Saturday, December 09, 2017

365 Days of Defiance, Day 343: Hangry Like the Wolf

Today's Day of Defiance comes at the suggestion of Bountiful Bully Booster Matthew Elmslie, who submitted several excellent moments of standing up against greater odds, only a handful of which you'll see this final month of the series. Matthew run the excellent blog Legion Abstract, which is absolutely essential if you're a fan (and who isn't?) of the Legion of Super-Heroes. And yes, I've finally added it to my sidebar of favorite blogs, because it really is as essential to the fandom of super-teens 1,000 years in the future as a flight ring and a McCauley Omnicom.

The set-up: one Legionnaire against the entire Fatal Five doesn't seem like a fair fight even it it were Mon-El or Ultra Boy or even the most powerful Legionnaire, Matter-Eater Lad. But how bad are the odds when that Legionnaire is Timber Wolf? Uh oh. Space Vegas is not even taking any more bets on this one, it's so overmatched. Can Brin Londo* (Timber Wolf's real name, and I didn't even have to look that up) stand up to the sheer quintuple power of the FF? Let's see, shall we?






Panels from The Legion (2001 series) #16 (March 2003), script by Dan Abnett and Andy Lanning, pencils by Kev Walker, inks by Andy Lanning and Al Milgrom, colors by Jason Wright, color separations by Digital Chameleon, letters by Comicraft

Well, that's not good. But I love his defiant- and determined-to-the-last attitude. That's gotta be part of why they admitted TW into the Legion. "I like his spunk!" said Cosmic Boy. "Spunk. I hate spunk." said Brainiac 5.

Anyway, Brin isbn't done for, because the very next page features one of my favorite tropes in comics, ever: the team arrives just in the nick of time.


Just as an aside, man, I miss Jeckie as a snake.

Anyway, we salute you, Timber Wolf! We thank you, Matthew Elmslie! Long live the Legion (and Legion Abstract), and keep on Timber Wolfin'!

Friday, December 08, 2017

365 Days of Defiance, Day 342: The Last Stand of Johnny Storm







Panels from Fantastic Four #587 (March 2011); script by Jonathan Hickman; pencils by Steve Epting; inks by Rick Magyar, Mike Perkins, and Steve Epting; colors by Paul Mounts; letters by Rus Wooton

Thursday, December 07, 2017

365 Days of Defiance, Day 341: Take a long, hard look down the road you will have to travel




Panels from March Book 2 (January 2015), script by John Lewis and Andrew Aydin; pencils, inks, and letters by Nate Powell

“Take a long, hard look down the road you will have to travel once you have made a commitment to work for change. Know that this transformation will not happen right away. Change often takes time. It rarely happens all at once. In the movement, we didn't know how history would play itself out. When we were getting arrested and waiting in jail or standing in unmovable lines on the courthouse steps, we didn’t know what would happen, but we knew it had to happen.

Use the words of the movement to pace yourself. We used to say that ours is not the struggle of one day, one week, or one year. Ours is not the struggle of one judicial appointment or presidential term. Ours is the struggle of a lifetime, or maybe even many lifetimes, and each one of us in every generation must do our part. And if we believe in the change we seek, then it is easy to commit to doing all we can, because the responsibility is ours alone to build a better society and a more peaceful world."
— US Representative John Lewis, Across That Bridge: A Vision for Change and the Future of America

Wednesday, December 06, 2017

365 Days of Defiance, Day 340: "The bell of man’s inhumanity to man does not toll for any one man. It tolls for you, for me, for all of us."



Panels from King: A Comics Biography graphic novel (February 2010); script, pencils, inks, and letters by Ho Che Anderson

Tuesday, December 05, 2017

365 Days of Defiance, Day 339: "The only weapon that we have in our hands this evening is the weapon of protest." (Today in Comics History, December 5, 1955)





from Martin Luther King and the Montgomery Story one-shot giveaway (Fellowship of Reconciliation, 1958), script by Benton Resnick, art by artists in the Al Capp Organization, letters by John Duffy

Monday, December 04, 2017

365 Days of Defiance, Day 338: Kids come running for the great lessons of Superman


1950s school poster created and distributed by DC Comics, art believed to be by Wayne Boring (or Win Mortimer?)

You can read more about this poster on the DC Comics Blog and on Buzzfeed and Mental Floss

Sunday, December 03, 2017

365 Days of Defiance, Day 337: You don't have to live like a refugee

Here's another DC PSA that lays it on the line, Superman-style: prejudice and bigotry have no part in our modern civilization, and the way to battle that is understanding and acceptance of refugees. What, you gonna go against Superman's advice?


"Superman Says: Lend a Friendly Hand!" from The Flash (1959 series) #114 (August 1960), script by Jack Schiff (?), pencils by Curt Swan, inks by Stan Kaye, letters by Ira Schnapp