 This is the SF Productions podcast network This is a 10 30s at 3 at Darren Pamela Fertin the bird's spirit of show Fighting episode of vast wasteland the video journal of popular culture. I'm Mark Schmidbauer. I'm Wilbert Neal Today, we're here to pick up again on our well the second part of our discussion of DC comics That's right But before we get into it want to tell you that's we're on Tuesdays at 6 Wednesdays at 10 and Thursdays at 3 p.m. Here on ACTV Kable 21 and also if you want to write into vast wasteland our box number is 15 14 11 Columbus, Ohio four three two one five. That's right So get in there and Right in and tell us to stop doing this sing song you think or whatever and often that's right So the second part of the the big history DC comics when we left off several weeks ago We we would we were just finishing up the golden age of DC comics Which basically ran into about the mid 50s it? Most people are kind of saying right after the war a lot of people say they basically ended off basically what happened was kids for some reason I think mostly because of TV just weren't buying the comics and so sales were dropping like mad and Of course there was the TV influence and the Whartham influence Well this guy The Whartham influence was dr. Frederick Whartham Whartham I don't know pronounce as he wrote this book called seduction of the innocence and was a book about how comic books were destroying America's kids and America took it incredibly seriously. I mean he was a he was you know He wasn't like a joke book or anything, but I mean He was saying that look at these panels and there and there were a lot of really rude things going on at the time I E.C. Comics. Oh educational was Crypto fear and That kind of stuff and so there was a lot of you know Lot of injury to the eye panels and stuff like that and actually today a lot of the a lot of the ones that are mentioned in seduction of the innocent and There's another one POP. I'm trying to remember Well, anyways actually today that those particular comics are now worth more because they were mentioned in this book Because of that those two influences Things basically went to hell in the comic book industry and certainly to DC The whole industry had to get together to fight off the Whartham crusade to ban comic books because the Senate was just about This is like 1954 For something like that somewhere right they were they were about to basically say here are the rules for comic books And the Senate was gonna put rules down and the comic book company said this is gonna ruin us So we'll put together the comics code authority The little sticker you'd still see on most of the comic books, although it is enormously decreased in size I mean the beginning was like a fourth of the page was Approved by the comics code authority and now if you look really closely you might be able to find it Oh, I doubt you're gonna find it on a Lobo comic But most of them still have that darn approved by the comics code authority Lobo is pretty much a reader. Yeah, pretty but at the Today pretty much you only see the major comic book companies use that the independence Considered a joke and they never use it and I think in the next couple years you're gonna see it disappear completely cuz it's cuz it's you know, they're all doing mature comics now, but in any case This was really the only way they could get published then they had to have something they had to have something to say Hey, we're you know, we're not all that evil We're we're doing good things and and the comics code authority at the beginning was so damn restrictive That you really couldn't have anything that interesting Yeah You know It was you could never see any anything that might even even suggest Gore or not even gore, but I mean any I mean anything that might be objectionable to parents Which which was pretty much everything and so the comic books got boring and the superheroes We're fighting aliens and stuff because you couldn't have them beating up on on regular Hoods because they might injure them and that would be objectionable So they were so they were fighting aliens and they and they got into a lot of of civic-minded type stuff And it was really boring So after a while the only thing you saw at DC Basically you've got your I don't know if we can see this or not, but basically what we're talking about our romance romance comics which these were you know kind of kind of Dippy things you still see them today, although really the the romance comics have really gone by the wayside by the 70s comics We're just like take whoever happens to be a comedian. They were like Bob Hope comics I think DC actually put out Bob Hope comics and there was a Jerry Lewis comic like like the one here There was a Lauren Hardy comic that romance comic again. Yeah, I'll just put my hand all over it Yeah, so you can't see any of it And finally listen finally the science fiction comics like mystery into space because you know, you could have alien races and Just draw lots of weird stuff without actually getting into significant issues or anything And people are walking around and and blowing up aliens because it was calling blowing up aliens was cool Then you know, it wasn't like you know, no one was gonna object if you blew up a few aliens Right and you didn't use guns right they were not guns that shot bullets They were ray guns and who knows what a ray gun can do to you, you know, they just In any case so by the time the 50s were over with The only superheros at DC that were still at a comic book were Superman Batman and Wonder Woman Everybody else had disappeared Actually, they've now they've now written into the continuity To try to explain inside the DC actual universe's continuity What happened to the old heroes and they said that there was during the the McCarthy hearings In the DC universe that they called up the superheroes and said well, you know We really should know who you really are so we want to know your secret identities And they went no and we're leaving and they all disappeared That's how they explained it Well, so The golden age ended and for Depending on who you talk to a number of years going to about 58 all the way to maybe 62 actually 55 to 62 Things were just really bad in the comic book industry. No one was making any money Most of the a lot of the big companies just disappeared By the end Marvel and DC were about the only ones left I mean Dell was out there and and Disney was doing stuff, but as far as anybody who might do a superhero comic There was pretty much all over with and then DC started a comic book called showcase Showcase's idea was we're gonna bring New characters and new and possibly Current characters that we're thinking of maybe having a comic book for and we'll do three