Posted By Dan Greenfield on Oct 21, 2023 | 2 comments

Silver Age tales to blow your mind…

By PETER BOSCH

The late Edmond Hamilton (born October 21, 1904) was one of the greatest Superman scribes during the 1960s. He was also the main writer of stories featuring Superman and Batman together in World’s Finest Comics, from Issues #141 to #159. 

Hamilton had written a number of Superman/Batman/Robin team-up stories prior to these issues, but with World’s Finest #141 he became the regular writer of the series and Curt Swan became the ongoing artist for the title. It wasn’t announced as a groundbreaking event but, in retrospective, it was. The art was more solid and realistic looking than previous issues and the plots didn’t involve Super-Batwoman aiding space creatures, or a distorted-looking Batman coming out from a mirror or transforming into a human buzz-saw. Hamilton’s stories, instead, were filled with plots about human conflicts.

Below are 13 of those tales.  (SPOILER ALERT for decades-old comics!)

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World’s Finest Comics #141 (May 1964). The first story during this period was “The Olsen-Robin Team Versus ‘The Superman-Batman Team!’” featuring a hoax by Robin and Jimmy Olsen to let Superman and Batman think they had been captured and killed by an unknown criminal. While this seemed cruel at first by Jimmy and Robin, the second chapter in the issue revealed they were doing it because they discovered invisible criminals planned to kidnap them in order to make Superman and Batman hold off interfering with their future crimes and the young men did not want their hero partners to be hindered in such a way.

Curt Swan pencils, George Klein inks

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World’s Finest Comics #142 (June 1964). At the beginning of “The Composite Superman,” Batman and Robin discover a sign in their cave from someone who says he knows all their secrets. Superman finds a similar sign in his Fortress of Solitude. Ordered to meet on a deserted mountaintop, the three heroes are confronted by a flying man wearing a half-Superman/half-Batman costume and displaying powers of the Legion of Super-Heroes. He demands they make him a part of their team or he will reveal their identities to the world. Due to the threat, they agree. The Composite Superman secretly arranges an emergency and humiliates the trio in the public eye by handling it practically single-handedly.

Swan pencils; Sheldon Moldoff and George Klein inks.

In a flashback, we learn the Composite Superman was once Joe Meach, a man who always wanted fame but was a failure at everything. Rescuing Meach from a foolhardy stunt, Superman gets him a caretaking job at the Superman Museum, which Meach accepts but resents as he sees the public loves Superman and Batman. One night, he is cleaning up in front of a collection of statuettes of the Legion of Super-Heroes, created by Brainiac 5 by duplicating each particle of their bodies in smaller size. What no one knew was the duplicator also replicated their powers. Suddenly, a bolt of lightning crashes through the window and electrifies the miniatures, releasing part of their power into Meach. In the second half of the tale, Superman and Batman battle him when they discover the Composite Superman intends to rule Earth and other worlds. However, he defeats them easily. Victorious, he suddenly feels weak and realizes he needs a recharge from the statuettes… but before he can do so, his powers vanish and he forgets everything. He continues as a janitor, without Superman and Batman knowing he was their antagonist.

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World’s Finest Comics #143 (Aug. 1964). In the first story page of “The Feud Between Batman and Superman!”, Batman got hit by a bullet that bounced off Superman when they were stopping a crime. In the hospital, Bruce tells Clark he and Robin are resigning from the Batman-Superman team because not having super powers makes them a burden to him. Later, Dick tells Clark that Bruce has lost his morale and believes Superman doesn’t need him. Superman comes up with a plan to convince Batman that he is his equal in everything by taking him to the one place where Superman would have no powers… the bottle city of Kandor. In an effort to boost the effort, Superman makes plans with a friend there to create a fake menace — but the menace turns real. Unfortunately, Batman overhears that it was a plan to fake him out and he strikes Superman. When Superman is later captured, Jimmy is able to convince Batman the menace is factual and the Caped Crusader saves Superman’s life. Batman is cured of his inferiority complex and the team is restored.

