#048. Zorro

Zorro (originally called Señor Zorro) is a fictional character created in 1919 by pulp writer Johnston McCulley. He has been featured in several books, films, television series and other media. Zorro has appeared in many different comic book series over the decades.

Read more about Zorro: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zorro

Here are some Zorro comics published by various publications:

Zorro 08 Dell 1960 (12.12 MB)

Zorro 09 Dell 1960 (12.29 MB)

Zorro 10 Dell 1960 (12.14 MB)

Zorro 11 Dell 1960 (12.21 MB)

Zorro 12 Dell 1960 (12.58 MB)

Zorro 01 Gold Key (Dell Four Color 0882 reprint) (8.81 MB)

Zorro 02 Gold Key 1966 (Dell Four Color 0960 reprint) (8.58 MB)

Zorro 03 Gold Key 1966 (Dell Zorro 008 reprint) (8.98 MB)

Zorro 04 Gold Key 1966 (Dell Zorro 009 reprint) (14.7 MB)

Zorro 05 Gold Key 1967 (Dell Four Color 1003 reprint) (8.51 MB)

Zorro 06 Gold Key 1967 (Dell Zorro 011 reprint) (8.42 MB)

Zorro 07 Gold Key 1967 (Dell Zorro 012 reprint) (8.45 MB)

Zorro 08 Gold Key 1967 (Dell Four Color 0993 reprint) (7.99 MB)

Zorro 09 Gold Key 1968 (7.21 MB)

Zorro In Old California Eclipse 1986 (26.6 MB)

Dracula versus Zorro #1 of 2 Topps Comics 1993 (16.88 MB)

Dracula versus Zorro #2 of 2 Topps Comics 1993 (16.91 MB)

Zorro v1 #01 - Preview Edition Topps Comics Oct 1993 (5.63 MB)

Zorro v1 #00 - Special Collector's Edition Topps Comics Nov 1993 (6.78 MB)

Zorro v1 #01 Topps Comics 1994 (12.56 MB)

Zorro v1 #02 Topps Comics 1994 (12.33 MB)

Zorro v1 #03 Topps Comics 1994 (13.78 MB)

Zorro v1 #04 Topps Comics 1994 (13.25 MB)

Zorro v1 #05 Topps Comics 1994 (11.41 MB)

Zorro v1 #06 Topps Comics 1994 (11.71 MB)

Zorro v1 #07 Topps Comics 1994 (16.23 MB)

Zorro v1 #08 Topps Comics 1994 (16.4 MB)

Zorro v1 #09 Topps Comics 1994 (24.21 MB)

Zorro v1 #10 Topps Comics 1994 (21.62 MB)

Zorro v1 #11 Topps Comics 1994 (23.22 MB)

The Mask of zorro #1 & 2 Image 1998 (based on film) (51.8 MB)

Zorro - The Dailies 01 Image 2001(89.98 MB)

Hand of Zorro 01 AC Comics 2002 (8.32 MB)

Zorro 01 Papercutz 2005 (12.82 MB)

Zorro 02 Papercutz 2005 (11.11 MB)

Zorro 03 Papercutz 2005 (14.15 MB)

Zorro 04 Papercutz 2005 (10.48 MB)

Zorro 01 All Covers Dynamite 2008 (23.03 MB)

Zorro 02 Dynamite 2008 (13.07 MB)

Zorro 03 Dynamite 2008 (12.85 MB)

Zorro 04 Dynamite 2008 (10.76 MB)

Zorro 05 Dynamite 2008 (10.88 MB)

Zorro #37 Indrajal Comics 1967 (5.11 MB)

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It Could Only Happen In the DC Silver Age

Luthor: We'll get these Superman dolls--

Brainiac: Action figures you mean, not dolls. Only girls play with dolls.

Saturn Queen: Watch it, computer geek.

Luthor: And we'll have these two salad bowls, you see, one labeled Doom and one labeled Freedom. And we'll vote by putting our dolls--err, action figures--into one of the salad bowls.

Brainiac: But logically we only need the Doom bowl.

Luthor: Yeah, but where's the drama in that? C'mon, it'll be fun. You'll see!

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One of the Hazards of Abstraction

In the Pulitzer-Prize-winning book from the late 1970s, Godel, Escher, Bach, the writer Douglas R. Hofstadter illustrated a problem of abstraction that we all have encountered in our own thinking and speech. At times we start out arguing a point, get off onto an abstraction, then elaborate on that abstraction, getting off onto another abstraction, and eventually wind up that second digression and pop back up to the earlier abstraction, wind it up and quit, forgetting that we have missed bringing the whole thing back up to the top level.

Hofstadter presented a story about Achilles and the Tortoise (who appeared often in the book). They were out for a day when they were kidnapped by a villain in a helicopter, who took them back to his hideout. While there, they read a book that the villain owned that had an adventure of Achilles and the Tortoise. And in that book, they watch a TV show about an adventure of Achilles and the tortoise. Eventually that TV story winds up and we're popped back to the book, where the story eventually is resolved. The end.

The problem, of course, is that we have not popped back to the top level yet, the story where Achilles and the Tortoise have been kidnapped, so that tale is unresolved.

Enter the Supergirl story from Action #329-331. Supergirl is tricked by an alien villainess named Fantasta, who is attempting to join the "Circle of Evil" by kidnapping her and bringing her back to their planet. Eventually she discovers Fantasta's weakness. Realizing she has failed, Fantasta chooses suicide. Supergirl decides to dress up as Fantasta to discover the secret of the "Circle of Evil"

Having apparently succeeded in her mission to destroy Supergirl, Fantasta (really Kara) is given one last assignment before joining the "Circle of Evil" She must defeat Drang the Destroyer, who has beaten several other candidates for the Circle of Evil.

Complicating matters is the fact that Supergirl has lost her powers apparently in this "cosmos", so she is unable to do anything as her space ship rockets towards the Purple Planet and Drang the Destroyer.

In Action #330, things change a bit. When Supergirl arrives at the Purple Planet, she discovers a bunch of heroes that she has previously encountered (presumably in an untold story). None of the former candidates for the Circle of Evil are there, however. We learn that Drang the Destroyer has another name: Dr Supernatural. Were DC's lawyers concerned that Drang was too close to Kang, and the Destroyer was a character appearing in Thor?

She meets Drang/Dr Supernatural, and he boasts of how easily he will defeat her. But he also shows some weakness. It turns out that he needs regular doses of evil energy, the kind emitted when villains (or heroes) do something evil. Supergirl and the heroes she discovered in the cages attempt to foil him by doing good deeds, but he has anticipated this:



So she decides to do something evil, but it turns out to be a double reverse fakeout:



Supergirl tries to trick Dr Supernatural into surrendering by pretending to have magical powers, but he realizes that she's just taking advantage of the abilities of the other superheroes he imprisoned. Faced with the fact that he has defeated them, the other heroes relate the tales of the worst crimes ever committed on their respective planets. Dr S summons the villains responsible for those crimes and assigns them to come up with even more dastardly plots. When those are executed, Dr Supernatural grows and grows in power. But he is unable to control it, and:



This is a very common theme in the Silver Age; faced with a powerful villain, the hero increases that power until the villain is unable to control it.

The other heroes return to their own worlds and Supergirl to Earth. The End.

Except... what happened to the Circle of Evil? Remember, the whole launching pad for this story was this group of villains who had kidnapped Supergirl. Indeed, initially Supergirl decided to pretend to be Fantasta so she could infiltrate the group:



And yet they are mentioned not at all in the windup in Action #331. That doesn't make a whole lot of sense; we know that Dr Supernatural was responsible for her losing her powers on the way to meet the Circle of Evil, so it's not as if she couldn't have mopped them up in a few panels.

The story is entertaining and of course features that wonderful Jim Mooney art. But it doesn't quite get completed.

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Single Issue Review: Action #331

This is one of those issues that I had not read until recently.



As you can see, this is one of DC's classic puzzle covers. Why would Clark Kent masquerade as Superman? Why would he do a "Superman dive"? Of course, we know that he won't be hurt, but surely this will give away his secret identity.

In the story, Lois has colluded with a pressman at the Daily Planet to print up an edition of the newspaper with the startling news that Clark Kent is actually Superman. It's all a gag on Clark, but of course when she springs the paper on him, he has a couple of adrenaline-fueled seconds:



But unfortunately for Lois, the head pressman has taken ill and his replacement runs the "Clark Kent is Superman" story, which causes shock waves around the world. Perry is furious when he finds out it was simply a gag, and is determined to fire Lois and the pressman. But Clark has an idea that may save the Planet's reputation. He could pretend to be Superman for awhile and then the Planet could announce it was a gag all along. Perry shows that he's more of a businessman than an editor:



The plot gets even more ridiculous, as Perry pretends to be an assassin out to kill Lois Lane. The bullets from his gun bounce off Clark (he supposedly was wearing a bulletproof vest, so this did not surprise Lois or Perry). But somehow Perry is not apprehended despite the fact that this assassination attempt takes place in the midst of a huge parade to honor Clark for his deeds as Superman.

In a clever plot twist, a crime boss is listening in on the Planet staff as they plan the next stunt to convince the public that Clark is Superman. He impersonates Perry and when Clark appears at a penthouse to demonstrate how he can make diamonds out of coal (secretly the diamonds are hidden inside soft coal), the crime boss suggests that Clark dive over the edge of the roof, to a waiting safety net. This gives us the cover image. Superman takes over and convinces everybody that he had impersonated Clark for awhile. But when Supes leaves and Clark returns, one of the crime boss' henchman shows up and shoots Clark. Lois sobs over his dead body as Perry subdues the gunman. But Clark was wearing the bulletproof vest and so (it appears to Lois and Perry) he survived.

Overall it's an amusing story. The idea of continuing the hoax on the public rather than fessing up is unlikely at best, but it's necessary to the plot, and it is rather amusing seeing Clark trying to pretend to be Superman but at the same time trying not to be Superman.

The Letters Page provides something pretty odd, a letter from Pakistan:



Even odder, the same letter (with some different details) had appeared in Action #330:



The Supergirl story in this issue is the conclusion to a longer tale that ran from Action #329-331. It's a good enough story and illustrates an interesting enough point that I would like to dedicate a separate post to discussing it, coming up next.

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