shaxper
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Post by shaxper on Aug 4, 2016 23:33:20 GMT -5
Actually, the British Invasion of beat groups in the early-to-mid '60s brought a lot of English slang like fab, gear, smashing, grotty and luv a duck into the everyday vocabulary of young American teens. For the record, if you were to ever receive a Christmas card from me it would almost certainly read: "Have a cool yule and a gear new year!" But then, every day is 1968 for me.   (and, for what it's worth, I get most of those phrases. "Luv a duck" was new to me, though. It's more their constant usage throughout the story that occasionally makes me have to stop and actively translate) Oh, I do understand all of that (though I appreciate the thoughtful explanation!). It's more that: 1. The salutes look a little too fascist 2. The dude smiling behind them breaks up the gravity of the situation 3. There is a current president that they are not saluting. That's just weird to me. "We'll do it!...for the dead president randomly pictured here in the Treasury Department (but not for the new guy)" Yes, JFK captured the idealism of youth whereas LBJ represented the suspect establishment. Perhaps this panel is just a little too blunt about that? |
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Confessor
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Post by Confessor on Aug 5, 2016 8:02:27 GMT -5
Oh, I do understand all of that (though I appreciate the thoughtful explanation!). It's more that: 1. The salutes look a little too fascist 2. The dude smiling behind them breaks up the gravity of the situation 3. There is a current president that they are not saluting. That's just weird to me. "We'll do it!...for the dead president randomly pictured here in the Treasury Department (but not for the new guy)" Yes, JFK captured the idealism of youth whereas LBJ represented the suspect establishment. Perhaps this panel is just a little too blunt about that? OK, fair enough. Personally, I don't see that particular panel in that way at all; I see the Titans saluting their fallen leader, which also serves to represent the American way of life as well as JFK himself. They're saluting his picture in the same way that I used to salute the Union Jack while singing "God Save the Queen" at Scouts -- nothing overtly fascist about it. As for the dude in the background, I see him smiling approvingly, happy and proud of the Titans and their allegiance to their country and president (albeit their martyred president from a few years earlier, but then, Kennedy's death did leave a pretty big scar on the American psyche for many years after his assassination). I agree that the panel is pretty blunt or heavy handed though. That's what I meant when I said that it was maybe a bit over-the-top or comic booky. Edit: Looking again at the Titan's dialogue here, they're definitely saluting Kennedy because of the example they feel he had set for them. Like I said, JFK had become semi-cannonised in the years after his assassination. |
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Post by Prince Hal on Aug 5, 2016 9:04:02 GMT -5
This was a popular bit of decor in many an American Catholic household.  |
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Post by MDG on Aug 5, 2016 9:59:18 GMT -5
This was a popular bit of decor in many an American Catholic household. I never saw this one, but, yeah, it was common in Italian-American homes and restaurants at the time to see portraits of Kennedy and the Pope (and Sinatra). |
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Post by Farrar on Aug 5, 2016 11:33:41 GMT -5
...this volume throws more slang at us than it ever has before (there were times I honestly didn't understand what was being said):  Well, I'm a bit of an armchair expert on 1960s social history, so allow me to translate: Ginchy is a '60s American slang term meaning groovy or very cool (I have a feeling it came from the West Coast surf or hot rodding culture of the early '60s, but don't quote me on that). "Luv a duck!" is fairly obviously an exclamation and is actually cocky rhyming slang for f**k. Gear is a '60s slang term for something that's very good and is, I believe, of Liverpudlian origin -- it was popularised internationally by The Beatles and other Mersey Beat groups. Actually, the British Invasion of beat groups in the early-to-mid '60s brought a lot of English slang like fab, gear, smashing, grotty and luv a duck into the everyday vocabulary of young American teens... Right--also, there was the satirical teens/genaration gap movie Lord Love a Duck (an underrated gem IMO), which had been released in the US in early 1966. So that phrase wasn't exactly unknown. |
