Adventure Comics #61 (1941)
by Gardner Fox & Jack Burnley
Another highly influential member of the Justice Society makes his debut: it’s Starman, possibly the DC hero of the Golden Age with the most extensive legacy.
Please note that I’m reading from a reprint, not from a scan of the original.
Not to mention the Gravity Rod™, which is such an important part of the character that it’s highlighted in the teaser page.
We sure start with a bang, with a lot of disasters breaking all kinds of technology.
This calls for the smartest man in Gotham City…
…Ted Knight. Who might live in Gotham City, but acts like Clark Kent.
When a blackout hits, he’s more interested in his vibrating rod than in his date.
That would be the Gravity Rod™, which apparently utilizes “infra-rays from distant stars” and magnets to control gravity.
Scientific nonsense aside, that’s a cool technology. Although I’m not quite sure that this is the most secure way to fly… if he’s no longer affected by gravity, wouldn’t he fly into space?
All those disasters were caused by the Secret Brotherhood Of The Electron… yes, seriously.
Despite being “secret”, Starman easily finds the base of the villains and melts their steel door.
Because as you’ve probably already guessed, the Gravity Rod™ can basically do anything science-themed.
If you call this thing Gravity Rod™ and specifically tell us that it can control gravity… wouldn’t it make more sense to use gravity for this trick instead of magnetism!?!?
If you thought “Secret Brotherhood Of The Electron” was a stupid name, just wait until you hear the name of its boss… Dr. Doog.
Yes.
Doog.
Once Starman rescues the kidnapped scientist, he meets Dr. Doog himself.
Of course the leader of the Secret Brotherhood Of The Electron has hypnotic powers. That’s just obvious given the name.
It’s the battle between the Ultra-Dynamo(patent pending)’s super-electricity and the Gravity Rod™’s literal star power.
Dr. Doog is not exactly impressive.
Is there anything the Gravity Rod™ can’t do?
Yes. Get you a date.
Poor Ted Knight will be home alone with his vibrating rod tonight.
(low hanging fruit, I know. Couldn’t resist.)
Historical significance: 9/10
Starman has a shockingly large impact on the DC Universe.
Silver Age-ness: 10/10
The Cosmic Rod rivals some of the actual Silver Age super-science.
Does it stand the test of time? 4/10
Extremely simple, but with the typical Golden Age efficiency and solid artwork. It’s not particularly different from a million other heroes of the era, so why did Starman endure?
There are basically three types of Golden Age heroes:
A) 40% are regular humans who are really good at punching people
B) 10% have a specific superpower
C) 40% can do anything the story needs them to do
I would put Starman in the third category. And my personal theory for why he endured is that he’s one of the very few heroes of his era in that category who focuses on science instead of magic.
How close is this to the modern character? What modern character?
As you saw Starman debuts on the cover, where he replaced Hourman. He will also replace Hourman in the same year as a member of the Justice League, with All Star Comics #8, simultaneously with Dr. Mid-Nite.
He would be a member of the Justice Society until 1944’s All Star Comics #23.
He would stay on Adventure Comics until 1946’s #102, after which the characters from More Fun Comics (including Superboy and Aquaman) moved to the Adventure Comics series. Which, incidentally, is why the Legion starts on Adventure Comics: it was Superboy’s title.
As you’re probably tired of hearing me repeat this, the Justice Society then shows up in 1963 on the pages of Flash… but Starman is not in that story OR in the first team-up between the Justice Society and the Justice League. He’s in the second though, Justice League #29 from 1964.
We’ve actually seen that one, since it’s the first appearance of the Crime Syndicate.
And here’s where things get complicated. There are SEVEN superheroes with the name Starman, some of which are successors to the original and some of which have nothing to do with him… plus his legacy is mixed up with OTHER legacy characters.
So, to give a MASSIVE simplification…
In 1977, on the pages of All-Star Comics #44, Star-Sprangled Kid… a hero who will show up later in the retrospective… inherits the Cosmic Rod™ (which is how the Gravity Rod is called now) and uses that one to create the Cosmic Converter Belt™ that gives him powers.
This will be important later.
This is completely unrelated to another Starman that shows up in 1976: this one is a blue-skinned alien named Mikaal Tomas.