Swan pencils, Klein inks

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World’s Finest Comics #144 (Sept. 1964). In “The 1,000 Tricks of Clayface and Brainiac!”, Brainiac returns to Earth and begins creating havoc by destroying the walls of a prison near Gotham City, allowing many criminals to escape, including Matt Hagen, who rushes to his hideout at a clay quarry to restore his body-altering powers as Clayface. Landing atop the Daily Planet in Metropolis, Brainiac fires a deadly Green Kryptonite ray at Superman, but Jimmy Olsen leaps into its path. The ray impregnates particles of Kryptonite within Jimmy’s skin and being near to him weakens Superman, so a decision is made by Batman to switch partners, Robin to Superman, and Jimmy to Batman, until the Kryptonite wears off.

Swan pencils, Klein inks.

While both young men look forward to the change, they discover how challenging their new positions are when they commit goofs the original partners would not have done. Later, after capturing the villains, Superman offers the lads the chance to change partners again next time, but both are quick to say no, relieved to be going back to their originals.

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World’s Finest Comics #145 (Nov. 1964). In “Prison for Heroes!”, Batman is fooled by aliens into traveling to a prison planet where, through super-hypnosis, his personality is bent and he becomes the cruel warden over a group of superheroes of different worlds. The aliens’ plan is to have the heroes put out of the way so they can conquer their individual planets. Batman tricks Superman into coming to the prison planet and activates a red-sun filter, weakening him to the point of almost having no powers left. Batman then takes supreme pleasure in torturing Superman in many ways.

Swan pencils, Klein inks

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World’s Finest Comics #146 (Dec. 1964). In “Batman, Son of Krypton!”, it’s Superman’s turn toward vicious punishment when he overhears that a close friend of Bruce’s father was responsible for Krypton blowing up. This comes halfway into solving a mystery in which Batman suddenly has memories of Krypton that could only have come from having lived there. Bruce finds photos of himself flying and breaking a bar of iron that are noted “Bruce-El” on them and he wonders if he is related to Superman (Kal-El) and lost his powers due to Gold Kryptonite when he was very young. His father’s friend sets him straight, that his memories of Krypton were from viewing a monitor-telescope showing activities on Krypton and that the photos of Bruce flying and breaking iron were faked.

Swan pencils, Klein inks.

However, he also confesses that he invented a ray that halts atomic reactions but when aimed at Krypton it stimulated the reaction instead and destroyed Krypton. Superman breaks in at that moment and wants the man to suffer, so he has him watch a time-space viewer that picks up images and sound from the past just as Krypton is about to explode. However, when they watch, it shows Jor-El and Lara detecting the ray from Earth that was meant to help… but the reaction inside Krypton was too strong and the ray has no effect at all. Still, they are thankful for whoever it was and hope their son will meet the man someday who tried to help them.

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World’s Finest Comics #147 (Feb. 1965). “The New Terrific Team” (aka “The Doomed Boy Heroes!”) consisting of Robin and Jimmy Olsen gets its start when they are unpacking trophies of Superman-Batman cases in their secret retreat, the Eyrie, an abandoned observatory. However, one of the souvenirs Jimmy unpacks was brought by mistake, a pair of jewels that Superman got on a distant planet. They put them on and suddenly their personalities change, crediting themselves for saving the heroes many times. They decide to form their own team and do all they can to raise money from their efforts to build a rocket.

Swan pencils, Klein inks

Superman deduces that the two jewels that the young men are wearing are actually living things with super-telepathic powers that have taken over their minds and are using them to get back to their native planet. As the rocket is about to leave Earth for the planet of living jewels, Superman grabs it, then forces Robin and Jimmy into a machine that fills them with electricity. The alien minds are forced back into the jewels and Superman removes them, flying the living jewels back to their home planet while Jimmy and Robin feel like they are awakening from a bad dream in which they deserted the heroes.

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World’s Finest Comics #148 (Mar. 1965). One of Hamilton’s very best World’s Finest stories was “Superman and Batman – Outlaws!”, with the heroes accidentally transported to a parallel Earth. The Superman and Batman of that Earth are the world’s greatest criminals and Luthor and Clayface are the heroes… and our Superman and Batman are mistaken for their lookalikes. In addition to the role reversals, Pa and Ma Kent are swindlers and Thomas Wayne is a cat burglar and they each trained their sons from childhood to become crooks.

