Story title: 1: "Till Death Do Us Part!" 2: "Manbat Over Manhattan" 3: "Surprise, Surprise!"

Cover Price: 50 cents
What I paid: a dollar (at a mini-con).

Writer: all three stories: Bob Rozakis
Pencils: 1: Curt Swan 3: Carl Potts
Features: 1: Robin, Batgirl 2: Manbat, duh. 3: Commish Gordon and Alfred. That's right, Alfred.
Cameos: Bruce, but only out of costume.
Details:
1: Someone's trying to kill Robin and Batgirl. There's a price on their heads by some underworld types. They set up their own wedding, in costume, to flush out all the bad guys. Yep, as so often happened in the silver age, we wrote the whole story to explain the hard-to-believe, gimmicky cover. The dominoed daredoll doesn't even get to wear the beautiful white lace bridal-Batgirl-costume we see her wearing on the cover AND the splash page. Wotta shame. A great story for those of us who would like to remember an innocent time before Barbara Gordon's continuity, AND her relationship with Dick. were both so messed up. "Those of us?" Okay, all of us, let's face it.
2: Remember when Manbat took a pill to trigger his transformation whenever he wanted? Okay then, did you remember that he could pick up criminal thoughts on his sonar? That's right, Manbat was in tune to the frequency of evil. A presumably well-educated scientist has never before nor since talked with such a hard-boiled swagger. The bad guy is a guy with flashing lights and sonics named Snafu, for those of you who collect minor-league villains.
3. Alfred picks up Jim at work to escort him back to the mansion to help decorate the place for Bruce's birthday. However, Alfred has a hard time keeping Jim's clever mind from stumbling onto things like the door in the grandfather clock, secret panels, etc. At the story's end, Jim drops a strange hint about Batman being at the party... in spirit, anyway... and Bruce and Alfred are both nervous... apparently, Jim was suspicious but let it slide, overcoming temptation to pry. Ah, the late silver age.

Score: 4.5 out of 5 utility belts

Story title: 1: "Mortal Clay" 2: "Love Bird"

Cover Price: 1.25
What I paid: a buck or two at a mini-con

Writer: 1: Alan Freakin' Moore. 2: Max Alan Collins
Pencils: 1: George Freeman. 2: Norm Breyfogle
Details: 1: Clayface, mentally not all there, falls in love with a department-store mannequin. Yes, really. Not Alan's best story... which still makes it as good as Neil Gaiman on an average day or Mark Waid on a really great day pre-KC.
2: The Penguin's gone straight. How do we know? He's motivated: He, too, has fallen in love with a good-hearted woman who demanded it of him. Batman isn't convinced at first... but he finally is... right before he realizes that the Penguin's new umbrella factory is manned by other ex-cons who couldn't get a break anywhere else. This violates Pengy's parole, and the parole board is not interested in Pengy's good intentions, nor are they impressed by the good word Batman tries to put in for him. However, Bruce DOES explain to Penger's ladyfriend, who visits him in prison.

Score: 4 out of 5 umbrellas

Story title: 1: "America Eats Its Young" 2: "Blood Rivalry"

Cover Price: 1.50
What I paid: a dime for one... a dime each, I think. Certainly under 60 cents for the pair...

Writer: Dwayne McDuffie and Ivan Velez, Jr.
Pencils: 1: Trevor Von Eeden 2: James Fry
Details: Much better than I expected. There was a big gang rumble goin' down one day, and someone gave the cops an experimental crowd-control gas. OOPS! Either someone had an Evil Plan, or we didn't test that sucker enough before hand (or, like, at ALL), 'cause it triggered mutagenic powers in lots of the people present, in a horrific scene we get in flashback that the writers ripped off from the first of editor George R.R. Martin's Wild Card series of anthology books. Just who needs super-powers-- the gangs! Ooooops. The baddest super-gang out there is the Blood Syndicate, and they're sorta cool, I must admit. Their leader wants to hold their turf while also cleaning the drugs from out of the ghetto. However, the gang has some serious internal strife. Obvious: vies for power coups within the group. Subtle: one member is a secret addict herself, afraid of her supply drying up. I am definitely going to look for other back issues of this title, preferably in order... The art is slightly better in issue #1. The degree to which I am growing fond of this title makes my heart ache all the more for the death of Milestone.

Score: 4 out of 5 DNA helixes

Story title: "You Can't Hide From a Deadman!"

Cover Price: 15 freakin' cents.
What I paid: uh... a thin dime, I think.