issues Of them and then we'll move on to somebody else and if we get a lot of good response and we saw a lot of comics We'll maybe make this guy. We'll decide whether we're gonna have a comic book for this guy or not So showcase started I don't happen to remember who did showcase one through three. I think it might have been enemy ace I'm not sure But the important one was not there was not issues one through three the important one was issue four The flash was um was issue for survival. Okay, right and that was the first Considered the first Silver Age character. I know there's gonna be some people out there gonna say no Martian Manhunter was really the first Silver Age character. He was around before the other heroes, but really I Consider I consider the golden the the Silver Age flash be the first Silver Age character Because he really started the whole thing. I mean Martian Manhunter was out there but he kind of retroactively got thrown into the Silver Age I think so The flash came out and of course based on the Golden Age flash a New costume a lot faster a little a lot more scientific about how things happen And there was always all these these things at the bottom of the screen Gardner Fox who had done the original flash comics was doing a lot of the new flash and There would be a lot of Explaining a little little bars saying how he would be able to throw a straw. Well, what is it? They they we always you always throw things that you wouldn't think would go through other things They did and they explained in the same way that a hurricane could throw a straw It's such a velocity that would go through like like a timber or something, you know And they were always doing this scientific thing of well He doesn't burn up because there's a productive war around his body and all this So he just creates one as yeah, yeah, so and he was the first real real and there it is There's there's the the the first Is that that be the first one, but it's actually it isn't yeah, they're right It's actually one of the one of the later ones, but it is flash appearing in showcase comics there and and an interesting concept here was this was the first comic book that that at least I know of that Acknowledged the Golden Age of comics because they said that this guy who got who this Barry Allen guy who was hit by Lightning while he was standing in front of this rack of chemicals and it's through all these chemicals around his over his body And he gained a super speed and he decided based on his his comic book collection that he was going to Base it on the Golden Age flash. He's gonna name himself the flash Kind of interesting thing there. Well showcase went on to basically repopulate the entire DC universe again with Resurrections of the Green Lantern and of course the Green Lantern really the first The first hero with this truly cosmic origin I mean other ones were really kind of vague as far as there were other heroes that had Weird cosmic type origins, but Green Lantern was the first one to just really Because they explained that while he wasn't the only Green Lantern He was the Green Lantern of Sector 28-14 because way in the center of the universe the Owens on the planet are the guardians of the universe on the planet Decided that well, we should probably have like a galactic police force And we'll give them these rings and they can do base of the things that the old Green Lantern did like make punching big giant punching fists punching fists, and you know you could you could through your willpower and Create anything you wanted it would be out of this green light Yeah, there's the there's the but see what happened was Unlike the original Green Lantern and and in my opinion just as silly a weakness as wood is Yellow yellow anything yellow. He has no power you to a necessary impurity in the ring But they which I can't I can't remember how many thousands of times that was you saw that line due to a necessary impurity in the ring So it's not all-powerful right so if you wore a lot of yellow he couldn't do a lot to you Amazing that more of his more of his super villain Fos didn't just wear yellow. I mean they thought it was cheating. I You know there was a spareness because Comic code right it could be unfair. That's right Well, let's see who else we have from them from a showcase showcase. Let's see Challengers of the unknown right there was a big one They were probably the I think they were the first ones whoo, okay to actually get their own title from the showcase thing Even though I mean it did bring back the flash right green Lantern and Challenges Right people like that lowest lane even appeared in there Adam strange. Oh, yeah, and the metal man The challengers the unwound were the first ones to get their own title and they were basically just Daredevil type people mostly and one of them was a scientist and they'd go and and and do impossibly Dangerous things, you know, I mean and you know, they they'd fight villains and stuff And they'd always be able to figure out a way out of it. They'd be thrown in horrible traps and And see who else have we got here? Black Hawk people like that. Well, you guys talk about the metal men Certainly, I mean again. I don't know this see DC in the 50s and 60s was nothing if not scientific Everything was scientific and so you had this this scientific group of heroes. They weren't actually people they were robots They were robots and they were formed out of each was formed out of a specific element element. Yes a responsometer Which which was this tiny little device. They never really explained when put in this robot It could allow the robot to I was to assume any shape. Yes, and there was and the leader of the team was gold and The woman when the group was platinum and there was tin lead iron mercury, I Think that's it. Yeah And they all had like the the characteristics the what you would I don't know if you if you gave emotions to metals You know gold was really really, you know The leader of the group and he was really really smart and all this and mercury was was really Was really mad all the time and and tin was always kind of shy And lead was the strong man, but he was kind of And then they made the tin guy had a little tin woman named Tina. Yeah Well, no Tina was the platinum one Tina was flat. Yeah, she was flat. Who was the tin woman? I don't know He got me Well now by golly, I guess I'm See, I'm sure that Tina was the little the tin woman that they know was platinum. Okay. I know Tina was platinum. Oh, why could she just be plattie? So anyways so showcase Virtually repopulated the DC universe of heroes and because until then most of the heroes were gone And this started certainly the Silver Age. Yes culminating in what is considered the greatest comic of the Silver Age