Dazzler #19

Dazzler #19 (1982)
by Danny Fingeroth & Frank Springer
cover by John Romita Jr.

Last time Dazzler managed to make the Absorbing Man even more powerful. If she teams up with Black Bolt how much worse can she possibly screw this up?

Absorbing Man has transformed into a giant made of solid light, which is supposedly more impressive that the time he absorbed the powers of freaking Odin back in the Silver Age.

AMAZINGLY, Dazzler makes what is possibly the first smart thing she’s ever done in her entire series and calls some real superheroes to deal with this!!!

What normally happens in this kind of story is that the Avengers are never home when you need them.
What actually happens is far more hilarious, because the Avengers butler Jarvis:
A) thinks this is a crank call
B) mistakes Dazzler’s voice for a man (which is kind of embarrassing for a singer)

True to the cliché, the Fantastic Four are not home. It’s one of the cornerstones of the Marvel Universe: whenever a hero needs them, they are N-E-V-E-R home.

Meanwhile, the Angel is still working on the case of Dazzler’s mother and… wait, he calls himself “WW III”? It’s technically correct since his civilian name is Warren Worthington III, sure, but no wonder he’s never been a popular character. Who wants to cheer for WW3 ?

Dazzler is all kinds of dumb in this series, and her father is a real nutjob, but her grandmother is apparently the only smart person in the family!

It’s probably unintentional given the time of publishing, but from a modern perspective this looks like a perfect parallel between admitting you’re a mutant and coming out of the closet.
Frankly, it’s handled better than the vast majority the X-Men stories that have tried something like that.

Aaaaand Angel has no clue whatsoever about how to find Dazzler’s mother, so this whole thing has been completely pointless.

Back to Dazzler, you might expect her to at least TRY to call the X-Men, since they have a history together from her first appearance. But nope, she goes straight to breaking and entering the Fantastic Four headquarters!!!

Even if I believed Dazzler would be able to get through the door like that… and that’s a bif if… I seriously don’t buy that she doesn’t trigger ANY sort of alarm.

Reed, you really should start placing some locks or passwords here and there. It’s just out of luck that Dazzler doesn’t open a portal to the Negative Zone here.

 By sheer coincidence she calls the Inhumans, and Medusa picks up the phone (or rather the microphone) to explain who they are.
This is before she married Black Bolt, so she just refers to him as her cousin.

Good thing they’re not from Krypton.

Apparently the Fantastic Four often talk about Dazzler to their friends.

Sounds legit.

Black Bolt comes to Earth thanks to his teleporting dog (don’t ask), and Dazzler gives him a quick update.

I’ve always appreciated the fact that we never get thought balloons from Black Bolt, since it would nullify the idea that we can’t hear him talk.
If we only knew what he was thinking.

Since Black Bolt can’t talk and Dazzler provides her own commentary, this is kind of hilarious.
Dazzler, it’s the nineteenth issue and you’re STILL getting upstaged in your own book, HOW ARE YOU SO BAD AT THIS!?

Black Bolt is ridiculously powerful, but he might be a terrible match for Absorbing Man.

Dazzler’s solution is to hit the Absorbing Man with MORE light. You know, doing exactly the same thing that made him more powerful?

This is picked up by the media, to the point that her boyfriend Red Moustache finds out by watching TV… but spoiler alert, Dazzler will STILL get out of this without being exposed as having superpowers. SOMEHOW.
Also, I’m 99% sure the general public should be aware of the Inhumans at this point, but Black Bolt is just “some guy” here.

Seriously, HOW is Dazzler not publicly known to be super after this!?!?

Black Bolt has a plan, though.

If only we knew what it was.

Just kidding, of course his plan is to give her enough sonic power to turn into so much light that Absorbing Man will be overwhelmed.

This is all kind of stupidly dangerous, because Black Bolt’s voice can level mountains and they’re doing this in a populated area…

This is so much power that Dazzler can levitate now. (WTF!?!?)

This works (SOMEHOW), but Dazzler’s completely unexplained flying powers don’t last.

This was done entirely in order to give Angel a chance to save Dazzler. Was this REALLY the only way to do it!? Couldn’t Dazzler just, and I’m spitballing here, be on top of a building when dealing with the giant Absorbing Man?

The love triangle nobody wanted: the blonde, the wings and the moustache.

Closing down the issue, Dazzler’s father is going into the spotlight in the following issues.
His mental breakdown is so over the top that you might assume he’s under mind control or something, but nope, it’s just one of the worst written mental breakdowns ever.

Sorry, I’m sure Dazzler’s story about her missing mother is interesting and all, but… she was just all over the news taking down a giant with a laser blast, WHY IS NOBODY ASKING HER ABOUT THAT!?!?

Instead we focus on her barely-seen backup singer friend getting singing lessons…

…and discovering a shocking secret about her.

Yep. After saving the city from a gigantic threat SHE created, Dazzler’s next adventure is going to be centered on… her friend’s teacher’s secret.

But at least we’ll have some absurdly mismatched villain for her, right? Who’s next, Magneto? The Mandarin?

Yeah that sounds about right.

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Dazzler significance: 4/10
Believe it or not, but the teacher’s secret will be one of the most important things to happen in this series.

 Silver Age-ness: 6/10
I can totally see the non-logic of Black Bolt’s plan working in the Silver Age, plus the absolute randomness of Dazzler suddenly being able to levitate.

Does it stand the test of time? 3/10
It’s not all bad. I liked Black Bolt being utterly nonplussed about the whole deal, Dazzler’s grandmother and… yeah that’s about it.