Tony Isabella’s Bloggy Thing: BATMAN THE SILVER AGE OMNIBUS: PART SEVEN

Here is the next chapter in my series of blogs about the stories reprinted in Batman: The Silver Age Omnibus Part 1. This hardcover chronicle collects Batman #101-116 and Detective comics
#233-257, from mid-1956 to mid-1958.

The first is Detective Comics #248 (October 1957) featuring one of my favorite stories as a young Batman fanatic. Sheldon Moldoff drew the cover for “Around the World in 8 Days” by Batman co-creator Bill Finger, Dick Sprang, and Charles Paris. The synopsis from the Grand Comics Database:

Bandits break into a hospital and steal an experimental new drug… the only thing that can save a patient, and Batman and Robin have only a week to discover its location and get it back so the man can be injected with it. To make matters worse, the spoils of the crime have been split up among “fences” all over the world!

I was six years old when I first read this story. I’m not sure I’d ever been outside of Cleveland. Probably not, because my dad worked ridiculous hours carrying the family bakery. He was the best of my grandparents’ brood.

Some locations only got one panel each, but the global quest was exciting nonetheless. I would love to re-do this adventure with more pages and set it in modern times. I miss the days when saving one person’s life was just as important to Batman as saving Gotham City or the world.

Detective Comics #249 (October 1957) features a cover by Moldoff for Finger’s “The Crime of Bruce Wayne!” The interior illustrations for the story are by Moldoff and Paris: The synopsis:

Bruce Wayne decides to go along with a plan that involves him confessing to being a wanted criminal, better known as the Collector, in order to extract vital information from a cellmate about where the crook has hidden $50,000… but the plan backfires miserably and Wayne ends up on death row!

This story is new to me, which is surprising since I had a crush on Batwoman and would have bought the issue if I had seen it. Which is probably a good thing since I didn’t know Bob Ingersoll at the time. Thanks to the many columns of my buddy “The Law is an Ass”, I now know that the legal side of this story is nonsense.

Batman Figure #112 (December 1957) features a cover by Moldoff and the usual three stories. First up is “The Signalman of Crime” by Finger, Moldoff, and Paris. Small-time crook Phil Cobb can’t get hired by Gotham gangs, so he makes the perfectly logical decision to assume a colorful identity and leave clues to his planned crimes for Batman. Because that always works. Spoiler: it doesn’t. But the Signalman is a fun, wacky addition to the ranks of very silly villains who challenge the Dynamic Duo.

““Batman’s Roman Holiday” is by Edmond Hamilton with Sprang and Paris. It’s another story without logic where Professor Nicholas – how I hated that character then and now – sends Bruce and Dick into the past to have an adventure as Batman and Robin. I’ve never understood the pseudoscience behind the stories. Normally I’d accept such nonsense, but this was just a bridge too far for me. If I were to write a Professor Nicholas story, it would reveal that things weren’t what they seemed and that he had his own evil agenda.

Finger solves the problem with “Am I Really Batman?”. Moldoff and Paris are the performers. Professor Milo strikes again. Milo wasn’t as loud as Batman’s usual recurring foes, but he always made things personal. This time, Bruce wakes up in a mental institution, unaware that Milo has attacked him with an amnesia joke that dulls his will to live.

We conclude Batman’s 1957 issues with Detective Comics #250
(December 1957). Moldoff’s cover shows “Batman’s Super Enemy” by an unknown writer with illustrations by Moldoff and Paris.

The summary: A wanted criminal finds a ship full of weapons from outer space.

John Stanner is on the run after Batman and Robin break up his gang. He is fortunate enough to be the first human to come across a spaceship full of advanced inventions, which he immediately uses to commit crimes and free his henchmen. The end of his reign of terror is logical, but foreshadowed from the beginning. There were a number of stories by unknown authors in the 50s. I keep hoping that they will eventually be identified.

Detective Comics #251 (January 1958) begins the 1958 issues with “The Alien Batman.” Cover by Moldoff. Story by unknown writer, Moldoff and Paris.

Is Batman actually an alien from another world? Spoiler alert. He isn’t. But a clever criminal makes the people of Gotham fear the Caped Crusader. Which is a boon for the local crooks. Until Batman reveals the plan.

This is a weak one. Much of the story consists of various people remembering Batman’s past dangers and wondering if he was able to survive them by using alien powers. The revelation behind a blood test that supposedly proves Batman is an alien is perhaps the weakest plot element in the story.

The comic book reading kids of the late 50s seemed to love the weird Batman transformations. I really enjoyed some of the stories. But the hoaxes always disappointed me.

Batman Figure #113 (February 1958) has a cover by Moldoff with “Batman – The Superman of Planet X.” But before we get to that story, we need to look at two other stories.

“The Menace of False Face” is by an unknown writer. Moldoff and Paris are the artists. The title villain disguises himself as a variety of famous people to commit crimes. He’s not really a match for our heroes. The GCD synopsis claims that Batman didn’t recover False Face’s loot, but I didn’t catch that at the end of the story. I assume the authorities eventually recovered it and returned it to its rightful owners. Minus the generous contributions to the Policemen Benevolence Society, of course.

““Batman Meets Fatman” is from Finger, Moldoff and Paris. A clown doing a Batman parody is a big hit with the audience, including Batman. Our heroes give the clown a ride in their surprisingly spacious Batmobile. They get a tip on the whereabouts of missing loot. Bad luck gets Batman and Robin into trouble, but they are saved by the clever clown. It’s a charming little story of a type we don’t see anymore.

“Batman – The Superman of Planet X” is by Ed Herron, Sprang and Paris. The synopsis: Batman is transported to the planet Zur-En-Arrh and helps the Batman of that world fight invaders from another planet. On Zur-En-Arrh, our hero has powers like his sidekick SupermanThe story is inventive and beautifully crafted.

I do recall Zur-En-Arrh playing a major role in recent Batman stories, but I’d have to read those stories to know for sure. Which I really have no interest in. Reading a healthy Batman in Mark Waid’s Batman/Superman: World’s Best is much more fun.

That’s all for another chapter in our ongoing look at the Silver Age Batman. I’ll be returning to this era in the near future.

© 2024 Tony Isabella