I am convinced that my life would be materially improved if I just had two things: a rocket belt and a ray gun.
However, the lesson of Adam Strange is that ray guns, rocket belts and pretty red fin-headed uniforms are finally useless when the menaces arrive. Only quick thinking really works.
“I've been so frequently disappointed by many of the modern day appearances of Adam, in which the writers downplay his intellect and basically just make him a Shoot-First-And-Ask-Questions-Later space cowboy, and in some instances he's actually portrayed as little more than a blundering fool,” observed comic book historian Gene Popa. “They clearly did not read and grasp his original stories, sad to say.
“Of all of the DC characters who have been 're-constructed' in the wake of Dark Knight, Adam has been perhaps the most sorely maligned.”
Adam Strange was lightning in a bottle, or a Zeta Beam, in terms of artist (Carmine Infantino), writer (Gardner Fox) and the feature’s jet-age moment in history. Because of the space race, science and reason were then being emphasized in America to a degree we have not, sadly, seen since.
In Mystery in Space 73 (Feb. 1962), Strange’s arrival on Rann coincides with an invisibility plague affecting everyone but him. The invisible alien warriors who caused it are seemingly immune to ray gun blasts. The sharp-eyed spaceman observes that the empty-uniformed warriors never risk hand-t0-hand combat, and deduces that the “warriors” are merely misdirection.
The real enemy must be elsewhere, and Strange tracks him down — a bit of multicolored energy ribbon named Ziathrion, a criminal scientist from the planet Karthal.
The invulnerable Ziathrion gloats as he shrugs off the effects of all weapons, but then Strange seizes him just as the Zeta Beam is wearing off, and both are teleported to Earth. There, far from Rann’s triple sun, Ziathrion is vulnerable, just as Strange had reasoned.
The Champion of Rann leaves Ziathrion under a tree, forever inert.
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| Adam expresses confidence in his ability to solve any problem with reason. |
Vincent Mariani said: While Adam Strange's knack for thinking through problems in order to come up with viable solutions has rightfully long been pointed out by Silver Age analysts, that cerebral trait was a hallmark of DC comics heroes in all genres, particularly in stories edited by Julius Schwartz.
ReplyDeleteSo, the quick-witted Adam Strange, with his emphasized thought process, was both typical and exceptional. Events of the 1950s had ushered in a somewhat tame and cautious era in comic books, and DC, a company that had always been less garish than its competitors, wisely downplayed violence in favor of intellect, with added bits of educational and scientific material sprinkled through scripts. Adam Strange's adventures epitomized the period's direction in storytelling.
Mark Staff Brandl said: Few authors have been so good at intellectual and even anti-violence yet still thrilling adventures as Gardner Fox.
ReplyDeleteDerek W Branim said: I've been reading through the Adam Strange silver age omnibus. Some very cool ideas in here and I love that Alanna tends to be more than just a damsel in distress. It's also great that Adam tends to think his way out of most situations.
ReplyDeletePaul Zuckerman said: I used to love the rocketmen serials that ran on our local station in the afternoons because of that jet pack. Of course, they all wore full face masks, unlike Adam who was so cool he didn't need one. Later, James Bond got one too but the real one wasn't as sleek looking as Adam's. I am still waiting for our private jet packs!
ReplyDeleteAs for ray guns--standard issue for spacemen!
You hit the nail on the head, Dan, when you pointed out that Adam was the thinking man's hero, even before Reed Richards. In the aforementioned Kanjar Ro story, one of the JLA was feeling bad for Adam because he was just standing around as the rest of the team was being pummeled until a moment later Adam defeats Ro and says he wasn't just standing around--he was thinking! Thinking! What a radical idea and one that went by the boards in all comics soon after as well as the world at large... Sigh!
Adam's transformation to a non-thinking hero actually happened as soon as Denny O'Neill got a chance to write an Adam story during the otherwise reprint rerun in Strange Adventures. The letters that were printed pointed out that Adam didn't get to do any thinking, just fighting!
I'm two issues into the current Strange Adventures series with Adam where he is being investigated for atrocities on aliens...we will see how that goes!
