#dufus p ratchet

[evilhorse]

Justice League International #23

[sebeth]

Who's Who In The DC Universe #2: Big Sir, Bizarro, and Bizarro World

Big Sir by Carmine Infantino and Klaus Janson

Dufus P. Ratchet “was born with a malfunctioning pituitary gland that allowed his body to gtow to monstrous proportions, while his mind stopped developing past the intelligence of an eight-year-old”. FYI, Big Sir is listed as 6’9” and 307 lbs.

Ratchet was kept under observation at Central City’s Breedmore Mental Hospital.

The Flash’s Rogue’s Gallery freed Ratchet and outfitted him with high-tech armor provided by the Monitor. The Rogues manipulated Ratchet into believing the Flash was a bad guy by claiming he killed a rodent. Ratchet went on a rampage that nearly killed the Flash (Barry).

Barry took Ratchet to Gorilla City where their scientists corrected his mental deficiencies. He now has a near-genius IQ and is “seeking to make a valuable contribution to society”.

The only Big Sir stories I’ve read were his appearances in the “JLI” era of the Justice League series. This version of the Injustice League consisted of Big Sir, Cluemaster, Clock King, Major Disaster, Multi-Man, and the Mighty Bruce. This version of Big Sir was most definitely not a genius. He was more of a sweet idiot. I’m not sure when or how his genius IQ was retconned as he was created shortly before the Crisis on Infinite Earths. Barry died in the Crisis and the Flash comic was cancelled around the same time. The Flash comic was re-booted with Wally West as the Flash. Big Sir did not make any appearances in the early years of the Wally West series. Justice League International began shortly after the West-Flash series started. So how did Big Sir lose his genius IQ? Were Giffen and DeMattis simply unaware of the IQ upgrade?

Read Justice League International, not only for Big Sir, but for the whole cast of characters – heroes, villains, and supporting. Great series, highly underrated.

Bizarro by Kevin O’Neill

Lex Luthor reconstructed a duplicator ray (invented by Professor Dalton). Luthor used the ray on Superman but created an imperfect duplicate. “Composed of lifeless matter, this duplicate also shared Superman’s memory, but in a distorted manner.”

Luthor named the creature “Bizarro”.

Bizarro searched the world for love and acceptance resulting in Lois Lane using the Duplicator Ray to create an imperfect duplicate of herself.

Bizarro and Bizzarro-Lois left Earth and soon founded the Bizarro World in another galaxy.

Bizarro rules the planet, “happy in the company of his family and friends.”

Bizarro is one of the more well-known villains of Superman. I first encountered the pre-Crisis Bizarro in the Silver Age Legion of Super-Hero stories. The 1980s saw much of the early Legion of Super-Hero stories reprinted in a pocket digest format. He wasn’t so much villainous as an over-eager nuisance. Frankenstein’s Monster had to be an inspiration for the creation of Bizarro – the imperfect appearance, the rejection by his creator, the search for love and acceptance – all the story beats are there.

Bizarro will always be one of my favorite Superman Family members. Post- Crisis, Bizarro has had many versions ranging from threatening (Injustice) to heartwarming (Red Hood & the Outlaws).

Bizarro World by Curt Swan and Karl Kessel

A short entry that details the inhabitants of Bizarro World. Bizzaro has used the Duplicator Ray to create duplicates of Jimmy Olsen, Perry White, Lana Lang, Krypto, Mr. Myxzptlk, the entire Justice League of America, and the Legion of Super-Heroes. Bizarro-Lois predates the creation of Bizarro World.

The World has a Bizarro Code: “Us do opposite of all Earthly Things! Us hate Beauty! Us love ugliness! Is big crime to make anything perfect for Bizzaro World!”

Superman reshaped Bizaarro World to make it an imperfectly-shaped cube.

[gorogues]

“Honey, I Shrunk Team Flash”

Spoilers for this week’s episode of the Flash!

Not really much Rogue content in this episode, but there is a little and it plays into a future Rogue episode so I'll talk about it in brief.

We learn that Big Sir is named David P. Ratchet, unlike the Dufus P. Ratchet in the comics.  Obviously that's a really preferable name change, although I admit to being surprised that they kept the 'P. Ratchet' part.  Sir's story drives much of the plot, as without him Ralph and Cisco wouldn't have gotten shrunk and Barry wouldn't get himself into serious trouble at the end: he uses his speed to break Sir out of jail and take him to China, and Wolfe finds out that he's the Flash.  Plus, he drugs Barry and puts him in a special cell which probably nullifies his powers, and plans to sell him to Amunet Black.

I did think Wolfe had been oddly nice so far.  He seemed to have been watching out for Barry as a favour to Joe in the last episode, but here we saw glimpses of his comics self when he warned Barry that everyone in Iron Heights "is a monster".  He later includes himself in that group, which is different, because comics Wolfe has always seemed to think of himself as a principled man who does cruel things to help the common good.  But his comics self has always had a 'once a scumbag, always a scumbag' POV, and clearly thinks that everyone in Iron Heights deserves to be there...which is why he had a suspicious grudge against Hartley Rathaway even though Piper had been a hero for a long time by that point.  So that tells you a lot about Wolfe.  I guess I'm a bit sorry that he's seemingly corrupt rather than possesses an extremely rigid view about morality because it feels less interesting to me, but of course we don't really know about his motivations yet.  Blacksmith and the Thinker may have threatened him into it and perhaps he believes he doesn't have an alternative, for example.  So we'll see.

Anyway, it was a pretty fun episode and not nearly as stupid as I'd been fearing.  There's always stuff in Flash that you kind of have to shut off your brain for and accept as part of the genre, but it wasn't overwhelming here even though it could have been.  Also I chuckled over the comment about frozen laserbeams (Len says hi), so at least they're also aware of some of the ridiculous stuff they put in the show and are having fun with it.  

[why-i-love-comics]

Justice League International #23 - "Gross Injustice" (1989)

written by Keith Giffen & J.M. DeMatteis art by Kevin Maguire, Joe Rubinstein, & Gene D'Angelo