Swan pencils, Klein inks

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World’s Finest Comics #149 (May 1965). Taking a break from menaces and betrayals, Edmond Hamilton’s story “The Game of Secret Identities” has Superman worrying that his secret identity isn’t safe. He goes to Batman and Robin with a request for them to see if they can discover who he really is after they agree to have themselves undergo a “selective amnesia-inducer” that can remove that knowledge from their brains. (This was pre-Identity Crisis.) Solve it they do, but then Superman becomes competitive and thinks he can outwit the World’s Greatest Detective. He neglects his obligations to the world by erasing his own memories and doing all he can to learn Batman and Robin’s identities. He does so… but he is unaware he was aided by Bruce and Dick so he can get back to his vital missions.

Swan pencils, Klein inks

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World’s Finest Comics #150 (June 1965). “Duel of the Super Gamblers” (aka “The Super-Gamble of Doom”) had a visit by Rokk and Sorban, two aliens from a gamblers’ planet. (They first appeared in Superman #171, August 1964.) Because Superman outwitted their plot back then to have him kill someone, they returned and arranged for Batman to be taken as prisoner to their planet where every native inhabitant is taught all the ways to defeat anyone who gambles against them. This time, they try to use those psychological skills against Superman, even in his dreams, to have him be the reason if Batman loses his life. In the end, they wager the complete existence of the planet Earth, which they can destroy with their mental powers, against Superman winning.

Swan pencils, Klein inks

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World’s Finest Comics #153 (Nov. 1965). Hamilton really knew how to tell a dramatic story, especially an “Imaginary Story” like “The Saga of Superman vs. Batman!” In this issue, young Bruce Wayne discovers his father, Dr. Thomas Wayne, dead over his lab table in Gotham City and the possible cure for Kryptonite poisoning he created gone, with a figure dressed like Superboy flying out a window with the vial in one hand. Bruce vows to become the World’s Greatest Detective in order to prove Superboy killed his father, taking up the Batman identity to this end. Batman goes so far as to reveal he is Bruce Wayne to Lex Luthor so they can team up to capture Superman. In the end, Batman discovers he was wrong about Superman and gives his own life to protect him when Luthor, the real murderer, fires a death ray at the Man of Steel. It was a shocking and powerful tale.

The notorious story page of Batman slapping Robin. Swan pencils, Klein inks.

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World’s Finest Comics #157 (May 1966). “The Abominable Brats!” was a change-of-pace story – and an Imaginary one, at that – which took place in the near future with Kal Jr. and Bruce Jr., the sons of the great heroes, suddenly turning rebellious towards their Dads, whom they always worshipped previously. Superman and Batman are perplexed by their behavior, especially when the kids show up each time after a prank and protest they never did it. Toward the end of the tale, there turn out to be two sets of young Bruces and Kals. The “brats” are revealed to be Mr. Mxyzptlk’s son and Bat-Mite Jr.

Swan pencils, Klein inks

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World’s Finest Comics #158 (June 1966). “The Invulnerable Super-Enemy” had Hamilton creating two things in the Superman mythos that were never heard of again: 1. Another Kryptonian city in a bottle, Jerat, occupied completely by criminals, and 2. “Brainiac A,” a forerunner to Brainiac in which the computer masters forgot to install “a liking for evil.” The story starts with Jimmy and Robin exploring the countryside near Gotham City and discovering a hidden cave containing three bottled cities that they believe are the property of Brainiac.

Swan pencils, Klein inks

They take the bottles to the Batcave while Superman and Batman are away and use a copy of a shrinking ray there to go inside one of the bottles. Superman and Batman return and discover the young men have been there and the shrinking ray was aimed toward the bottles. They visit each of the three bottles and find Jimmy and Robin have been taken prisoner in the last one. Like Jerat, the other two bottled cities from different planets are inhabited solely by felons, and Brainiac A admits he shrunk those cities down so the criminals would not be set loose on the universe. The heroes agree for him to take the bottles and hide them anew.

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MORE

— 13 SUPER STORIES: An EDMOND HAMILTON Birthday Celebration. Click here.

— 13 SUPER STORIES: A JERRY SIEGEL Birthday Celebration. Click here.

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13th Dimension contributor-at-large PETER BOSCH’s first book, American TV Comic Books: 1940s-1980s – From the Small Screen to the Printed Page, was published by TwoMorrows. He is currently at work on a sequel, about movie comics. Peter has written articles and conducted celebrity interviews for various magazines and newspapers. He lives in Hollywood.