Another Accentuate the Positive post + Jason's Early Adventures

[icon_uk]

This is a longer than usual post as it's a three part story, and I'm never sure about posting three parters; do I do one chapter at a time and probably forget to go back and do at least one chapter... or do I post it all in one go and risk boring you all. Good news, I've gone for risking boring you rigid! :)

This also counts as another entry in my painfully sporadic "The Original Origin of the original non-original Robin" posts, detailing the introduction and career of Jason Todd 1.0!





I will warn you in advance that this is one of those stories from the era when batman and Detective Comics crossed over each other so we have one issue of Don Newton art, a middle issue of Gene Colan, then finish off with Don Newton (and what a finish it is!). Both are superlative artists in superb form, but the shift in styles can perhaps be a little disconcerting when reading it all in one go.

I start with an entire splash page which does little to advance the story, but which does have a wonderful sense of atmosphere to it. Look at the textures, the colours and holy crap but that's an awesome Batman face... this is why I sometimes feel the modern, more sensitive and varied palette can lack the sheer... vibrancy of the old approach



Vicki Vale is in Guatemala, trying to get a scoop. THIS Vicki Vale was a noted globetrotting journalist, perhaps not on a par with Lois Lane, but right up there. (If there are any natives of Guatemala reading this, I'd be interested in hearing your comments about how this story "plays"). She is investigating (disguised in local garb) a rebel movement against the authoritarian regime. She has been following a shipment of arms intended for the rebels, when it is hijacked... but there's something not right about the situation, because, as she note....



Now, at the same time, Bruce and Jason are returning from the circus, in a story I haven't posted, Jason got frustrated that Bruce wouldn't let him train to be his new partner (at this point, Dick was still Robin, Jason had no identity of his own yet) and so had, quyite literally, run away to REjoin the circus, where he got involved in solving a case about a disguise expert burglar called "The Chimera" using the circus as a cover for his robberies. It's a fun little story I might post sometime. In the end Bruce and Batman come to assist, and it ends with Jason returning to Gotham after Bruce promises to train him...



I like Bruce being uncertain about his own motivations, it humanises him.

Vicki arrives at an ancient jungle temple to find that someone has made some modifications...



But her arrival has been noted by someone inside the temple, and she is quickly found, and imprisoned in a handy cell. And someone in the temples command centre seems delighted by this for some reason. But Vicki is also resourceful...



When Vicki is escorted out of the temple at gunpoint there are tourists around, and so she takes her chance.



So, can you guess who is the one in charge (And no peeking at the tags!)

Shortly thereafter, word of Vicki's predicament gets back to the US, and thence to Gotham Police HQ and and thence to Wayne Manor (There si a long subplot about Gordon having a heart attack which I'm not including, not because it's not a decent plot, but it's not the focus of the issues)



Awww...... :)



Batman lands safely, but the landing site is quickly attacked by ground forces... and how does Batman deal with someone shooting at his plane when he's not sitting in it?



He throws his damn plane AT THEM!



So Batman tries to move "offroad" so to speak, only to find himself under attack from a local tribe.

(Sigh, I could go on and on about how lovely Newton's anatomy drawing is, but you know the score by now...)



Or at least people DRESSED as a local tribe..



And so he goes on his way, alert to human attackers, and also



(Love the Looney Tunes style battle effects in the last panel)

So Batman infiltrates the lair of the temple, only to find, as if you didn't already half expect....




Yup, it's the menacing mountebank, the prince of pranksters, the clown prince of crime (Back when he knew a crime other than mass murder) THE JOKER!!

I always love this cover....



Can't think why

Batman challenges the Joker to explain his latest mad game!



Sigh...guy should have learned, if henchmen aren't safe (and with the Joker they're REALLY not), then what chance does a lackey have?

And why is the Joker planning on taking over a country? For a VERY Jokerish reason!





Now that's a lackey who might live to hench!

So, counting on the Joker's main weakness being his vanity, Batman easily goads him into MORE soliloquising



For a large scale Joker plan, that makes a fair amount of sense....



Sadly I had to trim the page introducing the death-trap for the issue, where Batman is forced, with his hands tied behind his back, squatting on top of a train at the top of a vertiginous rollercoaster drop, and Vicki as the damsel tied to the train lines (She's no Robin, but it's a nice idea)



And yet Batman has a plan, of course, as even the Joker is aware...





..and crash into the Joker's control centre. Batman frees Vicki and sets off to deal with the amassed lackeys, henchmen and possibly any other non-union underlings. But Vicki has no intention of being the helpless victim for any longer than she has to.... Grabbing up a gun, which she notes Batman would never do himself



The power of the press folks! Suffice it to say that between the two of them they do enough damage to cause a large chunk of the HQ to collapse into rubble, and the Joker didn't make it out....

Or did he...



