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popculturebuffet · 10 months

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Beetlemania: Dan Garret (Mystery Men Comics #16, Blue Beetle V1 #15)

Hello all you happy people and welcome one and all to beetlemania, patreon Brotoman.EXE's brilliant idea; use his patreon reviews for the next few months, take some time off robuts in disguise and onto those boys in blue, the unsung heroes of the dcu, and those who don't know when to give up: The Blue Beetles, covering all three up until the premire of the sparkly new movie in August. This WAS supposed to take up the summer, but with June being a mess thanks to my move, your getting two beetles this month, and then Jamie next month, along with a review of the film once I sees it. It's an ode to two heroes I love dearly.. and a chance to get to know one a lot better That one is Dan Garret and out of the three boys in blue, he's the only one I hadn't read ANY of going into this: I've read a ton of ted appearnces inclduing most of JLI and a chunk of his DC solo and all of the legendary John Rogers run for Jamie that kicked off the character, as well as a smidgen of his rebirth run. This isn't really the characters fault, but more DC Comics. See for those unaware while the beetle is a dc character NOW he has a bit of a complicated publishing history. Beetle started out under Victor S. Fox's Fox Comics. Fox.. was one heck of a character in himself, having been quoted as stomping around going "I'M THE KING OF COMICS I'M THE KING OF COMICS, I'M THE KING OF COMICS" and infamously making up Kooba cola, a soft drink that never existed but was still promoted in his comics and is refrenced rentelessly on atop the fourth wall. Fox was kinda nuts but he manged to still turn out a big star... which weirdly wasn't Stardust the Super Wizard, an actual character I just found out existed but have somehow never heard about and now badly need to cover. He was indeed a super wizard who watched as crime took place, for some reason did nothing, then after horrible things happened sure as hell avenged them with violence.

But since people didn't apparently want to see atomic supermen kill gangsters, Beetle became their breakout. The original Blue Beetle was Dan Garret, who definitely was a cop.

Yeah it's a shockingly common trope for superheroes, Dick Grayson also spent some time walking the beat, but it's really mostly there to set up Dan to be on the scene just in time instead of to beat up the poor, your tired, your huddled masses yearning to break free. Dan is a second generation cop and became the beetle to avenge his dad, sometimes working with a professor to give him super strength. Later it'd instead be a scarab he found after the silver age shifted dan to being an archeologist. This.. will be important later. For now though dan is flanked by two supporting characters: Joan Mason, an intrepeted reporter love intrest

And Mike Mannigan, Dan's dad's former partner and proof we need to defund the police. He's basically a comic relief grumpus who wants to catch the beetle but couldn't catch a cold and as we'll see is a bit of an asshat of all trades. Today we'll be looking at thereestories of the Beetle: The first is from Mystery Men Comic and both gives us a more typical blue beetle story.. but also has Beetle battling the nefarious crimes of Big Dix.

It's low hanging fruit and both AT4W and ComicTropes have talked about Big Dix, but frankly there's enough Dix to go around. The second is for less hilarious reasons: Brotoman wanted to spotlight Sparky, the blue beetle's sidekick, who most people don't know exist and who remained in comics limbo. Ironically neither of us realized that in the recent mini series Stargirl: The Lost Children... SPARKY CAME BACK.

Yeah. The series is about Courtney rescuting a bunch of sidekicks lost in time, all from the golden age and most being brand new, such as the Boom, daughter of jay garrick, but Sparky.. was also brought alone. He only shows up for one panel in profile, but a missing chapter of the beetle's legacy is something bound to peak ted and Jamie's intrest. So join me under the cut for some Big Dix, some small british children, and some casual racisim and sexisim! ... I don't know whY I ended on the worst part of it but come along!