Flash number I think it's 110 flash of two worlds in which both flashes Appeared in the same comic at the same time and was the first comic which brought up the concept of the multiverse Not just the universe a multiverse that everybody said well, you know if there's all these new heroes What happened all the old heroes they just retired and they disappeared in fact now they're saying that these other heroes didn't ever even exist So what happened to them? Well now wait a minute now. I thought they had been into it another um in another Dimension well, that's that's what they explained Well, there's earth one where most of the stuff happens and then there's earth two Which is where all the Golden Age heroes hung out Okay, and they were of course earth two and earth one were in the same spot But they were separated by a different no They're separated by a different dimensional frequency or something so so Certain heroes like the flash you could vibrate through concrete and stuff could basically vibrate into the other Continuity and that's what he did. He accidentally did that one time and he found out the Golden Age universe existed Starting the beginning of the JLA JSA team-ups The Justice League of America that was formed out of all these heroes the new heroes and the Justice Society of America They the old heroes from the 40s And they were all living on earth, too. Well, they were yeah Well hanging out on earth, too And then you get into these fun things with there's like an older Superman who's got graying Temple right yeah, and not nearly as strong because they said for a while that you could still only leap an eighth of a Mile although later they kind of rescinded that and said well, he's pretty much as powerful because he's older now He's more experienced He's working all out apparently and and also in earth, too And I believe in the 70s Batman retired and on earth, too and married Selena Kyle no didn't he marry Selena? No cuz cuz they weren't they weren't friends there I don't think they did I may be wrong about that. I think he married Kathy Kathy Kane or the that woman that woman from the old from from earth, too So so the earth to universe the heroes were older, but they still could go out there and fight pretty well Yeah, you've got your you got your what black canary Our man, right dr. Fay. Yeah And every year in Justice League of America, which again was the the Silver Age equivalent They'd have them come on over and they just happened to be together and there'd be a menace that neither of them could fight Alone but together Even though it was just like one guy, you know He was just one year. Well the one year. This is this is the one. I really loved was the Was the villains from earth 3? Whoa earth 3 where all the super powered people are bad guys So they came in and they beat up the people from earth 2 they beat up the people from earth 1 and then earth 2 and earth 1 got together and beat up the earth 3 people. It's kind of like tag team match That was always the thing that impressed me about it's like they're that whole tag team mentality They could never work well together when they were in small groups. They always get beat up every time or and they went on their Alone. Yeah, they always got beat up But when they get together the teamwork would kick in and they'd and they'd kick the other guys, but basically It's just funny Play them simple. It's just funny. Anyways, meanwhile during all this By this point for for the most part the same people who had been doing say Superman since we're almost done Gadzooks Already goodness. Yeah, well. Oh, anyways, the people who've been doing Superman since the beginning of time. We're still there and They were run out of ideas. So it began the imaginary stories Which there's virtually no continuity in the 1960s because virtually every story was imaginary after a while after a while Because they ran of ideas. They went what if we killed Superman and or what if Superman married Lois or What what if Batman got Superman super power? Yeah, what if Jimmy Olsen just happened? Become a bad guy or What if this weird explosion occurred which created two Superman that was the weirdest one Oh, the blue superman Who were a thousand times smarter than the original Superman so they figured out all the problems on earth and retired Amazing Simply amazing. Well, anyways, Yikes, we have really have not even got to the 70s. We may have to take this into a third part Oh, no We have to move it as a third part because it's about time for in the attic with Marty Wiley Take it away Marty Today's topic is the lava lamp Let's just be right here. I First saw a lava lamp probably back in the early 60s. I don't know when they really Originated or where or anything? But I remember they had a display of them at the dime store There was a big glass counter and they had them kind of lined up in the bottom of the counter and I remember right near the front door you'd first come in I get stuck there looking at the lava lamps they had like this blue green color and I remember there were red ones too that just looked like hell or something and I can remember just being real fascinated by those things When I graduated from high school, I was pleasantly surprised to receive my own lava lamp for my Aunt Mary and Uncle Bill as a graduation gift Probably about the most favorite graduation gift I got besides the money that you get when you graduate and And I became the first and only person I ever knew that actually had one of these things in their home. I Don't know how they work. I don't know what's inside them. I don't know anybody who's ever busted one open to find out But the lava lamp definitely probably the 8th wonder of the world in the 20th century today See ya Yeah, well, thanks a lot Marty. Thanks a lot for that nostalgic look. Thanks a lot Well Next time on vast wasteland We're gonna be talking Marty and Robert are gonna be talking about the second part of our toys Going in going into more of the toys cuz darn it. There's just so many toys out there You can't get through all of them. I mean look what we do with the comics. Yeah, gotta come back another time Simply amazing. We just rattle on forever. Basically. That's what it is. Well, you see that's the thing about comics You've got all this stuff written down. Yeah, there's just so many What can you do that's right talk about So let's see we have next time is the is the second part of toys and then we'll have a TV Theme show again, and then we'll be back again. We'll be back We may never end this this is incredible Hard to believe truly that's right. So we'll hopefully finish this DC thing up next time I would certainly hope so So for all of us air draft wasteland will see you next time Y'all remember to vote now here