So, I picked up the Brave and the Bold: Batman Team-Ups Showcase over the weekend. Now, Brave and the Bold has a special place in my heart. My strategy when I was a poor, trailer park living child was to get the most bang for my money. This meant team books and team-up books. I loved Brave and the Bold, Marvel Team Up, DC Comics Presents, and Marvel Two-In-One. I have complete sets of the last three and am working on the B&B.
Bob Haney wrote most of the team-up stories in B&B. His reputation for disregarding prior characterization, continuity and even good sense is legendary. I never really noticed it when I was a kid, but, two issues into the collection--Hoo Boy, is it noticeable.
This issue isn't really a team up, per se, but rather a chance to face of against Eclipso-Hero and Villain in One Man! He is either a demon living inside or the dark part of the personality of a man named Bruce Gordon. Either way, he looks like a pointy-headed, body-building elf who watched Braveheart one to many times.
The story starts out with a woman being shot at with an arrow fired from a bow held by some gangster looking dude.
Why did the bad guy use a bow and arrow? Because Batman would not be able to lasso a bullet, which he does to the arrow here.
Danger averted, Bats comes down and the woman collapses in his arms, leading to this exchange:
Batman: Marcia!...Darling!
Marcia: Batman! Oh, lover---!
You know, I think these two might have had a history.
Before we can find that out, we get an explanation of why Marcia was getting the William Tell treatment. Her boyfriend, Nicky, stole a rare gem called the Cat Emerald, named because it is an emerald which is shaped like a cat, in order to equal Batman in Marcia's eyes. He was jealous of the torch she was carrying for Bats and thought this would make him look better. This makes sense only if you do not think of it.
Unfortunately for Nicky, an "international crime syndicate" was interested in the gem, and "destroyed" him to get it. With his supposedly dying breath, he gives the Cat Emerald to Marcia, asking that she return it and clear his name. She was going to do that, but since Bats showed up, she asks him to do it.
Then we a wavy panel border flashback of the relationship between Marcia and Batman. It starts with Marcia taking a joywalk on a catwalk at the top of a very high bridge. Bats arrives on the scene and asks her to step down. Marcia's response is that he can't tell her what to do.
Batman does the only thing he can do in the situation. He spanks her. No, really.
Yes, as if a man dressed up as a bat spanking a hot young chick wasn't kinky enough, they add a photographer to the panel to up the kink level. You couldn't have zombies in comics but THIS SCENE made it past the Comics Code? Yikes! How many fetishes did this panel start in the young boys of the sixties? Hmm?
It gets even better. She must have really liked that spanking, because she follows Batman around, becoming a "Sidekick with benefits".
And Batman must have liked the way his hand felt against her soft, warm ass because he becomes smitten with her, even proposing to her! Oh, yeah, that would have been a great marriage. Built to last.
Luckily for the Gotham City Divorce Courts, Marcia writes Batman a "Dear John" letter an moves to Europe, leaving Bats all mopey and brokenhearted.
Since there is a deep love between these two, a sick, twisted and perverted love but love nonetheless, Batman decides to replace the gem.
Since it is Batman, he is successful. He then goes to the meeting place that Marcia set up to tell her the good news. She's not there, but Commissioner Gordon is. He's there to arrest Batman for stealing the gem, which is still missing. Batman pleads innocence, but Gordon has irrefutable proof--a picture!
Yeah, I have no police force experience, but I smell a set up. You'd think Gordon would too, but he's all too ready to send his ally to the hoosegow. yes, Batman was a friend for years, put some of the worst crooks away, but one picture and he's a bad guy. You'd think Gordon would investigate where the picture came from. Maybe the person who took it might have taken the gem as well. But noooo. So off to jail Bats goes, cheerfully if the panel above is any indication.
Gotta love that laughter, though.
So, Bats is in jail. They took his utility belt off him but let him keep his mask on. Yes, no mugshots or fingerprints for our hero. Nowadays, the Gotham police force is corrupt. Back then, they were merely incompetent.
Lucky for Batman, his cell is next door to a crook by the name of Gorilla Grimes about to be released and his new cell mate letting him in on the plans a "Mr. E." and Queen Bee have for the city now that Bats is in jail.
We are then taken to Solar City, where an eclipse is taking place. Eclipso is beginning to leave Bruce Gordon's body. His friends are about to zap it back in with concentrated light when several men dressed up as bees come and steal Eclipso away.
We are then taken to the secret lair of the Queen Bee. She is awaiting her minions to bring Eclipso, or "Mr. E." to the meeting. The mere mention of Mr. E. brings this reaction from a hardened crook at the meeting:
CROOK: Mr. E? Wowee!
Points off for being that excited. Double points off for saying "Wowee". Triple points off for making it all rhyme. Four points off for being off-panel so I couldn't see what this yahoo looks like.
So, while the bad guys are waiting for Gorilla to be released, they go on a mini-crime spree. Since the crime is bad enough the way it is, the police decide this is the perfect time to release Gorilla.
Batman, knowing Gorilla is involved with this whole thing, decide to make his escape. He takes an exposed wire and presses it against the bars. Instead of being knocked on his ass, it weakens the bars enough so he can get out.
He follows Gorilla to the hide out, which looks like a nondescript office building, and investigates. He is jumped by Gorilla, then gassed, then dumped by Eclipso down a chute that conveniently leads to the river. Two things about this. 1) Why didn't he just shoot him? and B) Queen Bee seems awfully upset by Batman being killed. HINT HINT!
Of course, Batman doesn't die, because, you know, he can swim (Eclipso didn't even bother to tie him up or weigh him down or anything.). He is promptly shot at by Gotham's finest and is presumed dead.
Back at police headquarters, Bruce Gordon arrives on the scene, offering his help. What he really wants is to get Eclipso back without anyone noticing.
Back at the bad guys hangout, and new player by the name of Cyclops arribves on the scene. No, it's not a slumming Scott Summers, it's a disguised Batman. His plan to upset their scheme works so well that he has to flee for his life. Of course, he choose the hallway where the floors move in the direction he's coming from. How much do you think that costs? A lot, I'd imagine.
Luckily, he is saved my Queen Bee, who Batman realizes is Marcia. I realized this as soon as I saw her, but I'm smart like that. She gives Bats the Cat Emerald and lets him climb his way down an elevator shaft.
Unfortunately, Eclipso has hear everything and is bringing the elevator up to crush Bats. How will Bats get away? By punching a whole through the outside wall. Huh? What? How? Wait. Let Batman explain. .
Batman: Lucky they make these buildings with glass walls!
Yes, the elevator shaft, literally tones of machinery, has one of it's wall made out of glass that Batman can easily punch his way out of. It's a bad guy hang out. They don't need to follow building codes!
So, Batman get out and clings to the side of the building using fingertip suction cups he conveniently had in his utility belt. This is the days when Bats had any illogical item that he needed at a specific time in his belt.
Eclipso comes out on a window washers rig and comes after Batman. Bruce Gordon sees this, and use a fire department ladder truck to get closer to Eclipso. He blasts him with concentrated light and Eclipso rejoins his body.
All is well, except for Commissioner Gordon believeing that Bats is a jewel thief. How will he get out of that?
Yeah, Batman hands over the jewel from the real thief and everything is A-Ok. While I didn't think Gordon should have arrested Bats to begin with, he definitely shouldn't let him go because Bats says that he got the emerald from the real thief. I mean, what to say that Batman didn't have it all along? And didn't Gordon think to ask where the real thief was? Isn't there any cop in Gotham with an inquisitive bone in there bodies?
God, I can't wait to read the rest of the Showcase!
