#golden age dc comics

[one-bat-day]

Getting some early bat in here

[danzigmcfly]

[kenandeliza]

A random thought / headcanon

Superman learns knitting/sewing, deciding to give an “ugly sweater” to his friends, including captain marvel

He doesn’t make them ugly intentionally, he’s just bad at making designs

[vintagegeekculture]

This panel, from Action Comics #32 (1941) is confirmation of something that I have long suspected, but I have yet to see any comics historian or biographer mention as a possibility: Jerry Siegel, the creator of Superman, suffered from face-blindness, and probably didn't know it.

Face blindness, also known as prosopagnosia, is the inability to recognize or differentiate people by their faces. Many who have it are not even able to recognize themselves in a mirror without concentration. To explain it as simply as possible: a different, more precise portion of the brain is activated when looking at human faces, as opposed to the part involved in analyzing other inanimate objects. For some, the "switch" between parts of the brain used does not happen. This is sometimes due to head injury or inflamation. Looking over Jerry Siegel's biography, I was not able to pinpoint a specific incident that could have caused brain damage, but that isn't always necessary. Face blindness, in many cases, is a condition some are born with.

Fans of Superman have spent long hours back and forth arguing whether Clark Kent's disguise would be effective or not. If Jerry Siegel suffered from face blindness, it would certainly explain why he thought it would.

[comic-covers]

(1943)

[theflashjaygarrick]

People have spent so much time fleshing out random background male characters and so for feminism I am going to give one of DC's under appreciated female characters this treatment . I am absolutely fascinated by Joan Garrick as a character. DC is not. But who am I to let that stop me.

So what are some things we know about Joan Garrick (née Williams). One is that she met Jay Garrick when they were both students at college. More potential context was given by Millar and Morrison in the iconic Jay focused Flash (vol 2) #134. Here we learn that at the present time she is teaching microbiology and based on the fact that in my experience a specific microbiology subject is more common in university and she's heading in for specific classes not the school day I can infer she is a lecturer/professor. These few facts paint a picture of an awesome and boundary breaking woman in her own right.

We can assume she was in college in the 1930s. This makes sense. After all the 30s was the first generation where (almost entirely white and middle class) women attended colleges in greater numbers and with more social acceptance then before. They became symbols of newfound female independence and education. But at the same time they faced a lot of obstacles , particularly in co-ed institutions like Midwestern University. She still had to navigate her way through a very male dominated institution that did not take her seriously if they wanted her to be there at all. Along with the change in female education came cultural backlash both within and outside the academy. Misogynistic (and racist) detractors viewed female higher education as frivolous, unsuitable for women's 'fragile physiology' and even saw it as the 'suicide' of the middle-class white American family. Yeah these people were the fucking worst. Anyway, being a female student at a university in that era meant dealing with and overcoming all kinds of bullshit from exclusion to outright harassment (even more than it does now).

And then there is the fact that she apparently studied biology (or microbiology more specially) in a time where most women pursued degrees in teaching or nursing (if they planned to use it vocationally) or liberal arts (if they did not). Women were actively discouraged from taking science courses and Joan would have been trying to enter an even more hostile boys club whilst fighting against even greater social pressure. But despite it all she seemingly did succeed and presumably help break barriers for women in science which is awesome.

And we can see this refusal to back down in her personality. Joan's kindness is matched by her tenacity and her 'do first, ask for permission later' personality, which whether forged through her experiences in academic or before-hand helped her persevere overcome the many obstacles she would have faced. She's an absolute badass.

Now this is not strictly relevant but she also knew Jay was the flash the whole time which is really sweet. I personally like to think she figured it out because he kept asking her really specific questions about human metabolism and the like (biology seemingly is Jay's scientific blindspot) and she put two and two together. Also he just innately trusts her with his secret which is cute considering how much secret identity drama silver age couples went through.

[batboopp]

batman should be campy because a billionaire playboy orphan who witnessed his parents get shot in front of him, who then started dressing up as a flying rodent while fighting a clown, a lawyer, a plant lady, and some other rich guys is inherently campy. it’s silly and tragic and confusing all at once. let him be campy again plz 💔

[kryptonbabe]

The inner covers of Superman Sunday Classics: Strips 1-183 (1939-1943), designed by Peter Poplaski

[superman-the-secret-third-thing]

Golden Age Superman's Health Advice

I could still use this tbh...

Source is Superman #2 (1939) by Joe Shuster and Jerry Siegel

[chernobog13]

Cover artists: Jack Burnley - #20, 23 & 27 (both with Charles Paris); Win Mortimer - #54.

I love these early World's Finest Comics covers with Superman and Robin messing with each other (sometimes with an assist from Batman).

This was the period before Superman and Batman and Robin actually teamed-up inside the book, which was an anthology title, but they shared every single cover. The covers usually showed the three pals having fun playing baseball, or basketball, skiing, going to the swimming hole, or other activities boys liked to do.

Inside Superman and Batman (with Robin) had solo stories, along with whatever other characters were featured.

It wasn't until Superman (vol. 1 ) #76 (May, 1952) that Superman and Batman actually met in a comic book story, and accidentally learned each other's secret identity at the same time.

And they wouldn't begin teaming-up in World's Finest Comics for another two years, in #71 (July-August, 1954). As a cost saving measure, the book's page count was cut, along with the anthology format. The editors decided to put their most popular characters together in the one story there was room for, and a tradition was born. The Superman-Batman team-ups would, except for a short period around issue #200, be the format of the book until it was cancelled in 1986 with issue #323.

[esotericheroics]

[one-bat-day]

[mydarlingbat]

Batman #37

[kenandeliza]

shotgun crutch doodle

A silly shazam doodle based on this comment by @puppetwoman17

in this post

I have never dealt with shotguns before, so this drawing might be inaccurate

[everwalldigan]

Batman gets hit with something that makes him lose all his memories up until Dick’s second year of being Robin.

Dick is the one who finds him first. Bruce immediately recognises him because of course he does, that’s his son, he would know him just from the cadence of his walk, even though he’s grown into his limbs and lost the awkward pitter-patter of a growing boy. He would know him just from his voice, even if it’s now the voice of a 28 year old man instead of a 10 year old boy.

He knows next to nothing about the great things Nightwing has achieved and yet he’s maybe just slightly choked up when he throws one long look at him and says “you’ve turned out better than anything I could have ever expected” and Dick is maybe also slightly choked up because Bruce has no idea the impact those words have on him.

He has no idea this is the most open version of himself that Dick has spoken to ever since they lost Jason. He has no idea that despite Dick knowing that Bruce is proud of him and what he’s achieved, it still hits him hard when he actually hears the words out of his mouth. Bruce has no idea how much it hurt to be confronted with the version of his Batman that he misses so much and resigned to never seeing again.

And when Bruce regains his memory and they go back to the status quo, neither of them daring to mention that moment, every time Bruce does something that infuriates him, every time his words seem harsh without regard, he’s going to remember those words and sometimes that still doesn’t change a thing but sometimes, sometimes it does.

[docgold13]

Batman in The Golden Age

Paper cut-outs in the styles of Bob Kane; Jerry Robinson; Dick Sprang ; Lew Sayre Schwartz; Sheldon Moldoff; Jim Mooney; Jack Burnly; and Win Mortimer