Arthur Lockwood said: A comic book or cartoon character can go through several writers throughout his existence . It can sometimes be hard to capture the flavor of a character, but in most cases, a competent writer can write a story that's faithful to his legend and respectful to the character . If you read the "Adam Strange" stories in "Mystery In Space", you'll get a good idea of how Adam Strange solves his problems . At one point, Adam Strange lost his eyes in a teleportation accident, so somebody cloned him and gave him a new set of eyes . It doesn't sound like it was worth it to write him losing his eyes in a teleportation accident to begin with . There was an issue of "Swamp Thing" where it was revealed that the people of Rann were sterile, and they teleported Adam to Rann so he could father a child and revitalize their race . That's "mature", but sometimes "mature" and "stupid" mean the exact same thing . Maybe that new wrinkle is the kind of thing that should be "forgotten about" . Don Markstein's "Toonopedia" website said "Adam returned to Earth, got a new girlfriend, and took the attitude that Rann can jolly well save itself from those ever -- recurring menaces ." . Adam Strange's whole reason for being is teleporting to Rann to visit Alanna -- or better yet, living on Rann and being married to Alanna . Without that, there's nothing you can do with him . At one point, a villain teleported the planet Rann to Thanagar's solar system . That kind of thing should be strictly against DC policy ! .
ReplyDeleteOrson Welk wrote: John Broome and Gardner Fox understood super-heroes as role models. Superman and Batman didn't pummel anyone to death; Flash, Green Lantern, and Adam Strange all used their wits to defeat their opponents as much as their signature powers and abilities. There wasn't much variation in characterization, though; if you ask me how to tell Ray Palmer and Barry Allen apart from one another, I'd be at a loss. Grant Morrison describes the Schwartz characters as examples of what he calls "Kennedy Man," which I would argue has to do with the ethos of Postwar Liberal Humanism (which can also be found in the writing of Rod Serling and Gene Roddenberry on TV from the same decade).
ReplyDeleteStan Lee, on the other hand, wrote characters *with whom adolescents could identify*-- The Hulk and the Sub-Mariner were not role-models, but you could identify with their anger and alienation (only The Doom Patrol came close to that at DC. and maybe Metamorpho). But Stan and Roy were still writing under the PLH ethos. The 70s writers--the first generation of fanboys-- were part of the 60s generation, and had a bit of countercultural subversion going on (e.g. Englehart's 50s Cap, the Secret Empire as Watergate, the Roxxon Corporation; Steve Gerber in general; etc.)-- i think the culmination of *that* trend was Alan Moore. But I think the folks who came to prominence writing comics in the 90s were people who'd grown-up on WWF and James Cameron films as much as anything else, and by then the ethos of Postwar Liberal Humanism was eroded at the very least, if not in the grip of some kind of proto-fascism. And things have just devolved from there, I think. As near as I can tell, the current writers (having read only a few) are influenced by Postmodern irony, which I don't think works well with superhero comics.
Brian Hennessy said: Yeah a lot of comics have eschewed the intellect of some of these heroes. I haven’t read Batman in forever but he’s rarely played as The Worlds Greatest Detective.
ReplyDeleteChris Juricich said: I visually recall a Denny O'Neil 'new' Adam Strange story where he arrives on Rann to discover that some non-technological tribe from some city-state had kidnapped Alanna. Adam's comment? 'Nuts! Let's charge in there and wipe them out!' (or words to that effect) which...even then at age...what? 17 or so? 'Adam Strange would never talk like that...' I remember being enamored with the mini-series that came out in the late 80s or early 90s where he was brought back but also...they were darker and less pleasant. Sardath was increasingly played as a manipulative, nasty two-faced jerk, also. I remember that Rann's population needed an 'Adam' and new genes so he encouraged him giving Alanna kids to repopulate the planet. Now? Is Rann still even in Alpha Centauri? Planet Heist? Did it ever get returned? God who the fuck knows
ReplyDeleteMark McKenzie said: The Early stories of Adam Strange were to me the cream of the crop. Interesting stories and that art that Infantino did was amazing, it actually stepped up a notch when Anderson inked him
ReplyDeleteJoseph Lenius wrote: Adam Strange will never be written as well as when Fox wrote it, or drawn as well as Infantino & Anderson did. That era of true quality is over.
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