Writer: They didn't often list creative credits back then. If I had to guess, I'd guess Denny O'Neil, but I'm probably wrong.
Pencils: No credits listed that I can see... it's either Neal Adams or someone doing a fair job of copying his style (probably Neal).
Details: Deadman got hit by a poison dart near the entrance of the city in Tibet wherein he actually has a solid body. In his half-solid state, instead of killing him, it rendered him suggestible, as if hypnotized. A bad guy tells him to go and kill his closest friend. Deadman really had no friends... the closest thing he had was Batman. Oooops. However, his moral character makes Boston hesitate rather than kill Bruce... once he snaps out of it, they set off to stop the bad guy and save Boston from dying from the poison once he solidifies once more in Nanda Parbat! They enlist the help of Boston's brother Cleve... that's right, Boston and Cleveland Brand. Good silver-age fare.

Score: 4 out of 5 trapeze artists named after cities

Story title: "Hour of the Serpent"

Cover Price: 35 cent
What I paid: about a buck

Writer: Bob Haney
Art: John Calnan and Bob McLeod
Features: Bruce, and Etrigan the Demon (and, naturally, Jason Blood, and even his paramour Glenda)
Details: Shahn-Zi, a magical ghostly guy, is back for more trouble. The kicker: Bruce is actually turned into a real vampire bat! Not a vampire, just a vampire bat. Very disconcerting for him! Fortunately, Etrigan defeats Shahn-Zi, breaking the spell, just before Bruce sucks Glenda's blood. Oh well.

Score: 3 out of 5 forms of man

(And as far as I know, these are the only ones they ever published.)

Cover Price: 12 freakin' cents, man.
What I paid: a dime each. You just can't beat that. Thank you, Land of Cran, of Canton, Ohio.

Writer: Joe Simon
Pencils: Joe Simon
Details: Sometimes in DC, Gaea does weird things. Inanimate stuff gets fused with ghostly souls, or just comes to life, or something... fire is usually involved (Swamp Thing, Firestorm...). In this case, lightning struck a wet clothing-store dummy and brought it to life. It has super-strength as long at the wires that held/hold it together stay somewhat charged with electricity and he doesn't get waterlogged. Anyway, the geek is adopted by some hippies and they name him Brother Power (for his strength). At one point, however, he's captured by a circus, and gets the name of The Geek, a name he hates. Defending the hippies from tough bikers and fighting The Man, Brother Power was very smart, but also on a groovy love trip, man.
When he finally returned in the modern age (In a Swamp Thing Annual written by Neil Gaiman), Neil explained, surprisingly plausibly, that Brother Power was a Doll Elemental, one of the stranger, rather failed attempts on Gaea's part to create a magical messiah to uphold the good. Then Rachel Pollack wrote a Vertigo Visions one-shot (remember those) and I never saw him again. But Brother Power the Geek is great. A fantastic artifact from the days when all DC's creatures lived under one stable roof in peace and harmony, and no one had to write anyone into Comic-Book Limbo just because they were weird.

Score: 5 out of 5 elementals

Story title: 1: "The Haunting of Charlie Kweskill!" 3: "The Terror Beyond Twilight!"

Cover Price: 60 cents each
What I paid: 50 cents each

Writer: Steve Gerber
Pencils: Gene Colan
Inks: Tony DeZuniga
Details: Steve Gerber writes this miniseries... at some point, one of the Phantom Zone villains (Quex-Ul) somehow got out, got amnesia, and was exposed to gold kryptonite, so he lost all his powers forever. Apparently, Clark renamed him 'Charlie Kweskill' and got him a job doing layouts for the Daily Planet. However, the other villains use their combined willpower to make 'Charlie,' in a sleepwalking-state, rebuild a new phantom zone projector... which, of course, can also bring people out of the zone. Will Supes be able to prevent these villains from all escaping?
Uh.... no. OOOOOOPS. I presume that Gerber was ordered/allowed to work on this series because of the appeal of escaping Phantom Zone villains due to the 1980 movie Superman II, but for all I know, Gerber's clever enough that he (or someone) had the idea first, and then Gerber just got around to using it later. Whatever. The Kryptonology (study of all things Kryptonese) on this series is pretty good, and I think Steve invented a few new twists, too. Silver age super-funkyness at its finest. Cameos from Jor-el and Lara, the staff of the Daily Planet, Batman, Supergirl (that's right, Kara, with lil red skirt and everything), General Zod, and Mon-El, doin' his time in da zone, while waiting for a cure for his lead poisoning. Golly.

Score: 4.5 out of 5 Kryptonian headbands