The Blue Beetle versus the Nefarious Girth of Big Dix Look the name alone would be funny.. but what makes this story special is the horrifying contrast. See we have the funny name.. but Big Dix crimes are dead serious: He's selling faulty playground equipment that causes the death of several children on screen. No blood, thank god, but it's still pretty damn harrowing and not something i'm willing to show you guys. So yeah this is a story about a chlid murderer.. named big dix. Brotoman has a theory about that

Joan mason outs big dix as the biggest dix to the cops, and nearly gets killed for it, but Dan and Mike easily clean house. So now

Soon after Dan goes to get some MMMM drugs to become the blue beetle.. and we get a panel that perfectly sums up the unintentional tonal whiplash of this story

BIG DIX, MURDERER OF CHILDREN

It only gets funnier because they treat Big Dix as the biggest test Dan has ever faced, a true insurmountable wall. And as a villian Big Dix woudl work.. if it just werne't for the name. It'd be like if the Kingpin was named Testicles McGoo. It just deflates any menace you have.

After finding where Big Dix is sheathed, we get this awesome entrance

FUCK YES. Ted may have his bitchin Bug, Jamie may have his armor, but Dan Garret has a fucking mortorcycle. Paint that sucker blue and yellow and it'll join it's friends.. and the beetle buggy in valhalla.

Oh and if that wasn't enough...

Holy shit I think Dan Garret just killed a man...

I'll admit dan is just fun to watch. While he has super strength drugs and bullet proof chainmail, most of his prowess is just pure skill. He focuses more on throws and punches.. mostly throws. Seriously Dan Garret REALLY loves throwing guys.

Look ted has Genius, Jamie has armor , both of them have heart.. but none of them have the power of motorcycles and throwing motherfuckers.

The two face off and while the Beetle Can take big dix, he can't take his mortal weakness STAIRS!

And blunt force head trauma.

So after capturing jone, Big Dix plans to throw Blue BEetle out of his tower, the BIGGER DIX, but Beetle wakes up from his concussion and as his style throws another guy. Big Dix responds with gas.... for some reason, and super runs away. So beetle's response to get him and joan out of the deadly gas filled hallway before they both suffocate?

... why has DC done nothing with this man?

After a "Ray for the blue beetle!" Which.. isn't a ship I ever thought of but nice thought 1940s man, we get our destined showdown

With dan as you can see winning with his deadly THROWING PUNCH. Seriously the man can't even punch without throwing someone. Beetle wins, the world's children are safe from Big Dix, all is well. So ... this story is actually really good. While the name is hilarious, it's a genuinely fun "Superhero vs gangsters story", with Big Dix having disappearing stairs and a big tower and dan throwing people every which way. My only regret is he didn't throw anyone at the screen. Sure some of the mention of big dix can come off as

But that's entirely in hindsight. Hilarious, hilarious hindsight. As a story on it's own it's really good stuff.

Blue Beetle and Sparky Vs Some WWII Propoganda!

Now if you glanced at the covers of the original volume of the blue beetle you'd probably expect sparky's first apperance to be issue 14

For whatever reason all we get in that issue is Blue Beetle fighting the wicked looking RED ROBE OF DEATH!.. and I file that away on the rather massive pile of "Stuff I need to cover another day. " So we're onto sparky's first apperance.. which weirdly ISN'T his origin. Yeah that comes later in the comic and is kinda dry but in short: he's an orphan, he's rich, he can kick ass, as demonstrated on some toughs, and he finds out Dan's identity and asks him to train him. Mike also bafflingly reacts to this like he's seeing double here, four beetles, despite Sparky being younger, not having the chainmail cap and being an actual chlidren.

So our story begins with a splash page foreshadowing the story with nothing in it before we cut to Dan and Mike, given their latest assignment, to extradite Rob Rutter, local thug , from one state to another. They get an unexpected stoaway in sparky.. whose just here now. He's also despite his upperclaass as hell name seen in the panel way up above... a little shit.

This may be the worst thing i've seen a sidekick do. I mean if it was Dick Grayson i'd absolutely get it

But here I Mean where does it end? Will he threaten them if dan dosen't take him to mcdonalds? will he do it anyway if dan just gets a black coffee for himself as he should in response to this blackmail? Will mike be mad he dosen't get his double quarter pounder with extra cheese? These questions will forever haunt me as I doubt JSA will be answering them.

