World’s Finest #181

World’s Finest #181 (1968)
by Cary Bates & Ross Andru
cover by Irv Novick

Never judge a book by its cover, otherwise you’d think this is just a story about Superman and Batman avoiding a weird villain. But it’s far, FAR more bonkers than that.

We begin with Clark Kent celebrating being named “Reporter of the year”.So much for the last issue showing him being only given lame assignment.

Then he’s alerted about some Superman business by an alarm on his glasses!
Which… well on one hand it’s a neat way to give the glasses a role, but… since the entire point of Jimmy’s signal-watch that Superman can hear it anywhere, why does he need the glasses if he could hear the alarm all the way from the Fortress of Solitude?

You just have to love these nearly omniscient Silver Age computers. Just try to think about this from a modern perspective, what kind of data would it possibly need to A) know the existence of a being more powerful than Superman B) know his motives with near absolute certainty C) know his time of arrival with near absolute certainty?

But come on, this is Superman we’re talking about! The Man of Steel, the Man of Tomorrow, the greatest superhero ever… surely he has a plan to deal with any threat, right?
Like GETTING THE HELL OUT OF EARTH.

The world’s greatest hero, ladies and gentlemen!

Well at least we’re past the point of the heroes informing each other by blinking lights. At this rate they might discover phones exist by 1995.

You might think that was a copout, but… no, Superman seriously just left the planet because the computer told him someone more powerful than him was going to show up.

Meanwhile, Robin discovers someone has stolen the Batmobile.

Except it IS actually Batman in disguise. So you can already tell this story is about to get seriously convoluted.

And that’s before he hops into a freaking time machine!!!

And finally, the last piece of this absurd puzzle… THIS is the invincible guy that Superman is deathly afraid of.

I don’t know about this guy, but his dog is freaking great: he’s able to find Superman with absurd ease. And Superman, why are you surprised this guy has an alien dog that can track a scent across interstellar distances?
YOU ALSO HAVE A DOG WHO CAN DO THAT!!!

Ah yes, another famous Superman characteristic, the fact that he always obeys the laws of physics.

The entire point of Batman using the time machine was just because he wanted to hide from this hunter, so… yeah at this point I’m rooting for the dog. You guys are just terrible at being heroes!

As if THAT wasn’t enough, we now move to the hunter’s home city of Azib on planet Orr.

So much for the villain being invincible, uh?

Well I’m glad SOMEONE is being entertained by this story.

No matter where you go in the universe, it seems it’s impossible to avoid museums dedicated to Superman and Batman.

Batman takes care of the robot, while Superman defends himself from some fire. Turns out he hasn’t lost ALL his powers, just flight.

Now we move to the second phase of the story, which attempts to give SOME explanations.
This is planet Orr, the hunter is named Kralc, and he introduces the heroes to the beautiful Yllas.
Who is SO beautiful that Superman finds her attractive despite the lack of alliterating initials (admittedly she does have LL in the middle of her name).

Kralc and Yllas consider Superman and Batman the founders of their race, despite the fact the two heroes have never heard of this place and that not everyone on Orr is convinced.

These two never miss a chance to show off.

It’s time again for our old game of “Guess the stupid ending”!
What is the secret of planet Orr?

A) It was founded by robot duplicates of Superman and Batman
B) It was founded by Bizarro duplicates of Superman and Batman
C) It was founded by time-traveling Superman and Batman with amnesia
D) It will be founded by Superman and Batman’s descendants
E) It was created by Mr. Mxyzptlk and Bat-Mite

And the answer is… mostly B) with a touch of D).

Yep. “Orr” is actually the future of Bizarro World!!!

Now you might be wondering: how the heck do you miss Bizarro World, the only cube-shaped planet in the universe? Well…

Supposedly there were hints about this plot twist, but they’re extremely lame.

To be fair, the fact that the hunter was called Kralc was the only obvious hint. Then again, it might be because I’m so used to this trick that whenever there’s a character with weird name the first thing I do is always see if it’s the backwards form of something familiar.
The fact that the city of Azib was mentioned specifically, instead of only the planet Orr, was a slightly more clever trick to spell out “Bizarro” backwards.

I do wonder where does “Sally” come from… why not use a more familiar female name backwards?
I mean if they used Lois backwards she could’ve been named Siol, or they could’ve spelled Lana backwards and call her… you know I just figured out why they used Sally.

So naturally Superman and Batman fight for the affection of Yllas.

Well, actually they were fighting for the honor of NOT going out with Yllas.

If you’ve read any comic in your life, you’ve probably figured out that they’re acting like Bizarros in an attempt to be kicked out of the planet.

And so we end with Orr being brought back into the future, and Bizarro world being returned to the present. I didn’t even notice the planet itself traveled through time, but it’s not like that detail makes the story have any sense.

---

Historical significance: 10/0
You better believe this version of Bizarro-world never shows up again.

Silver Age-ness: 10/10¹⁰
Time-traveling human descendants of Bizarro hunt down Superman and Batman, who proceed to hide like cowards. ‘Nuff said.

Does it stand the test of time? 10/0
You would expect a story involving Bizarro to be at least a bit conscious of its ridiculousness, but the drama is played completely straight.

Did Robin actually do anything?

Did Superman really need Batman?

---

Interesting letters: who writes to a Superman book lamenting impossible things?