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Confessor
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Post by Confessor on Aug 5, 2016 11:41:07 GMT -5
Well, I'm a bit of an armchair expert on 1960s social history, so allow me to translate: Ginchy is a '60s American slang term meaning groovy or very cool (I have a feeling it came from the West Coast surf or hot rodding culture of the early '60s, but don't quote me on that). "Luv a duck!" is fairly obviously an exclamation and is actually cocky rhyming slang for f**k. Gear is a '60s slang term for something that's very good and is, I believe, of Liverpudlian origin -- it was popularised internationally by The Beatles and other Mersey Beat groups. Actually, the British Invasion of beat groups in the early-to-mid '60s brought a lot of English slang like fab, gear, smashing, grotty and luv a duck into the everyday vocabulary of young American teens... Right--also, there was the satirical teens/genaration gap movie Lord Love a Duck (an underrated gem IMO), which had been released in the US in early 1966. So that phrase wasn't exactly unknown. Never heard of that, Farrar. Interesting...I'll have to look up some info on that. |
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Post by Farrar on Aug 5, 2016 12:32:51 GMT -5
Right--also, there was the satirical teens/genaration gap movie Lord Love a Duck (an underrated gem IMO), which had been released in the US in early 1966. So that phrase wasn't exactly unknown. Never heard of that, Farrar. Interesting...I'll have to look up some info on that. Yeah, it's a very interesting film (imdb link) with Tuesday Weld (I am a major Tuesday fan and have seen most of her films), Roddy McDowall, Ruth Gordon, Harvery Korman, others. Not a big hit, more of a cult film. And evidently the movie was based on a 1961 (American) novel of the same name, so the phrase must've been around for a while, or at least somewhat known in the US. |
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Confessor
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Post by Confessor on Aug 5, 2016 12:48:57 GMT -5
Never heard of that, Farrar. Interesting...I'll have to look up some info on that. Yeah, it's a very interesting film (imdb link) with Tuesday Weld (I am a major Tuesday fan and have seen most of her films), Roddy McDowall, Ruth Gordon, Harvery Korman, others. Not a big hit, more of a cult film. And evidently the movie was based on a 1961 (American) novel of the same name, so the phrase must've been around for a while, or at least somewhat known in the US. That's obviously prior to the British Invasion, which didn't get started until February 1964 when The Beatles came over, so maybe it was a phrase that American servicemen had picked up from Londoners during the Second World War? |
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Post by Farrar on Aug 5, 2016 13:01:29 GMT -5
Yeah, it's a very interesting film (imdb link) with Tuesday Weld (I am a major Tuesday fan and have seen most of her films), Roddy McDowall, Ruth Gordon, Harvery Korman, others. Not a big hit, more of a cult film. And evidently the movie was based on a 1961 (American) novel of the same name, so the phrase must've been around for a while, or at least somewhat known in the US. That's obviously prior to the British Invasion, which didn't get started until February 1964 when The Beatles came over, so maybe it was a phrase that American servicemen had picked up from Londoners during the Second World War? Yes, that makes sense, Confessor...and per wikipedia looks like the guy who wrote the novel Lord Love a Duck, Al Hine, was a journalist and had been a war correspondent during World War II . There were probably also other ways the British terms/slang made it to the US, including the "Angry Young Men" British movies shown here (in the US) in the late 50s/early 60s, such as Room At the Top, Saturday Night and Sunday Morning (huge Finney fan here), and others. |
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Post by dupersuper on Aug 5, 2016 22:28:03 GMT -5
I never saw this one, but, yeah, it was common in Italian-American homes and restaurants at the time to see portraits of Kennedy and the Pope (and Sinatra). The holy trinity... |
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Post by Deleted on Aug 6, 2016 8:24:15 GMT -5
At my (Catholic) school, we were taught to revere Kennedy; we were constantly being told what a great man he was. Much was made of his supposedly always carrying a rosary. Nobody ever mentioned Marilyn Monroe, for some reason. Different times. We were still allowed (hell, expected) to have idols back then.
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shaxper
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Post by shaxper on Aug 8, 2016 13:13:58 GMT -5
Teen Titans #8 (April 1966)  "A Killer Called Honey Bun" Script: Bob Haney Pencils: Irv Novick Inks: Jack Abel Colors: ? Letters: Stan Starkman grade: B Nick Cardy may be absent again this issue, but he at least turns in what is arguably the only good cover of the early Teen Titans issues (pre #14). The action, the perspective, and the irony of the robot's name are all first rate. In fact, the story inside really doesn't make enough use of either the robot or its ironic name -- I wonder if the idea was editorially imposed. Irv Novick does a nice job as a stand-in, though. I've only known him by his later work on Batman a decade from now, and I strongly disliked it there, but here he not only keeps the action impressive:  He's also doing a lot of the same things Cardy's been experimenting with in these pages, most evidently his unorthodox panel arrangements:  Was that something being tried by a number of artists around this time, or is he explicitly trying to match Cardy's style? Either way, that Wonder Girl leap is all Novick, and it's fantastic. Beyond that, we're back to the familiar structure of a Teen Titans story as of this issue, with a specific government-sponsored program being endorsed to kids (study abroad/foreign exchange) and a dude in a suit being the one to summon them and tell them what to do. What's different, however, is that there's no overt attempt to preach patriotism or to warn kids of being too counter-culture this time around. Instead, there's a much more real moral at the heart of all this about tolerance of immigrants that truly impressed me:  It's truly sad that the panel below is just as much a reality today.  In the '60s, we feared foreign spies. Now we fear foreign terrorists. Both yield the same devastating results, and this issue does not shy away from that fact, even if it does make all the suspicion fall on the white-skinned, blue-eyed European immigrant in order to play it safe (we barely see the other two throughout the story). And it really is fun watching the Titans kick the racist mob's a$$es:   Not a particularly remarkable story, but Novick was a solid stand-in for Cardy, and the message about tolerance was both bold and impressive. Worth Noting:- Once again, the issue begins with the Titans reading letters from fans. Presumably, these are letters actually written by readers of the comic (it was suggested in the very first letter column that this would be done). - For those of you who enjoy the relics of 1960's culture referenced within these pages, enjoy:  Department of Aquatic Desperation:In the first battle, Wonder Girl intentionally drops the bad guys into a pond so that Aqualad can punch them. Nothing desperate about that except...why does Aqualad need to be in a pond just to punch them?? In the second battle, there is no under-water sequence. Haney Desperation Level: low Department of Being Worried About Wonder Girl:How many hours per day does she spend admiring herself in the mirror?  She's literally in the same pose every time we cut to the Titans' Lair. Minor Details:- You can take down an enormous robot by loading sand into a pellet gun and aiming it at the robot's knee joint? Pretty sure the '50s and '60s Sci-Fi industry would have dried up fast if this solution had made any sense at all. Plot synopsis in one sentence: The Titans are called in to protect three foreign exchange students who are being threatened by an outspoken group of townspeople. Just then, the big robot the local defense contractor has been working on is stolen, and the German(?) kid is immediately suspected because he'd been snooping around it a few days earlier. The Titans first put a stop to the tonwspeople attacking him and then trail him to discover that he has, indeed, stolen the robot. In a typical Teen Titans' twist, though, the teen was unfairly judged. He stole it to get away from a spy from his country that was trying to steal the robot for their military. The Titans face off with the robot, and Robin takes it down by shooting sand into its knee joints. |
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shaxper
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Post by shaxper on Aug 8, 2016 18:42:32 GMT -5
Teen Titans #9 (June 1967)  "The Big Beach Rumble" Script: Bob Haney Pencils: Irv Novick Inks: Nick Cardy Colors: ? Letters: Stan Starkman grade: D+ Wherever the edict that's driven the bulk of the run up to this point came from (the Titans are squeaky clean and avoid the hip lingo, every issue endorses a government program or agency and preaches obedience to authority), it appears to be history as of this issue. Last issue, we saw less emphasis on obedience and on the agency being endorsed, but this issue is a totally wild departure from that mold. We've got the Titans freely using the lingo for the first time since Showcase #59:  (and note the reference to The Mad Mod, from Teen Titans #7) we get no suggestion that the Titans and the teens they encounter owe allegiance to anyone, even the adult who sent for them this time is dressed in a less formal suit color and actually tries to meet the teens at their level:  (Robin respecting his good intentions but certainly not showing an abundance of respect towards his age or position) and, for once, the teens the Titans encounter aren't merely misunderstood; they are actually doing bad things without being manipulated by an adult (though they do not prove to be the arch villains of this issue). In fact, while Haney is getting back to the idea of the Titans being a voice for teens, this issue makes it more evident than ever that he doesn't actually understand teens. ...because, of course, college teens on Spring Break want nothing more than to riot and fight:  Kinda' makes you wonder if "Boom Boom" uses that name on his college term papers. But, better yet, all it takes is Robin and Kid Flash bullying "Boom Boom," and suddenly they're able to sell the teens on the idea that the most fun to be had is in doing...(that's right!)...SERVICE PROJECTS:  Ridiculous as this is, Cardy's inks manage to make the page pop even when nothing either interesting or remotely plausible is occurring on the page. And, with the Titans having successfully turned an army of college deviants into upstanding citizens via intimidation, all that's left to do is to battle the pirate who conveniently decided to loot this beach community at the exact same time that all this was going down. Because, again, plausible. Cardy's pencils are sorely missed here (and it looks like it will remain this way for a few more issues to come), but Novick is an adequate sub, and Cardy's inks are still strong. Really though, this moment aside:  this issue lacked any visually interesting action. A unique decision seems to be made to depict the climax less like a dynamic battle and more like...well...a party:  I guess this continues Robin's message that being upstanding and like The Titans is every bit as fun as being a part-time delinquent. Department of Aquatic Desperation:No, I have to be fair: This was an awesome use of Aqualad. He sneaks up on the pirate's submarine, uses eels to distract the crew, and then flings a grenade in the torpedo launcher. Haney is no longer trying to find Aqualad two water scenes per issue, and that seems to be freeing him up to provide more convincing and well executed rationalizations for Aqualad's usefulness. Haney desperation level: none Department of Being Worried About Wonder Girl:- Good news for this department as well. As much as Wonder Girl is still far too obsessed with boys (especially older college boys):  there's some evidence in this issue that she's all talk. After all, she states her plans for the party that evening:  but, when we cut to that scene, she's not dancing with a college boy at all:  Perhaps Kid Flash wasn't completely joking in that earlier verbal exchange. Maybe something is developing between the two of them. - Still, gotta say the feminist in me was a little uncomfortable with WG cooking for all the cute boys as a means of impressing them:  Department of "Holy Product Placement, Batman!": What a weird concept that the Batman TV show also exists in the DC Universe. Of course, Haney does enjoy being cute in having the Titans read real fan mail in the book, pretending Titans Lair is real place (that even he doesn't know the location of) and such, and I guess it helps to explain why the TV show doesn't always line up with the comics. Worth Noting:For sticklers like myself, Haney finally explains how the Titans get their mail, what with Titans' Lair's location being a secret:  Just another way in which the clearly overpowered Wonder Girl virtually carries this team. Plot synopsis: The Titans are invited to a beach community in order to stop two groups of college students from clashing during Spring Break. Robin is able to convince them to put their energy towards fighting beach erosion instead. Soon after, a pirate and his submarine crew show up to loot the town, and the Titans struggle to stop them, but the teens jump into the fray at the last moment and are able to save the day.Ridiculous, ridiculous story on so very many levels. Cardy's inks looked good. |
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Confessor
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Post by Confessor on Aug 8, 2016 22:03:55 GMT -5
Of course, Haney does enjoy being cute in having the Titans read real fan mail in the book, pretending Titans Lair is real place (that even he doesn't know the location of) and such An idea he pinched from the Fantastic Four perhaps? Just another way in which the clearly overpowered Wonder Girl virtually carries this team. Again, not unlike the Invisible Woman in the Fantastic Four. |
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Post by wildfire2099 on Aug 8, 2016 22:35:05 GMT -5
RE: Teen Titans #8
I don't remember that one at all! I do love it when Haney runs out of hip slang, though and has the character say stuff that only their grandparents would say.. like Robin referring to the others as 'Characters' instead of somethings a little less formal... like he couldn't stomach 'guys' or 'dudes', or decided that such terms couldn't possibly include a girl.
Re: Teen Titans #9
I remember this one, and thinking Haney must have just watched Westside Story or some other 50s movie with Greasers and a Rumble and got his decades mixed up. The TV show placement cracked me up.. since there's really no reason for any kid to think it's a real show if they don't already know it.
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