So the extradition itself goes smoothly, but on the way back your standard boiler plate "THE JAPANESE ARE BAD. IT'S OKAY TO BE RACIST AGAINST AN ENTIRE COUNTRY BECAUSE WE'RE AT WAR WITH THEM. THIS WILL NEVER LEAD TO HORRIBLE CONSEQUENCES" vilaness, who takes their gangster and leaves them with four flat tires. Mike's reaction.. is half the reason I wanted to cover this story in paticualar. Perhaps even 75%

I just.. I can't.. I just can't stop laughing at this panel. It's so agressively sexist, so grumpy, so over the top. LIke.. how much does he buy into that/ Is it just bluster? did he have a bad divorce? is he just a sexist asshat?

Or does he genuinely, 100% this in some crazy conspiracy theorist way.

"Think about it HITLER was born by a woman. If she'd just let her husband pull out there'd be no world war 2!" "Polio was made in secret womens only labs!" "Women made the mighty stegasaurs go excitnct by telling him to fix his alchol problem!" "My ex wife killed kaiser wilhelm!" "I saw a woman drive a chicken off a cliff but miraculous survivie!" "A woman cut my breaks after I dated her sister who also cut my breaks! "I saw a woman turn into a griaffe and then back into a car!" 'WWOWOOOOOMMMMEEENNNNNN" Naturally in a fit of karma not only is our heroes savior Joan whose here because the plot says so because scoops, but he falls off the back. Granted Dan casually uses the J slur so I guess EVERYONE in this car except joan is some form of asshat.

At any rate our friends find an abandoned country club. Madam Fang berates Rutter and tells them to TAKE HIM AWAY. So wait.. her whole purpose for doing this, drawing attention to herself... was just to pull a you have failed me? That's what prison shankings are for. Clumsy madam fang, real clumsy.

The Beetles plan to have Joan attentend to Mike . Thankfully before he can club her for mailing all his cats to his ex wife in canada, she's kidnapped by the villians including an awful japanese sterotype. I mean i've seen some bad stertoypes but I forgot just how next level hate mongering Golden Age racisim was. They make the poor guy look like a cromagnon and talk like jar jar binks. I .. I refuse to show it. I just do. It's gross.

So Madam Fang kills plot device gangster and plans to kill Joan and we get a fight scene. Once again the art is top notch. Not as good as the last story, the panels are a touch more crowded and the art a bit muddy (though the last part is likelyin some big part age), Sparky throws out some slurs, and Ted gets beaten by his newest arch foe.. a vase

Sparky is captured because small child

And our heroes are put in the DROWNING POOL instead of letting the bodies hit the floor. Sparky is less than optimistic

Dan however has a pretty clever fix: he got the shards of glass from the vase she broke over him... int he 40's vases were made of glass and elephant bones apparently. This allows Team Beetle Plus Sparky to get free and escape So apparently madam fang's plan is to.. cause a giant flood . She just needs a patsy. Enter mike who dosen't recognize Fang from earlier, suprising no one, and makes a racial slur. I remain not suprised as he agrees to throw a switch for her no questions asked.

Oh and it gets better... when Beetle arrives to stop her, he plans to ARREST HIM FOR DISTURBING THE PEACE.

Thankfully beetle saves the day and Mike.. never figures out the switch was a trap

The Madam Fang story wasn't nearly as good as big dix thanks to a combination of clumiser art, PLENTY of racisim, and Mike having to be so stupid the sun blots out to make this work. That being said Mike's intense stupidity makes it ENJOYABLY bad, not as much as the name big dix, but still a lot of fun. It's like Chief Wiggum because a superhero's bumbling nemisis. It's great.

So that was Dan. He'd gon on to have more adventures, getting rebooted in the silver age as an archelogist, with sparky lost to time till the lost children, and joan still lost to time, with that being the origin brought over post crisis. Next tim we'll see the man that took over him in both Charlton and DC Flavors, get more on that transition as we meet the man, the myth, the bwahahah, mr TED MOTHERFUCKING KORD. Thanks for reading

#blue beetle #dan garrett #dc comics #fox comics #sparky #kooba cola #golden age comics #sparkington j northrope #joan mason #mike manngian

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