Negative Monday 4

Just a quick image this week while I try to chew everything I've bitten off.

This is from the second issue of John Byrne's 2004 reboot of the Doom Patrol. To say Larry's got a skin condition might be a little bit of an understatement.

More later this week as things get tamed.

Elasti-Girl Friday 4

For this week's Elasti-Girl Friday, I decided to highlight part one of the the Doom Patrol's appearance in the phenomenal Mark Waid-written, Barry Kitson-drawn JLA: Year One series.

Rita appears on the cover, treating Black Canary like a Barbie doll. This issue is chockful of wonderful Silver Age goodness, as is the entire series. I urge you to track it down, either in floppies or TPB.

I love how Barry Kitson matched up Green Lantern and Negative Man in the first (and feel free to correct me if that's wrong) team-up between the JLA and the DP. Cliff taking on Martian Manhunter is inspired too.

I'm curious what happened to Aquaman in this struggle as he appears to be down for the count. Flash is also nowhere to be seen.

The story is a very Silver Age-ish affair. The Brotherhood of Evil is stealing parts from people and creating a Frankenstein's monster-like army. The Doom Patrol hits the scene first and are quickly upstaged by the League.

The exchange between the Flash and Aquaman as an expository tool to introduce JLA readers to the Doom Patrol is classic Mark Waid. Bravo!

I especially love how Flash's question just hangs out there for Aquaman (and the reader) to ponder, with Flash completely oblivious to the awkwardness of the moment. I'd love to see Aquaman and the DP team up a little more frequently, as Aquaman frequently seems more apt to be an outsider than a headliner.
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The Other Elasti-Girl. . .

The other Elasti-Girl, now officially known as Mrs. Incredible - at least as far as comics go - found her way to the new comic book shelves this week under the pen of - surprise! - Mark Waid.

The four-issue series, written by Mark Waid and featuring art from was released from BOOM! Studios on Wednesday and will also be available on newstands everywhere.

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. . . and one other thing. . .

Monsters Vs. Aliens opens to day with Reese Witherspoon providing the voice for Susan Murphy aka Ginormica.

Looks like a fun movie to me. The kids are dying to see it.

Let me know what you think about ANY of these topics.

Negative Monday 3

Happy Ted Bruder day!

Ted Bruder was a super-powered employee of Thayer Jost, who hoped to create a superteam branded with his sensibilities and guided towards his interests. Essentially the very worst end result of the team Maxwell Lord hoped to assemble in Giffen and DeMatteis's Justice League.

To that end, his team was comprised of four less-than-spectacularly-powered individuals.
Shyleen Lao aka Fever had the ability to increase the molecular vibration of objects so they would heat up.

Vic Darge aka Kid Slick could eliminate friction around his body.

Ava aka Freak who possessed prehensile hair, much in the same manner as the Inhumans' Medusa.

Originally dubbed "Fast Forward" for his power of prescience, Ted Bruder was soon (second issue of the third volume) branded with the nickname "Negative Man" due to his consistent brow-beating and complaining about anything and everything. Ted, it seems, was one of those people who would complain about having nothing to complain about.

In his first encounter with Robotman, Cliff warns him to look thirty seconds into the future as Ted gets carried away yelling at Cliff. Deciding to back up a little to avoid getting his clock cleaned by Robotman, Ted begrudgingly allows Cliff to begin consulting the team.


Besides having some amazingly amazing art from then-unknown Tan Eng Huat, this John Arcudi-penned series was every bit as quirky as any interpretation of the Doom Patrol. It embraced the DP legacy while trying to deepen the legend.
Robotman, however, wasn't really quite Cliff Steele, as I'll cover at some point in the future. Maybe Ted can clue us in as to when that'll be. . .

Elasti-Girl Friday 3

So this is the third installment of Elasti-Girl Friday. To celebrate such a momentous occasion, I thought I'd provide Elasti-Girl's origin, as told in My Greatest Adventure #80. The images shown here are mostly from the DC Blue Ribbon Digest mentioned earlier this week. The first panel, however, is from the first volume of The Doom Patrol Archives. As if you couldn't tell from the brighter art.

The first of the DP to share her story, Rita is essentially givent the third degree - placed under a spotlight to share her tale of woe.

Rita was filming a scene with a crocodile (I bet she'd appreciate modern CGI) and declared the only way to avoid the hungry croc was to plunge over the edge of a raging waterfall. Turns out she was right. The croc, being no dummy, turns away, but Rita falls. The rest of the origin lies below for your perusal.

Poor, poor distraught Rita Farr. Cursed with the "terrible" power of growing larger or smaller, she walked away from a promising movie career. Good news for the readers, though, as she became the heart of the Doom Patrol.

Doom Patrol Digest Back Cover

Truly, what more needs to be said?


What an awesomely fun back cover!

DC Special Blue Ribbon Digest

Not to be confused with Pabst Blue Ribbon, DC produced a fine line of digest reprints of some great stories. The nineteenth addition to this fine line was dedicated to the Doom Patrol. For fun here's some linkage to another Rob Kelly! site featuring those same Blue Ribbon Digests.

I saw this beauty once a long, long time ago and didn't buy it. Since then, I've been trying to track it down and thanks to my "dealer", Scott, over at Back to the Past in sunny Livonia, Michigan I was able to get my grubby paws on it.

When I emailed Scott to see if they had it in stock, he replied, "You mean like this one?"

His expression in this photo is priceless. I expected him to continue to send updates, peeling the pages out of the book and laughing. Or at least post a ransom note. Later that day, the book was out of Scott's hands and on its way home.

The gorgeous George Perez cover (with a new outfit for Rita, seeing as this one has sleeves) promises 100 pages of goodness, but the page numbering stops short. The last numbered page is 98, which I've chosen to share with you. Keep reading. You'll get there.

I'm thinking the inside covers were included in the page count.

At any rate, this issue reprints some choice DP stories from yesteryear. Published in 1982, it reprints My Greatest Adventure #80 as well as Doom Patrol #86 and 90-91.

The gem of the collection, however, is this diagnostic illustration of our buddy, Cliff Steele. Also rendered by Perez, this drawing has only ever appeared in the digest.

Perez also added some new artwork for the back cover, which I will add in a little later today. Be sure to check back.

Coming up Friday, I'll be returning with some more Elasti-Girl Friday fun. Until then, keep Patrolling.

Negative Monday 2

First things first - yes, this is terribly late. Or not really, after all, it is still Monday.

Secondly, sorry to string you along Ted Bruder fans, but maybe next week.

Yeah, I'm taking the easy way out here, this week, Negative Monday features the Who's Who entry for Valentina Vostok. She first exhibited the negative powers not as a dispatchable spirit, but rather could transform herself into an energy being.


As time went on, however, her powers came to manifest themselves in a manner nearly identical to that of Larry Trainor - the Negative Man. The major difference was that Vostok's expression of the negative being was decidedly female in silhouette.

The commonality ad mutual familiarity with the Negative spirit would eventually lead to a struggle between Vostok and Trainor.