Detective Comics #224 (October 1955)



"The Batman Machine"

Script: Bill Finger(?)
Pencils: Dick Sprang
Inks: Charles Paris
Colors: ?
Letters: ?

Grade: C+

The GCD credits this one to Bill Finger, but I don't see it. Edmund Hamilton is the writer who tends to center his stories on one outrageous idea that makes for a great title page tease and then has a 50/50 chance of paying off as a decent story. "The Bat Train" (from my last review) is a perfect example, and "The Batman Machine" is no different, really.



It does get me thinking, though, that DC really should publish a coffee table edition collecting all the title pages of these Atom-Age stories. With stories like "The Bat Train" and "The Batman Machine," the idea showcased on the title page is really all you need; the story is more like an obligatory after-thought, at least when Hamilton is writing. But those title pages burst with wild imagination. Being able to flip through them, one after another, would be priceless. Sure, you can just look at the covers (which are often similar, if not almost the same), but the Batman title is often putting the least visually interesting of its three stories on the cover each issue. I want to be able to see them ALL.


I don't usually waste much time on plot summaries, but that might be the best way to discuss this one. Batman and Robin are testing new, faster engines on the Bat Plane and, while doing so, somehow manage to observe and intercept a crime committed on foot(??). While doing so, a criminal rips Batman's sleeve and notices metal underneath, automatically assuming this means he's a robot.



Yeah, no.

So Batman ultimately decides that the best way to beat them is by building an actual Batman robot



...which somehow only takes them a couple of hours. I salute the efforts here to make the technology seem believable, but who were they kidding?


Anyway, Batman's big plan is for Robin to then walk around in plain sight, controlling the robot, so that someone will attack him and steal the robot.



What could possibly be wrong with using your adolescent partner as bait and standing by watching while they knock him out by having a giant crane swing into his skull?



But don't worry. Somehow it's all okay:




And, in the end, all of this -- building a Batman robot, putting Robin in harm's way, and delivering said powerful robot to the control of a bunch of criminals -- was done so that Batman could recapture the robot (without giving it a killswitch or secret vulnerability of any kind) and then---get this--ripping out its insides and wearing it like a costume:



I almost spit out my coffee on this one. These Atom Age stories expect us to suspend a ton of disbelief, but this is a whole new level for me! Even accepting every other aspect of this absurd idea, that robot was designed to be the same size as Batman, so how the hell is he inside of it?


I also love the idea that Batman feels the need to prove to the world that he isn't a robot because no one will take him seriously if he doesn't.



I'm a little lost, here. Wouldn't a robot be more intimidating to a criminal and not less?


This story does have one saving grace beyond the title page. As I've often discussed in these reviews, the Comics Code really minimized the amount of fighting that could be depicted on the comics page, the writers often going out of their way to minimize the amount of punches thrown (if any). But Batman fighting a robot instead of a human opens up all sorts of doors for intense action, and thus Sprang and Paris cut loose for one thoroughly memorable panel as Batman takes down the robot:



Too bad they won't use this excuse more often. "Batman: Robot Fighter 1955 AD." I'd be up for it!




Really, that one panel of intense action is what boosts this otherwise half-considered story to a C+.


Important Details:

1. Batman and Robin can apparently descend from the Bat Plane to fight street-level crime via helicopters that we never see:



We're still three years away from the introduction of the Whirly-Bat, but that's absolutely what I'm imagining here.

Of course, what happens to the Bat Plane while they're doing this??


2. A new trophy is added to the Batcave collection:



I'm curious if we'll ever see it again.

I'm also curious why it counts as a trophy if Batman and Robin made it. Heck, wouldn't it make a great crime-fighting tool for further use? We're still a few years away from Superman using robot doubles to throw off Lois Lane and fight criminals weilding Kryptonite, but imagine how much more useful this would be for Batman, never having to risk his life anymore while fighting crime?

I love reading Shax trying to make sense of these stories... I think that's better than the actual stories would be for sure!

Detective Comics #225 (November 1955)



"If I Were Batman"
Script: Edmond Hamilton
Pencils: Sheldon Moldoff
Inks: Charles Paris
Colors: ?
Letters: ?

Grade: A-


Yeah, it's not a very original story idea. Only two months back, Bill Finger gave us a story in which a wealthy socialite trained to become the next Batman, and it was only last month that Alfred was suiting up as The Caped Crusader too. Still, Hamilton executes this one a lot better than most of his stories. In a tale in which some brilliant criminal is planning an elaborate prison break while Gotham is holding a charity contest in which four winners will get to be Batman for a day, the easy assumptions are that:

1. The criminal will either be, or be working with, one of the Batmen.

2. Each of the Batmen will be totally incompetent, thus providing laughs and complications for Robin as he tries to determine which one is deliberately sabotaging him.

The story practically writes itself, and yet Hamilton rejects both obvious directions and treads boldly down a different path.

Instead, each Batman brings their own unique spin to the adventure, a shamelessly self-publicizing movie star recognizing the error of his ways while also giving Hamilton an opportunity to showcase just how capable Robin can be without Batman:



A meek and anxious Batman fan finding his inner hero in the midst of a crisis and blowing Robin away:



and even Commissioner Gordon providing us with rare insight into his inner thoughts



before suiting up and reminding us (and perhaps it had never been mentioned before!) that he was once a cop, himself:



There is no predictable symmatry to these three episodes. Each allows the Batman in question to forge his own path and take the story in a new direction. It's...refreshing.

And, of course, the fourth Batman is Bruce Wayne, in desperate need of an excuse to work alongside Robin without ruining the charity event:



This part is a little more predictable, and their wrap-up of the prison break doesn't prove all that interesting. Still, we got three very unique and memorable stories before ending on a formulaic note. It's the finest thing I've yet seen from Hamilton.



Important Details:

1. I can't say whether it had ever been mentioned prior to 1954 (where this review thread begins) or even if it's common sense and the way police commissioners are always picked, but we are told here that Commissioner Gordon used to be a policeman.


Minor Details:

1. Bruce and Dick really dress up for the breakfast table:



I know upstanding characters in the media of the era were usually depicted with a certain level of formalty, but couldn't Bruce at least be in a smoking jacket as opposed to a full-blown suit?


2. I respect Moldoff's attempt to break up the monotany of a talking heads scene with something more abstract, but what the hell is going on here?



And what's wrong with Batman's cape?

Not going down that rabbit hole! If I start taking an interest in reviewing Martian Manhunter, I'll NEVER get past the 1950s!

I’m hoping you can make an exception for the Manhunter story in Detective #232. The Manhunter saves a dog from drowning and it follows him around for the rest of the story. It is hilarious.

Which means secret identity issues, or I don't know my Silver Age tropes.

In later stories (Bronze Age) it was said that they were not "real" time travel, but "only" hypnosis.




As to why Superman, who can travel through time at will, didn't use this ability more often even just to gather information, I have no idea. Probably because he was a jerk.