The 1978 2017 2023 DC Calendar of Super-Spectacular Disasters: October Occult

This is an expanded and updated version of a post originally published October 1, 2017.

Welcome to October! Everybody loves October! Isn't that right, Mitch?


from "The October Game" in Shock SuspenStories (1952 series) #8 (EC, June 1953), story by Ray Bradbury, comic script by Al Feldstein, pencils and inks by Jack Kamen, colors by Marie Severin, letters by Jim Wroten
Aw, Mitch, this ain't gonna be the DC Calendar for you then this year, I guess.


Note: Want to see what makes October so bad for Mitch? Tune in again this Halloween! Hint: it's an DC story. It won't end well.

But for everyone else, here's a calendar! You know the drill: it's from 1978 but it still works in 2023!

"October: Atom and Hawkman" in The 1978 Calendar of Super-Spectacular Disasters; artwork by Al Milgrom
(Click picture to Great Pumpkin-size)
Throughout several past Octobers in this here puppet-town cow-blog I've brought you stories of superheroism and mysticism in Rutland, Vermont, set at their annual Halloween Parade. Just search for the category "One Night in Rutland" to find others, and be aware I still have not yet finished off this feature! (What is wrong with me?)

Anyway, no Rutland Rutrospective is complete without this page from the 1977 DC Calendar of Super-Spectacular Disasters, which tells the tale of the time the Atom, Hawman, and Hawkgirl fought Felix Faust, the Matter Master, and the Gentleman Ghost at the scariest party to end all parties in Vermont (unless you count that time I got into the vats at the Ben and Jerry's factory)!


They're on a collision course with wackiness! I can say this because the calendar doesn't actually tell us how many people died.


Take us up to date, Justice League computer: what's the latest calculations about the criminal genius behind all these seasonal shenanigans?


Huh, that's still baffling. Another clue, computer?


OH HEY IT'S EARLIER-PERIOD, MORE-INNOCENT DOCTOR LIGHT


Cover of Secret Origins (1986 series) #37 (February 1989); script, pencils, inks and letters by Ty Templeton

The 1978 2017 2023 DC Calendar of Super-Spectacular Disasters: January Justice

This is an expanded and updated version of a post originally published January 1, 2017.

It's once again January and time for me to finally and reluctantly take down my Li'l Björk Calendar


and hang up one for 2023. So let me first consult with my handy-dandy Perpetual Calendar, which tells me that it's 2023. Um, thanks, Perpetual Calendar! Ah, it's also telling me that if I have any calendars from the years 1967, 1978, 1989, 1995, 2006. or 2017, I can hang 'em up on the wall and use them to party as if it were 2017! Which it is, so that's a good thing.

Well, whatdaya know!


cover of The 1978 Calendar of Super-Spectacular Disasters, front cover art by Neal Adams
It's a year full of Super-Spectacular Disasters, so this really should have been a calendar for 2016, and I'm certainly hoping that it doesn't apply to this new year, or, as I'm calling it, the Year of the Bull. (does celebratory somersault, lands in plate of spaghetti) Whoops.

Yo, 2023, I'm really happy for you, I'ma let you finish, but 1978 had one of the best comic book calendars of all time! One of the best comic book calendars of all time! It's probably the only calendar that actually tells a story over the course of a full year, apart from some copies of Ethel the Aardvark Goes Quantity Surveying Calendar 1984.


With its all-star cast of characters and artists, the 78CoSSD is attractive enough, but month by month it unravels a sinister plot of the DC Super-Villains to execute dark deeds plotted by an evil mastermind! Follow the story in each month's illustration!

"January: Batman" in The 1978 Calendar of Super-Spectacular Disasters (DC, 1977); artwork by Dick Giordano
(Click picture to 100-watt-size)
Then, pick up on the clues in the date boxes! Please note that beginning on January 1, Doctor Light threatens the Big Apple by...no, not that, stop it...by putting the city under a blackout. He starts with a one-minute power failure on 1/1, and by 1/4 has increased it to four minutes!


That means he's doubling the blackout duration each day, so by the time Batman slugs Doctor Light upside the luminescent bulbs on January 11, the blackout is 17 hours and four minutes! Why, by the very next day, he'll be sinking Manhattan into darkness for 34 hours a day! Good thing Batman was right on that or Dr. Light would have been warping time and we all might be our own grandpas.

There's more long-game clues to follow: throughout the month, certain days will tell you to black out squares...


...in a grid at the end of the calendar, so that by December 31, you'll have figgered out the identity of the super-jerks' evil boss!

"December 31"; art by José Luis Garcia-López
(Click picture to you-sunk-my-battleship-size)
Starting on February 1, at the beginning of each month, I'll show you the blacked-out version of the grid so far (or take a Sharpie and mark them off on your computer monitor screen!), and we'll all meet back here on December 31 and see who was behind all these terrible, world-breaking disasters.

On the other hand, you might just be able to detect some inkling of the dastardly villain thanks to this bald-faced clue on January 29.


(And tune in later for a peek at a '78 calendar from the Magnificent Competition Guys!)

365 Days of DC House Ads, Day 231: You make me feel like I'm livin' a teenage dream

House ad for Teen Titans (1976 series) #44 (November 1976); printed in Super-Team Family #7 (October-November 1976)
Ad designed and lettered by Gaspar Saladino