If I'm honest, I'm not a fan of the Joker image in the second last pane, but I have to say that the Joker laughing for so long (and such a precise description of the length) does make him seem even creepier than usual.

And now we enter into the last part, back to Don Newton art, and a terrific cover....



Oh, and what Jason has been up to...



I wonder where this is heading. (On a tiny little note, there was a suggestion that Jason had Dick's old room, which never made much sense to me in a place the size of Wayne Manor. I like that Jason got a place of his own)

Meanwhile back in Guatemala, the Joker is determined to not let his scheme go to waste. Sure, he's lost his base, but the plan remains...



And there we have this incarnation of the Joker in a nutshell, he's mad, he knows he's mad, but it's FUN!

Again, I regretfully have to trim a sequence where Batman encounters the REAL rebels in the jungle, and meets their leader, who at first assumes that batman is there to stop them and that he is, in fact there...



Nice summation there Bat's...

And back at the ruins, where obviously bits survived (and for those who enjoyed the Joker-Mobile in my last posting, hope you like these!)



General Diaz makes his speech in Mixtaya, disparaging the rebels...



When who should appear in the skies, but...



A strange alliance forms, the Generals troops and the rebels both attacking the Joker's assault.



So it continues, with the two opposing leaders actually coming face to face for the first time ever..



Fleeing in his Jokercopter, with Batman apparently left behind the Joker has a surprising reaction to defeat...



Of course, that goes about as well as you might expect, and the copter is forced down, to find that Batman also made it down intact.



Batman, scaring the bejabbers out of crooks no matter WHAT country he's in! And then of course the Joker runs into BOTH sides he tried to play against the other



Leaving the troops to fight it out, Batman pursues the Joker back to the temple. The Joker has a machine gun and the high ground, Batman has only a batarang or does he have a weapon even HE doesn't know he has yet...



Who else?



Words cannot express how much I love this next page...



Jason has rarely been more adorable than right there....

Meanwhile, Diaz and the rebel leaders troops have defeated the Joker's mercenaries. They face each other and each acknowledges the other's contribution. They may be enemies, but they are both, in their way, patriots, and can respect the other's courage against a common foe. They agree to part without further bloodshed, there has been enough of that already. There will be time enough to fight their fights, and so let peace reign...



Two things Jason, 1) it's never wise to use your real name when Batman is lugging someone around who may well be faking being uinconscious. and 2) It's dyed, not died (or is that foreshadowing)



"... stealing someone else's identity is quite another. And one I won't allow"

(Batman, frontrunner in the fight against identity theft!)

I'm sure there's a smutty comment to be made about Batman ordering Jason to take his clothes off, but... nah, I won't gp there...

And as for what happened next... well, that my dears, is another story for another day....

Hope you enjoyed this, probably my longest post ever!

Comments

[lascoden]

Very nice stuff. Man, Batman is all about throwing things. Throwing them at each other! Leopards? Throw them at each other!

And Gene Colan draws a really messed up looking Joker. Face looks like it's made of putty. Interesting that the ways of drawing the Joker are almost as varied as his personalities. And I laughed out loud at that second lackey.

[mommy]

"But boss, we failed-- we blew it!"
"So what, idiot? It was fun, wasn't it?"

This is the Joker I miss reading about. Sure, he'll lose, but it's all a great big gag!

I haven't read much about Jason 1.0, so it's interesting to see what he's like. Thank you for posting this.

[icon_uk]

I've put up a couple of other posts about him and his introduction here and here

[nefrekeptah]

No offense to people who liked original Jason, but from the moment I read what his origin story was, my very first thought was "Thank God they retconned this." Not because it was badly written or drawn, but because it was just so lazy. It was just a carbon copy of Dick Grayson's origin with a few different faces.

[icon_uk]

True but a bright acrobat has a lot more "Robin-ready" skills than any street punk possibly could. Jason 2.0 could always fight, but that's only a part of being a Robin.

And I'm not sure I'd call it lazy myself, so much as a deliberate homage. Their intent was to create a new Robin as much like the original one as possible as simply as possible.

[whitesycamore]

a bright acrobat has a lot more "Robin-ready" skills than any street punk possibly could.

Hey, Jason 2.0 was very bright himself. Also, calling him a 'street punk' is a bit like someone calling Dick a 'carny' (i.e. a really unpleasant slur based on their background and social circumstances, which neither had much control over).

And it's not just about who can be Robin, but who needs to be.

I've always found it odd that Bruce thought the best thing to do in the case of Dick and Jason 1.0 was to take them into his own care, and away from the circus, where they had lived all their lives and had a strong network of friends/relatives who knew them and were probably willing to look after them. Well, it's not strange really because it's just a plot device conceived in a more naive time, but it seems weird in the context of modern Batman, which is much more concerned with psychological realism.

I find Jason 2.0's origin story a lot more satisfying because he was a kid who had well and truly slipped through the cracks and didn't have anyone who was concerned for his welfare. The idea of rehabilitating a kid who had been abandoned and had had his potential written off at the age of twelve makes a lot more sense to me than separating a kid who was already well-loved from an environment in which he was well-adjusted. and was already given ample opportunity to exercise his talent.

[icon_uk]

Actually, I can see Jason 2.0 wearing the name "Street punk" with considerable pride, and I didn't say Jason 2.0 wasn't smart. I said that a smart acrobat has more Robin ready skills. A smart street kid (like Jason 2.0) has some skills, but not, IMHO those uniquely suited to be Robin.

I may be wrong (not having any actual experience in the field), but I'd say it would be easier to teach an acrobat how to fight than it would be to teach a street fighter how to deal with flying through the air on jumplines and the like.

I've always said, I have no real problem with the Jason 2.0 origin as such, though the sudden change and particularly the shitty way they changed Dick giving up the role. A Robin who needed to be taught not how to fight, but when NOT to because there was a better way of achieving their goals, had a lot going for it (And sort of did come about when we got Damian, though that's another take on it)

Interesting point about removing them from the circus, but that was never Bruce's choice to make. In Dick's origin the courts ruled that, in the absence of actual family members there, he couldn't stay with the circus, so it was become Bruce's wardof court or the orphanage and foster care system. I believe that Jason 1.0 had more leeway, but chose to be with Bruce (Though there's a long story arc about Natalia Knight aka Nocturna wanting to adopt him too (originally because he would bring her closer to Bruce Wayne, but partly because she did care for him))

I'd say calling anything Batman related as being "concerned with psychological realism" is stretching the term to it's limit, since it only ever addresses the areas of psychology directly relating to the story they want to tell at that moment and ignores the rest: Is Batman a loner? Does he have a pathological need for a family? Is he sane? Is he insane? Is he emotionally immature? Is he fully mature and simply made a eccentric lifestyle choice? And let's not being to venture into the diagnoses of the villains.

[whitesycamore]

I can see Jason being proud of the title 'street punk' but I can't see him reacting well to people using the label to dismiss his skills and talents, or to talk about what "any street punk possibly could" or couldn't do.

I'm glad to hear that even the original story of Dick becoming Robin recognised that Bruce swooping in to adopt him even when he already had a loving environment required at least a little bit of creative explanation though.

I may be wrong (not having any actual experience in the field), but I'd say it would be easier to teach an acrobat how to fight than it would be to teach a street fighter how to deal with flying through the air on jumplines and the like.

I always got the impression that Bruce *himself* learned to fight either before or at the same time as he learned the fancy acrobatic tricks, so I don't see why it would be a problem if Jason did. Also, most fighting styles require quick reflexes, good balance, flexibility and strength, which are the core skills of gymnastic anyway. If Jason had a natural talent for fighting, he'd probably pick acrobatics up quickly as well.

I'd say calling anything Batman related as being "concerned with psychological realism" is stretching the term to it's limit, since it only ever addresses the areas of psychology directly relating to the story they want to tell at that moment and ignores the rest: Is Batman a loner? Does he have a pathological need for a family? Is he sane? Is he insane? Is he emotionally immature? Is he fully mature and simply made a eccentric lifestyle choice? And let's not being to venture into the diagnoses of the villains.

I meant psychological realism in the sense that they usually try and go some way to explaining the character's internal motives, etc. It's not that Batman comics in particular are any pinnacle of psychological realism, there's just been a general shift in that direction in *all* fiction since the 30's. People nowadays expect fiction to spend more time examining the emotions of characters (even in simple stories) than they did back then.

Is Batman a loner? Does he have a pathological need for a family? Is he sane? Is he insane? Is he emotionally immature? Is he fully mature and simply made a eccentric lifestyle choice? And let's not being to venture into the diagnoses of the villains.

Well, those are existential questions. You have as much authority on the subject as any clinical psychologist does! It all depends on what you think healthy looks like. I mean... Batman is deeply messed up, but he has a mission he believes in, work that he excels in, people who love him and who he loves in return, and he doesn't think that moths are living in his ears.

He has a lot of problems, but IMO they're mostly concrete ones caused by his unusual crusade. I'd say he's sane. Maybe not fully 'emotionally mature,' but who's to say what that looks like?

[icon_uk]

I always got the impression that Bruce *himself* learned to fight either before or at the same time as he learned the fancy acrobatic tricks, so I don't see why it would be a problem if Jason did.

Not a problem per se, but the time factor is relevant. Bruce took over ten years to acquire his skills and didn't start his career until he was an adult.

Dick and Jason 1.0 had the advantage of being trained as aerialists from around the time they could crawl, Bruce even notes in Dick's first appearance that he quite probably would be able to teach Bruce a number of acrobatic moves. Given that intelligence is a defininf factor in any event, in terms of general fitness and physical tone, I'd say a performing circus acrobat (and wide recognised as being one of the best EVER, even at the young age) would be better suited to a career in Bat-style crime fighting than a scrappy kid who can hold his own in a brawl, useful though that skill is.

[salamangkiero]

Is that cover by Walt Simonson? Because if it is, then I know where he got the basic idea for Malekith the Accursed's smile.

[salamangkiero]

or should I say it's no wonder that he can do Pscyho-smiles so well for any character?

[icon_uk]

The third cover is indeed by Simonson, you can see his signature near the bottom in the middle.

[qalchemist]

Interesting bit of foreshadowing here...

The Joker's first meeting, almost his first words, to Jason Todd being 'I'll kill you'.

Of course, it wasn't intended, but it's interesting!

[icon_uk]

I suspect the Joker says that to EVERYONE on meeting them; sidekicks, police officers, the milkman, Jehovah's Witnesses....

[qalchemist]

Maybe, but notice that in a rare moment the Joker abandons his 'Everything including murder is a hilarious joke' attitude to say it here.

[fredneil.livejournal.com]

The first lackey was probably too stupid to stay alive long in that kind of work. If something is going to swing a mallet onto the spot where you're standing, your first impulse should be to move from that spot. If you're holding a machine gun, your second impulse should be to shoot the thing that's about to swing the mallet at you and then the person controlling that thing.

[icon_uk]

Perhaps the mallet tracks towards the target even if they do move, and if they move out of range, the NEXT jack in the box gets them.

[fredneil.livejournal.com]

I'm not sure early 80s tech could do that, or if moving backwards wouldn't have moved out of range of all of them, but anything's possible with comic book tech. He still had a machine gun, though.

[icon_uk]

Of course it could 1) We weren't living in the Dark Ages and 2) as you say, it's a Batman story, which are usually full of vaguely implausible tech.

I think you're making a rather infeasible demand for reality from a story concerning a demented clown and a guy with a bigger arsenal in his belt than most countries have in their army combined.

[fredneil.livejournal.com]

Ok, it is possible that 80s technology would have allowed that, though you're asking for something pretty advanced, not something on a part with indoor plumbing.

I still think that it's not unreasonable to ask "he had a gun, why didn't he use it?" Even in the world of Batman and the Joker, that's how most people would have reacted.

[icon_uk]

Think about how fast a jack in the box pops up; from "Boing!" to "Thud!" in probably less than a second.

[randyripoff]

Man, I love a good Joker story. And there are so few of them too...

Personally I've always thought that a) while the Joker is insane, he's not quite so insane as he pretends to be and b) all those henchmen and lackeys he's killed over the years for seemingly small slights was done mainly for show, and that the Joker had a better reason (to him, at least) to kill this or that henchman. He's scarier when everyone thinks he's bugfuck crazy than if they all thought he was a trifle touched in the head, but brilliant.

I guess that's another thing that sets a good Joker story apart, when the Joker is shown to be extremely intelligent. That to me is what really makes him a perfect foil for Batman--he can actually outwit Batman on many occasions--and that's also what makes him really, really scary.

[ladydouji]

I wonder, is it a thing for new robins(except steph) to wear the robin costume without permission? I know Tim did it in his introduction, and Damian(as he donned his version before Tim went to Red Robin) I just didn't know that Jason had done the same thing.

[icon_uk]

Interesting point, I think it maybe has to do with them showing that they have the determination to be Robin whether Batman approves or not and so he HAS to take them on to train them to survive.

[jkcarrier]

This run of Batman comics was just soooo good! One of the best ever. What a tragedy that Don Newton died so young, he was amazing.

[riddler13]

Probably your longest but best post ever!

About Guatemala, I never lived there, but I've had family over there for the past 30 years, so I know something about the place. But meh... most 3rd World countries in the Cold War were buffers for the US-USSR conflict, and Guatemala was no exception.

How on Earth did Jason travel to San Mateo straight from Gotham, specially when there's no airport in San Mateo? LOL

And do you really want to know creepy foreshadowing? "But the Joker never even touches him... the Boy Wonder's agility is flawless!". Brrr...

[kraesil]

Joker does like people to know when it's HIS vehicle. WITH STYLE.

[icon_uk]

If the Joker and his schemes doesn't have style, he's not worth reading IMHO.

[twospirit.blogspot.com]

There really is something about the fight when Robin swings in, and then taking that moment for the splash page for the two to say nothing....that's good comics. I wish moments like that happened more often in comics now.
Also, "I serve Justice. And when Justice fails, I serve Vengeance." might be the best summation of Batman ever. Except for perhaps "I am the Night" (said in Kevin Conroy's great voice.