Detective Comics (1937-2011) #470

Detective Comics (1937-2011)

by Steve Englehart (Writer), Walter Simonson (Illustrator), Al Milgrom (Illustrator)

“THE MASTER PLAN OF DR. PHOSPHORUS!” Batman confronts Dr. Phosphorus at the new Gotham City offshore nuclear power plant.

Genres: Comics, Batman, Dc Comics

18 pages, Kindle Edition

First published June 1, 1977

About the author

See also John Harkness.

Steve Englehart went to Wesleyan University in Middletown, Connecticut. After a stint in the Army, he moved to New York and began to write for Marvel Comics. That led to long runs on Captain America, The Hulk, The Avengers, Dr. Strange, and a dozen other titles. Midway through that period he moved to California (where he remains), and met and married his wife Terry.

He was finally hired away from Marvel by DC Comics, to be their lead writer and revamp their core characters (Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman, Flash, and Green Lantern). He did, but he also wrote a solo Batman series (immediately dubbed the "definitive" version) that later became Warner Brothers' first Batman film (the good one).

After that he left comics for a time, traveled in Europe for a year, wrote a novel (The Point Man™), and came back to design video games for Atari (E.T., Garfield). But he still liked comics, so he created Coyote™, which within its first year was rated one of America's ten best series. Other projects he owned (Scorpio Rose™, The Djinn™) were mixed with company series (Green Lantern [with Joe Staton], Silver Surfer, Fantastic Four). Meanwhile, he continued his game design for Activision, Electronic Arts, Sega, and Brøderbund.

And once he and Terry had their two sons, Alex and Eric, he naturally told them stories. Rustle's Christmas Adventure was first devised for them. He went on to add a run of mid-grade books to his bibliography, including the DNAgers™ adventure series, and Countdown to Flight, a biography of the Wright brothers selected by NASA as the basis for their school curriculum on the invention of the airplane.

In 1992 Steve was asked to co-create a comics pantheon called the Ultraverse. One of his contributions, The Night Man, became not only a successful comics series, but also a television show. That led to more Hollywood work, including animated series such as Street Fighter, GI Joe, and Team Atlantis for Disney.

Reviews

[Jayson]

(B+) 78% | Good
Notes: A casual feel and lighter deal, colloquial speech supplied, not Silver Age, just more engaged in Batman's human side.

*Progress update

[cauldronofevil]

”The Master Plan of Dr. Phosphorus” starts with Batman interrupting a thief (not sure what he’s doing with a scalpel!). The thief jumps out a window to escape.

”Let ‘im try to take me! I know this city like the back of my hand! ”

I’m pretty sure the thief is Martin Landau.

Batman catches up to Smiley but someone approaches him from behind. And serves him a subpoena to appear before the Gotham Grand Jury.

Talking with Commissioner Gordon, Batman learns the subpoena is probably from Boss Thorne, the City Council Chairman. They want to shut Batman down. Vigilantes don’t belong in Gotham City!

In Treasury Comic C-58 I just read the legend of Julie Schwartz, who is also editing this book, but on page 5 he has two asterisks (“*”) that should presumably say something like ‘see issue #?’ And no such footnotes exist!

Elsewhere at a concert the singer (of Tutti Fruity!) chokes from the poisonous air Dr. Phosphorus has sent into the air-conditioning of Gotham’s Sprang Memorial Arena.

At the bat cave (under the Wayne Foundation), Batman gets a call from Chief O’Hara! Warning him that the City Council has issued a directive that Batman is off limits.

Bruce Wayne is throwing a party on his super yacht and meets and flirts with the beautiful Silver St. Cloud. Batman uses the party to sneak away to the nuclear power plant that sits on the water. There he finds Dr. Phosphorus. They fight, Batman being in his radiation resistant suit (looks exactly like his normal costume). Batman kicks Phosphorus off a girder, presumably killing him.

The action is really pretty fuzzy here. Is that the product of bad writing? Bad art? Bad editing? I’m not even sure where Batman kicked the Dr.!

Back on Bruce Wayne’s yacht, dinner is served. Buffet style! Bruce manages to run into Silver again while police boats are headed for the power plant. Somethings wrong there.

This was kind of strange. It had some unnecessary divisions that really seemed like padding to me. 2 stars.

[Samuele Previtali]

Orca puttana quanti spiegoni

[Egghead]

batman- you fool! he's
radioactive! also,
he's now laser floyd!