero, with Astro City as main working base. Using his Zyxometer, a living bio-computer shaped like a diamond with tentacles, he creates a job for himself as "Asa Martin", a facts checker at Current, a newsmagazine in Astro City. He after a time joins the Honor Guard, the cities premier superhero team. To learn more about the Samaritan and the world of Astro City, pick up you copies of the trade paperbacks or back issues today!

Astro City: The Confessor

I thought for today I'd blog about one of the heroes of Astro City that is honestly one of my favorites. This guy is like the Batman of Astro City, because he is a stalker of nighttime villainy. Originally Roman-Catholic priest Jeremiah Parrish, who came to America in the 1800's with Cardinal Grandenetti to build his cathedral. He was seduced by a beautiful woman while working in the shanty town of the Eastern-European immigrants who had come over to America. The woman turned out to be a vampire, who drained Parrish and left him dead in the filth of an alley. Three days later, Parrish rose again, a vampire himself. Over the years, Parrish sank further and further into seclusion out of fear of what he was. It was not until the arrival of Air-Ace, the first hero to emerge publicly in Astro City (the known as Romeyn Falls) that Parrish began to feel hope. After secretly observing the heroes for years, he took on the costumed identity of the Confessor, as penance and made his first documented appearance in the late 1950's. His costume was a strange priest's robe, with a silver cross stitched on the front to help stem the need to drink blood. For years he fought crime, and at the climax of his career, he took on a sidekick, Brian Kinney, who became Altar Boy. They worked together taking down mostly street crimes, and hitting The Deacon (crime lord of Astro City) and his operations the hardest. At the time, the Shadow Hill murders were prompting public outcry against the heroes, and the Mayor of Astro City began behaving in almost brutal manner in treatment towards the city's protectors. Brian discovers Parrish's secret, but does not condemn him. Parrish dies while exposing a terrible truth, that the Mayor of Astro City had been replaced by a doppleganger, a member of the shape-shifting alien race known as the Enelsians who then mounted an invasion force of the planet, which was stopped by the various heroes, villains and strange creatues that made up the "super-human" community. After four years of training, Brian took up the mantle of his former mentor, and continued to fight crime as the new Confessor.

Astro City: What is in store next?

When Kurt Busiek and Alex Ross first introduced Astro City in 1995, it set the wheels in motion for something fantastic. To those who follow my blog and don't know a thing about comics, Astro City is a series in which there is a world with heroes and villains aplenty. But the premises of these series's is that the characters have been active for a long time in their respective careers, so Busiek and Ross pretty much have created a whole world. One of the interesting things about the Astro City series is that it does chronicle the adventures of heroes yes, but not just from the heroes perspectives, but also from the perspectives of the villains, and the people who live in the city. This comic follows in a way the story-telling style of the great Will Eisner, in whose Spirit stories the regular people of Central City (and no I don't mean the Central City of the DC Universe). This latest series Dark Ages, follows the lives of two brothers in the world of Astro City, one who became a policeman and the other a crook. Now that this series has ended who knows what new direction will be taken in the next chapter of Astro City. I highly recommend anyone who follows my blog to pick up copies of the trade paperbacks, and also to check online or at your local comic book store for a complete run of each of the series. So don't hesitate, get out there and get hooked on Astro City today!