Lightning Round: HERO SQUARED, BOOSTER GOLD, LARFLEEZE

[tcampbell1000]

106 of 108. Giffen and DeMatteis’ collaborations continued on a few JLI-adjacent properties and a few works that had nothing to do with the JLI. They could dip into nostalgia now and then, but their real skill was trying new stuff or putting new spins on things.

In this update and the next, we’ll cover six of their projects. I’m excluding one-offs, but I still might’ve missed something. There’s a lot more here than I thought there’d be when I started looking!

Hero Squared is, AFAIK, Giffen and DeMatteis’ sole creator-owned work. Wannabe filmmaker and slacker loser Milo has one good thing going for him, his girlfriend Stephie. But it’s an open question how much longer even she can put up with his shit. Things get complicated when he meets a refugee from another dimension…superhero Captain Valor, the alternate-universe Milo, whose archenemy Caliginous is the alternate-universe Stephie! She's already destroyed their entire reality, and that's just the warm-up...

I’m sampling this one a bit lightly because the plot twists come early. The story was published as a series of one-offs and miniseries, and the intended reading order isn’t always clear, so if this sounds like your jam, your best bet is to track down the Hero Squared Omnibus. As the property owners, Giffen and DeMatteis had the chance to bring it all to a decisive conclusion. They didn’t waste it.

The year’s worth of stories in Booster Gold v2 #32-43 are an interesting piece of post-JLI history. Max Lord has shot Blue Beetle, and Booster can’t change that with time travel…it’s, uh, “solidified time” or something. He has to live with that, and the fact that Max’s actions have further poisoned his League career, which history was already judging unfairly (#32).

However, time travel gives him other options: he might be able to gather evidence from the past to foil Evil Max’s current plans (#33).

Or maybe he can just see his old friends again…not just Beetle, but Scott and Barda…on a lonely Sunday (#35).

Giffen and DeMatteis aren’t mono-focused on their legacy with these issues, though. Their first Booster Gold pages aren’t about Booster’s past, but about him rescuing a young girl who might affect his future (#32):

And after issue #39, Gold tries his best to let go--or let go of the anger, at least...

...and move on to face a new enemy. Or possibly an old one.

One of Giffen and DeMatteis' next DC projects revolved around one of the most unheroic “heroes” of the DC Universe…the greed-powered Orange Lantern Larfleeze, in his self-titled series.

The series only lasted a year, but they finished it on their own terms…and established a connection between this canine Lantern and one of their favorite JLI creations.

Thursday: Giffen and DeMatteis do a series about clinging desperately to the past, a series about passing the torch to the next generation, and a series taking a property of their own youth into a wild new direction.