Honestly he’s such a minor player that I probably won’t include him in the retrospective.
Yet another Starman without any connection to the Golden Age character debuts in 1980.
Despite being created by Paul Levitz and Steve Ditko, he doesn’t really have a huge impact.
I know absolutely nothing about this guy other than that he’s an alien prince and that he seems to have stolen the Quantum Bands of Marvel’s Quasar.
1988 sees the creation of a THIRD completely unrelated Starman: this one is from Earth, is created by Roger Stern and Tom Lyle, and has a respectable 45 issue run that lasts until 1992.
I’ve never read this one but everything I’ve heard about the concepts behind it sound very cool (he’s basically turned into a sentient star): is it actually any good?
But we finally bring it back to the original in 1994, which is not a good year with the Justice Society thanks to the Zero Hour event.
Starman is not among the heroes who die there, but he’s so old that he leaves the business to his son David.
And then David is IMMEDIATELY killed in Starman #0 the same year!
His brother Jack inherits the mantle in the critically acclaimed Starman series by James Robinson.
It’s by far the best known Starman series, lasting 85 issues from 1994 to 2010.
Jack wields the Cosmic Staff™, a much more powerful and MUCH better designed evolution of the Cosmic Rod™. Another creation of the original Golden Age Starman.
Speaking of the original, he has a hero’s death in issue #72 from 2000.
Needless to say, but Robinson’s series is HIGHLY recommended.
The Robinson series weaved a very complex relationship between all the characters named Starman, plus there’s also the Starman of the 863rd century that shows up in the “DC 1,000,000” event.
And this is when things get complicated.
Yes.
NOW.
Because the 2007 Justice Society book by Geoff Johns also has a Starman…
Who is actually a time-displaced, amnesiac and randomly insane Star Boy.
Yes, the Star Boy from the Legion of Super-Heroes.
I know Johns has his fans, but I utterly despise this.
Because it’s the beginning of an absolute mess of a lingering subplot that will eventually destroy two version of the Legion that I really liked (the reboot and the so-called threeboot), only to introduce yet another version of the Legion… the so-called retroboot… that I liked so little that I completely dropped reading the Legion regularly and I haven’t returned to it yet.
But while we will talk AT LENGTH about that when the time comes, we’re not done with the Starman legacy yet.
Because remember how I said the Cosmic Conveyor Belt™ and Star-Sprangled Kid would be important later?
That’s because the heir to both the Starman and the Star-Sprangled Kid legacy is the same person: Courtney Whitmore, the stepdaughter of the original Star-Sprangled Kid’s sidekick.
She has inherited both the Cosmic Staff and the Cosmic Conveyor Belt.
Debuting in 1999 and also created by Geoff Johns.
I actually really like her as a character. She’s had tons of adventures with the Justice Society, her own series, and proved popular enough to get her own TV series.
(haven’t seen a single episode of it so no idea if it’s good)
And mind you, this is a SIMPLIFIED summary of the Starman legacy. I didn’t even get to talk about he was retconned into being linked to the origin of Phantom Lady, his cousin.
Impressive considering Phantom Lady didn’t even start at DC Comics but at Quality, as we’ll see with her origin.
What else was in Adventure Comics #61?
The adventure serial Mark Lansing, followed by a detective story following FBI agent Steve Carson. He doesn’t get the title but he’s a Jerry Siegel character that pre-dates Superman, since he started in 1936.
Not to be confused with the adventurer Steve Conrad, another 1936 character (this one created by Creig Flessel).
So yeah, there are two stories with a protagonist named Steve C., back-to-back.
I never pay attention to those things, but the lettering is VERY distracting.
The story also, uhm, hasn’t aged very well.
Then a comic strip featuring a kid with the scariest eyes I’ve ever seen.
Then a Hourman story. At this point he had his own sidekicks: the “Minute-Men Of America”.
They are exactly as uninteresting as they sound.
There’s the original Manhunter. Don’t let the name fool you, this is not the same Manhunter who will be a superhero: that character, confusingly also named Paul Kirk, is from 1942.
And no, he’s not fighting Marvel’s Kingpin.
Another adventure serial, this time Cotton Carver. And yes, that is his name.
And finally Sandman, starring in “The Menace Of The Metal Gun”.
Aren’t all guns metal?
Well no, it’s a gun that melts metal. So he’s facing the Golden Age Melter.
Sandman’s stories tend to be relatively grounded, but in this one he covers his car in sand to protect it from the Metal Gun.
To give you an idea of the popularity of superheroes, Superman already has his radio show at this point.
The 1988 Starman series was very good, Will Payton is an everyman and has a family; unlike some heroes who keep their secret identity from absolutely everyone, his sister is his confidante from the very beginning, and eventually, his mother is brought into the loop as well. It’s a great dynamic. He’s based in Phoenix, which translates to action being set in various locations across the southwestern United States, which are not often seen in comics. The art is top-notch. I highly recommend it.
James Robinson hooked me on Starman immediately, and I sought out the comics in which the prior Starmen appeared as well. An eclectic bunch of characters, to say the least. I also didn’t care for the idea of the retroboot (I enjoyed the Beirbaum-Giffen run and do not like that Johns decided to pretend it never happened. I suspect it came from the same attitude that compelled him to return Hal Jordan and the full GL Corps with Guardians to essentially the pre-Crisis status quo, and resurrecting Barry Allen.) but I thought the stories ultimately held up well. I don’t hate the idea that someone with schizophrenia might be able to function normally with 30th-century medicine but is stuck with the condition when forced to do without it.
Correction, though: Courtney Whitmore is the stepdaughter of Stripesy, not the Star-Spangled Kid.
D’oh! I knew she was Stripesy’s stepdaughter, don’t know how I missed it in the review. Fixed.
Will Payton, the 1988 Starman, was a likeable character, but he may have debuted at the wrong time. He lost editorial favor real quick.
Prince Gavyn, the 1980 Starman, was well written for what it was. Which was a high fantasy series with some superficial sci-fi trappings. There were some interesting character dynamics and some decent plot twists. But ultimately the original run was very short indeed and I don’t think it could have had a lot more mileage without significant changes. Which he got; as you probably know, James Robinson used both him and Will Payton some during his Starman series. But by far the writer who most used Gavyn was neither Paul Levitz nor James Robinson, but Jim Starlin. But he changed his personality and status quo quite a lot.
Starlin wrote him in just one issue, the character’s final story before he “died” in the Crisis. But as it was a team-up with Superman, it was no doubt the most widely-read story of Gavyn’s existence.
That was DC Comics Presents #36.
Yes, that happened. But Starlin used Prince Gavyn extensively post-Crisis as well, in “Rann-Thanagar War” and in its sequel “Holy War”, and finally in volume 2 of “Strange Adventures”.
Entertaining series, those.
Dr. Doog is SOOO evil, his name is literally good reversed. This is where Silver Age got all its bad habits lol.
The blue Starman from the 70s is not that minor of a character… Yes he didn’t make an appearance after his debut until the Jack Knight Starman series but after that he’s made plenty of appearances and he was even a member of the Justice League. In fact his most recent appearance was starring in a story in yesterday’s (yes, yesterday) DC Pride 2024 #1. So don’t discount him so easily… Great article though, I’m a big fan of all the Starmen. I just finished reading the Will Payton Starman series a couple of weeks ago.
Dr. Doog did make a memorable reappearance in a 3 page sequence in All Star Squadron Annual #3 illustrated by George Perez and Jerry Ordway. Roy Thomas includes the ridiculous outfit, the Ultra-Dynamo and Starman apologizes for not doing a good enough job of searching for Doog’s body the previous time.
An interesting Starman footnote is that he’s the one major JSA character who never had a “legacy” referenced in Infinity, Inc.. Aside from the proteges and children (Atom, Green Lantern, Wonder Woman, Hawkman/Hawkgirl) and the clearly-labeled successors (Hourman, Dr. Midnight, Wildcat) Roy Thomas even included the detective “Jonni Thunder a.k.a. Thunderbolt” in a few issues and used the Sandman name by turning Hector Hall into the successor of the 70’s Kirby Sandman.
You would have expected that after the JSA were consigned to limbo, Star-Spangled Kid would have been renamed Starman, but he became Skyman instead. Not sure if this was because the Will Payton series was already in the works, or if Thomas for some reason wanted some separation.