SHOWCASE 40 (1962)
by Robert Kanigher & Ross Andru
This is the last time the Metal Men show up on Showcase: the next story will be the start of their regular series.
The cover does a good job of showing how insane things are going to be.
Also: “The day the Metal Men melted” could be any day that ends with a “y”.
Strangely for the Silver Age, we don’t actually start at the beginning but in the middle of things: Doc Magnus has been transformed into a giant radioactive statue!
And for some reason he’s called “Doc Evans” this time.
But wait, there’s more! Doc is still alive (!!!) and has ordered the Metal Men not to do anything (!!!) because if they touch him they’re going to die (!!!).
Now THAT is a way to start a story!!!
Neither the Metal Men or the fact that she’s going to become radioactive is going to stop Tina from obsessing over Doc Magnus.
Doc Magnus is going to be shot into space (!!!), but that’s okay for the robotic stalker.
Doc’s transformation is tied to the battle with Chemo from last issue, so we’re given a recap.
This time we see that the death of the Metal Men was a lot more gruesome than we thought.
Also it turns out that Doc Magnus took Tina to the beach while the Metal Men were being repaired.
Although I’m not ruling out the possibility that she’s imagining all this.
But after that fun, Doc Magnus went back to the caves where Chemo was destroyed… only to be present when AN UNDERGROUND LIGHTNING BOLT revives him!
Yes.
A lightning bolt.
UNDERGROUND.
Your regularly scheduled reminder that CHEMO IS AWESOME.
Doc Magnus manages to escape (HOW!?!?) but it comes at a cost!
I’m going to have to reference the meme a lot during future issues, isn’t it?
Wait, it’s actually worse: he’s “hyper-radioactive”.
The now giant radioactive Doc Magnus has to warn the military with a tiny telephone.
But wait! It gets crazier: Doc Magnus changes into metal!
We’re now reached the present, where Doc Magnus is going to be shot into space with Tina.
In a rocket with a giant chair, because I guess the military had one ready!?
How can you not love Tina? She’s being exiled into space with a giant radioactive living statue and THIS is her reaction!!!
We then check with the Metal Men. Their creator and a member of the team are lost forever, and what do they do? Argue about who’s going to be the leader.
And they elect… Tin.
TIN.
Guys… Tin sucks! Even Tin says so!!!
Unfortunately Tin doesn’t react very well to peer pressure.
Is anyone, literally ANYONE reading this who isn’t rooting for Chemo at this point!?
I’m beginning to understand why the Metal Men die in almost every issue.
Speaking of which: Mercury is dead.
The “““plan””” involves ordering Gold to separate himself into several sheets to be thrown at Chemo…
…so that he can kill Gold…
…and while Chemo is blinded by Gold’s corpse, Iron can use Lead as a shield to contain him.
Don’t think too hard on how Chemo can see in the first place.
It’s the Silver Age.
SOMEHOW Lead and the team’s UFO are able to survive Chemo’s acid attacks long enough to drop him on the same rocket that is about to shoot Doc Magnus into space.
“You’ll never survive into space”… he’s a giant statue of living radioactive metal, HOW THE F#CK DO YOU KNOW THAT!?
Don’t question how big Chemo is. There’s no consistency whatsoever because, again, Silver Age.
“We’re going to die horribly TOGETHER! Yaaay!” must’ve been cut from Tina’s dialogue.
THAT’S NOT HOW ANYTHING WORKS!!!
“Robots don’t kiss each other”? Well, either Tina is being a robophobe or there goes my headcanon about Lead and Iron being gay lovers.
This the first time where not all the Metal Men die at the same time: Tina has one less death!
And after all that happened, we end with… what else? Doc Magnus being a heartless monster.
He’s not kidding, mind you! He IS giving her away to a museum in the next story.
Metal Men significance: 0/10
I guess you can consider the introduction of Chemo being basically indestructible, but come on.
Silver Age-ness: 12/10
An underground lightning bolt revives a monster made of mixed up chemicals who transforms a scientist into a giant radioactive living statue.
Does it stand the test of time? 0/10
The Metal Men will lean hard on their camp nature later on, but at this point we’re still supposed to take them seriously. And I guess we’re also supposed to side with Magnus.
Good luck with any of those!
“Mercury is the only liquid metal at room temperature”: 4
I can’t believe it but despite boasting about being different from the other metals, Mercury doesn’t actually say what makes him different so it’s the same number of last issue.
Times Platinum has died: 4
Times Gold has died: 5
Times Iron has died: 5
Times Lead has died: 5
Times Mercury has died: 5
Times Tin has died: 5
It’s an interesting exercise to look at comicbook writers and see just how much or how little they trust their artists to convey the story. The great ones will know when to shut up and let the art talk unimpeded. Will Eisner comes to mind, although he was also his own artist. The bad ones will over-narrate. Chris Claremont, though blessed with some of the best artists in the business, could never resist taking the reader by the nose and narrating every little detail ad nauseam. This thought struck me when Magnus narrated his run-in with Chemo; the pictures tell the story, but Magnus narrates with his speech balloons (including “I’m being hit with a chemical spray” instead of “AAAAAHHH IT BURRNS” like a normal person would.) DC was using full-script writing rather than the “Marvel Style”, so the only conclusion I can draw is Kanigher had zero trust in his artists. (That, or he got paid by the word.)
Excellent point! It might have been the house style at DC, since it happens constantly there. Marvel wasn’t immune, of course, but it’s not anywhere near as prevalent as DC (probably due to the “marvel method”).
When it comes to the Metal Men, however, I wouldn’t trust the reader to have enough brain cells after witnessing the sheer insanity on the pages, so a bit of over-narration might be useful 🙂