METAL MEN 21 (1966)
by Robert Kanigher & Ross Andru
This is probably the ugliest Metal Men cover. Also, while the title refers to the adversaries as the Plastic Perils, their name within the story is the lamer Plastic Gang.
We begin with the Metal Men looking at Doc making out with whatshername. Or it could be a new woman, all his love interests are incredibly generic.
This story doesn’t waste time getting bonkers, since we immediately transition to the Metal Men reading their own fan mail… and their fans are just thrashing the series!
I’m inclined to believe those are actual complains from actual fans, since we have a panel specifically calling out Irene Vartanoff… who was an INCREDIBLY prolific letter writer (not to mention one of the authors of Lois Lane #120).
Since the fans are angry about the Metal Men only fighting robots, they decide to move to a different city to look for new villains… all while Doc is STILL making out.
What is it with Kanigher and motorcycle gangs!? This is like the fifth of his comics I review where the bikers are bad guys!!!
Up to this point, the Metal Men have been notably disconnected from the rest of the DC Universe.
But this issue establishes that they do, in fact, share the same universe of the other heroes… at least I think, because since when does the Flash break the fourth wall!?
They also look for crime in Gotham City, but Batman (who is also appearing in his own 60s TV series as per last issue) is on top of things, so they’re not needed.
There’s something disturbing about seeing Batman’s eyes.
Then they take a detour to Washington DC, where they hope to rescue Wonder Woman… because apparently she’s powerless while drinking soda!?
Take a wild guess on how useful the Metal Men are in this situation.
And so the Metal Men return to their base, depressed at the thought that they’re doomed to only fight other robots.
That is equally hilarious and depressing.
We then move to the actual “plot” of the issue: the fight with Professor Bravo, who has brought his stolen money and his plastic creations to the Metal Men base.
And so we begin the fight nobody was asking for: Metal vs Plastic!
Are you really surprised that Plastic wins?
I’m beginning to wonder if Kanigher actually hates the Metal Men. Not only he’s just admitted they have limited use as heroes, not only they just lost yet another fight… the mad scientist they’re fighting isn’t even a real scientist!!!
And Doc is STILL busy making out!!! At this point it’s no longer about Tina having emotions, it’s about Doc Magnus being a jackass!!!
Then absolutely out of freaking nowhere Tina falls for Gold… for ONE PANEL!!!
God forbid Gold actually does anything interesting, ever.
Although, to be fair, the comic does acknowledge that the Metal Men shouldn’t always rely on Doc.
We then spend a lot of time showing off that plastic is better than metal, or something like that.
Styrene is toxic, by the way, so it might explain why we never see Dr. Bravo after this issue.
Stop trying to make the whole “give a name to Nameless” a thing! NOBODY CARES!
I always suspected meth was somehow involved with the Metal Men.
They’re eventually defeated by exploiting plastic’s weakness to high temperatures.
Also we can all agree that Tina just straight up murdered this dude, right?
It was only a matter of time until Tina murdered whatshername.
And now, ladies and gentlemen, I bring you: the dumbest moment in Metal Men history.
Yes.
Dumber than Dr.Yes.
The Metal Men are SO UNBELIEVABLY STUPID they can’t distinguish between cardboard and humans.
Metal Men significance: 5/10
Up to this point we could pretend the Metal Men were not in the DC Universe.
Silver Age-ness: 101000/10
Does it stand the test of time? 0/10
Number of elements: 28
Adding the five members of the Plastic Gang.
Issues when not a single Metal Man dies: 7
Interesting letters: even in 1966 they had to know this was not correct, right? Right?
This is one of the rare pages where Kanigher answers, instead of pretending it’s the Metal Men, giving us this insight:
