Brainwave Explains it All! - All-Star Comics #59

Brainwave Blows Up! 

All-Star Comics #59

Cover Date: April 1976

Released: 16th December 1976

⋅ Writers: Gerry Conway ⋅ 

⋅ Pencilers: Ric Estrada ⋅ 

⋅ Inker: Wally Wood ⋅ 

⋅ Editors: Paul Levitz ⋅

Continued from All-Star Comics #58.

October 9th is the publication date for the original publication date for All-Star #58, hence the birthday for Power Girl. So what better time (more or less) to look back at the original comics. Obviously is not an excuse to improve on my terrible early post, really don't look, no really!

When I started this I really didn't know anything about these comics and it's amazing how different looking at this comic with all the many comics between now and them.

We start with Brainwave, looks remarkable like how his son will later look (without the googly eyes alas) taking down the Justice Society. Or so it seems as they begin to fade away as Brainwave celebrates his victory whilst talking to a disheveled old man, who wearing a trenchcoat and hat it could be almost anyone!

Three of the Justice Society, Power Girl, Wildcat, and Flash (Jay Garrick) arrive at the JSA headquarters. We have a quick kerfuffle about Power Girl not yet being a member and hence can't enter the building before she is let in and slamming the door on Wildcat over him calling her Broad. Even Jay thinks about how out of character Ted is being when dealing with Pee Gee, normally being a pretty chill guy.

Adult Robin, Dick Grayson, is trying to fill a hole producing noxious gas, by using a handy dandy truck of explosives. Obviously in this alternative South Africa (Earth-2 remember) has these kind of things just lying around in case they're needed! He then figures out that the gas is actually an illusion before being attacked by goons (or henchmen). Luckily for him because he disbelieved the illusion Dr Fate and Green lantern (Alan Scott) are now awake and can help him defeat the baddies.

Meanwhile in the air above Seattle, Hawkman is also attacked by henchgoons, causing him to drop Doctor Mid-nite, luckily Star-Spangled Kid through some convoluted means of flying down then up the whole, manages to catch Mid-nite by colliding with him! Luckily they recover and Star-spagled Kid gets to use his slightly fallic rod to take down the remaining goons. Dr Mid-nite interrogates on of the goons and find out what we already know, that they're working for Brainwave.

Meanwhile Brainwave reveals that he recovered the old man from Skid-Row and taken him to his satellite to recover the mans memory, and it seems looks as he uses a high-tech chair to restore the guy to his true form of Degaton! And slightly chunkier Degaton as I'm (now) used to, but Brainwave obviously has a thing about people out doing him in the height department!

This is all in good time as the JSA burst into the place, starting with Wildcat, Flash and Pee Gee, but quickly joined by the others, as a massive fight breaks out. Pee Gee gets a pretty good show here, making a few attacks on the villainous pair, though she also get thrown around a fair bit as well. Until Brainwave raises the stakes by using his mental powers to activate a Gravitic Displacement Beam to destroy the Earth!

The JSA can't stop his brain waves so Pee Gee flys outside and using her might Krytonian strength to push the space station out of the way stopping it effecting the planet. It also makes a point that Pee Gee isn't as powerful as the Earth-1 Supergirl, probably to do with Pee Gee only being active for a few years compared to how low Supergirl has been active (roughly twenty years real time).

Brainwave returns to his normal form and it conjectured that he'd recovered Degaton to building him a big boy body. We then end with a classic Freeze Frame moment of Pee Gee pointing out all of the thing she did to save the day to Wildcat, with the other of the JSA laughing in the background. 

It's amazing how much more I got out of this comic this time around, know that I know all about these characters. And as I mentioned all so long, long ago reading these older Bronze Age comics is a different experience to reading more modern comics. NOw that I do I can enjoy these old comics to there fullest!