Doom Patrol #113 (1967)
by Arnold Drake & Bruno Premiani
cover by Bob Brown
The cover asks who dares to challenge The Arsenal. Not too many people, considering this is his only appearance.
We begin in the middle of an action scene, with the Doom Patrol assaulting The Arsenal’s headquarters.
This is happening “in the city suburbs”, without specifying what city. Why do I keep running into stories that feature medieval castles that SOMEHOW are in the United States?
The Arsenal is this guy inside a huge armor, with a machine gun and a knife instead of hands.
He’s a pretty tough opponent, and manages to escape before the Doom Patrol can do much.
Meanwhile Mento is losing a game of chess to Beast Boy, and showing the grace we have come to expect from him.
Why is he even wearing his helmet? I bet it’s to cheat by reading Beast Boy’s mind.
Beast Boy continues to have the weirdest possible taste in food.
I don’t have a problem praising Mento (but DON’T GET USED TO IT) for wanting to help Beast Boy… but the fact that he doesn’t tell the “specialist” that he’s Beast Boy makes me wonder: what is even the point of keeping a secret identity now?
The reason for it was to prevent his former legal guardian from exploiting him, but it’s no longer applicable. I could understand if the goal was giving Beast Boy a normal life… but people know his adoptive parents are superheroes, so why keep the secret?
The reason why I (reluctantly!) praised Mento was that in previous issues Beast Boy expressed the wish of looking normal.
But I have to retract my praise because he STILL manages to sound awful.
Not that Chief is particularly better, since he’s keeping busy staring at Madame Rouge sleeping.
To be fair he’s also trying to make her return to her original personality, but couldn’t he have found a less creepy way?
Oh, right, this was supposed to be about The Arsenal.
I find it hilarious that he has a gun for a hand but he’s always shooting stuff from his mouth.
Even Chief is more interested in Madame Rouge’s subplot than in the main one.
The team returns to the castle, where they cleverly get past one of the traps…
…only to immediately fall for another.
The trap for Negative Man is very straightforward but not very effective.
The one for Elasti-Girl would have been horrifically gruesome if it wasn’t for her specific powers.
This is one of the panels that could make you mistake her for having elastic powers, while she’s actually just stretching specific parts of her body.
Robotman doesn’t have a specific trap; instead, all three heroes are gathered into a single house of mirrors where they’re supposed to hit each other.
This is a rare occasion in the series where the storytelling breaks apart, because the artwork really doesn’t sell what is supposed to be happening.
It’s also kind of dumb: what if the other heroes followed different paths, or if they were delayed?
Especially since the real deal is right beneath the mirrors.
And ultimately The Arsenal is revealed to be… just some guy.
Missed opportunity for not making him Giacomo The Midget from Doom Patrol #87.
And we finish the story with The Brain and Monsieur Mallah reversing Chief’s treatment.
How come a brain-in-a-jar and a gorilla are the LEAST creepy people looking at her sleep?
The backup feature with Beast Boy will be reviewed separately.
Historical significance: 1/10
Chief begins messing with Madame Rouge’s mind. That will become important later, but it’s not the focus here.
Silver Age-ness: 4/10
There’s randomly a medieval castle in the suburbs of an American city… quite possibly New York City. And you can switch personalities with science rays.
Does it stand the test of time? 3/10
This was a snoozefest. Arsenal is an incredibly boring villain; the scene where he robs the bank is the only one where he’s even remotely threatening.
He has a gun for a hand and HE NEVER SHOOTS WITH IT FOR THE ENTIRE STORY, plus we don’t even learn who he is or how he has the resources for an entire castle.
Times Robotman has been damaged: 20
Issues when Robotman is never damaged: 19
Interesting letters: finding letters from soldiers is always both heartwarming and sad.
This one particularly, with the emphasis of soldiers not needing help to win the Vietnam war.
Just because the writer seems to have forgotten that Elasti-Girl’s powers are supposed to kill her, doesn’t mean all readers forgot!
Arsenal himself is of little relevance, but his armor and his motivations will be revisited by Marv Wolfman in 1982’s “Tales of the New Teen Titans #2”
It fits remarkably well with what is actually shown in this story published fifteen years earlier.
Eh. Somehow fifteen years felt like a lot when I was forty years younger.
Forgive the nitpick: it was #3, not #2. I remember that series well. Raven’s story was issue # 2, Gar’s was issue # 3. (In case anyone was wondering, # 1 was Cyborg, # 4 was Starfire.)
R.I.P. to Marty Schultz of the U.S. Marine Corps, who passed away in July 2024: https://www.carpenterjenks.com/obituaries/Martin-J-Marty-Schultz?obId=32321719
If it’s the same guy, I wonder if he kept up with the other Doom Patrol incarnations once he got back to the States.