When the issue of the Earth-1 Jim Corrigan came up in that previously-discussed JLA/JSA crossover, writer Roy Thomas advised us to see the “upcoming JSA miniseries” for details. That’s up next in our look at Hourman in the 80’s:

AMERICA VS. THE JUSTICE SOCIETY #1-4, Jan-Apr 1985


(Cover to the collected edition by Jerry Ordway)

It’s written by Roy and Danette Thomas, with art by Rafael Kayanan, Rich Buckler, Jerry Ordway, Michael Bair, and Howard Bender, with most pages inked by Alfredo Alcala, bringing some semblance of consistency to the product.
The overarching plot involves the JSA being put on trial as traitors who aided Hitler in WWII, accused by a diary left behind by the late Bruce Wayne, Batman of Earth-2. The diary is eventually proven false, but the trial puts the JSA in the proper place and time to defeat their time-traveling enemy, Per Degaton. However, this plot serves primarily as a tool with which to summarize the entire history of the JSA, covering all the key events in its history, from its founding in 1940 to its then-contemporary connections to Infinity, Inc.

Of course, Hourman’s stint with the original team was a short one, and as the JSA’s history is retold, Hourman’s part is over by page 13, except when the team is shown reunited at FDR’s funeral on page 19.
Unfortunately for Rex Tyler, even though his term on the team was brief, he is accused of the same treasonous crimes, so he’s at the table with the rest of the defendants throughout the trial. In issue 3, he has to take the stand and admit to some embarrassing facts:



Later, the series drops this nugget of previously undisclosed Hourman info:



I may have missed it mentioned somewhere in ALL-STAR SQUADRON, but according to this, Rex Tyler enlisted in the Army or the Army Air Force for a few months before being ordered back home by the War Department to serve with the other JSAers as part of the “Justice Battalion”. (Wait, even technically blind Charles “Dr. Mid-Nite” McNider served? Did they let him wear his special goggles while in uniform?)



Naturally, Hourman cropped up a few times in INFINITY,INC., the mid-80’s series focusing on the next generation offspring of various JSA members. He first shows up in issue 20, November 1985, written by Roy Thomas with art by Todd McFarlane, Mike Hernandez, and Steve Montano. With Rex Tyler is his son Rick, whom Rex is attempting to steer into a medical career. When Rex attempts to discreetly take a Miraclo pill to help with an emergency, his son takes one, as well, against his father’s orders. Rex gets to see some action:



And Rick, using the new non-addictive Miraclo, has his first taste of heroics. He reveals his sketch for an Hourman II, and dad Rex still disapproves. Despite Miraclo being on-addictive, it “makes you feel like you can save the world, at first—but the thrill won’t last—and there’s a price to be paid for that—believe me!”

In issue 21, Hourman attends the wedding reception for Alan “Green Lantern” Scott and Molly “Harlequin” Mayne. With him is his wife, Wendi Harris:



When Rex and the other heroes are transported away by Harbinger to fight the Crisis on Infinite Earths, Rick is left behind. He hitchhikes to South Carolina to join Beth Chapel, and they debut as the new Hourman and Dr. Midnight.

Rex is back in issue 25, seeing his son in costume for the first time:



Beyond that, Hourman makes only incidental appearances in INFINITY, INC., as his son takes up the mantle of Hourman. But Rick Tyler is not the Hourman to whom this thread is devoted, so coming next, we move on to the ending of Earth-2 as Hourman takes part in the heroic battle against the Anti-Monitor.

Hourman appears in CRISIS ON INFINITE EARTHS #5, 9, 10, Aug, Dec 1985, Jan 1986.

Issue 5 follows from INFINITY, INC. #21, with Hourman joining an army of heroes transported to the Monitor’s satellite:



In issue 9, he’s in the background crowd on page 15:



In issue 10, he’s among the heroes who battle the Anti-Monitor at the beginning of time, thus retaining, at least temporarily, memories of his origins on Earth-2 after the history of the DC Universe is rewritten to contain only a single Earth. Need proof? Here he is:



COMMENTARY:

Obviously, there's little to comment on, here, but these are important as the last canonical adventures of the guy we started out with, Rex Tyler of Earth-2. We learn he joined the Army in WWII, confirm that he married Wendi and had a son, and that son carried on his legacy as Hourman.

From here on, things get complicated, and I won't be trying to track all of the post-Crisis Hourman, but we'll hit the high points, the ones that are most directly connected to the Rex we've come to know.

I shouldn't have overlooked WHO'S WHO The Definitive Directory of the DC Universe, published after CRISIS. Naturally, Hourman got an entry:




There's at least one detail here that escaped my mention earlier in this thread: Hourman's unusual longevity and sustained physical prowess is attributed to the Justice Society's exposure  to the "temporal energy" of villain Ian Karkull. As I recall, this affected the entire JSA, not just Hourman. It was a continuity implant intended to explain away how superheroes active in the 1940's could still be active 40+ years later, but I don't remember exactly where that was documented. The write-up also describes the Miraclo Ray (called here the "Miraclo machine") as an ultraviolet light, something that was not specified as such in the original run. 

It's nice to see Murphy Anderson returning to draw this one; Anderson, of course, drew the Dr. Fate/Hourman team-ups in SHOWCASE. It's too bad they couldn't get Bernard Baily, whose last published work for DC was back in 1980; it would have been a lot of fun to see Hourman's co-creator return for one last rendition!

In addition to his page in issue 10, he was featured as one of the Justice Society in issue 12, in a group shot drawn by the terrific Jerry Ordway:

That was established in All-Star Squadron Annual # 3 (1984).  The discharge of temporal energy resulting from the explosion of Karkull's shadow-form extended the vitality of the active Justice Society roster at the time (All Star Comics # 7 [Oct.-Nov., 1941]), along with honorary JSAers Superman and the Batman and the Flash; future members Starman and Robin, the Boy Wonder; and girl-friends/hangers-on Hawkgirl and Lois Lane and Joan Williams.

Besides trying to account for how so many Justice Society members could still be active in their senior years, the (untitled) story provided explanations for the sudden line-up shift that appeared in All Star Comics # 8 (Dec., 1941-Jan., 1942), to wit:  Hourman and Green Lantern being replaced by Starman and Doctor Mid-Nite.  The plot also provided the rationale behind Doctor Fate shifting to the half-helmet he wore from All Star # 8 on.

Hope this helps.

The Golden Age (1993)



The next published comic to prominently feature Hourman was THE GOLDEN AGE, a 4-issue Prestige Format miniseries published in 1993, written by James Robinson with art by Paul Smith. Although it is branded as part of DC’s Elseworlds imprint, it does not transport the characters (very far) out of their familiar environments; in this case, the Elseworlds label serves only to declare this story to be out-of-continuity, with all of its events and character developments not to be referenced by subsequent stories set in the DC Universe.

Originally, though, the miniseries was proposed and developed with the assumption that it was in continuity, telling the post-war exploits of many of DC’s Golden Age heroes, as it occurred in the post-Crisis reality. And aside from some final-issue twists that may or may not have been part of the initial pitch, it would have worked perfectly well as a canonical story without disrupting much if anything that DC was to do with any of the characters later.
I’m not going to provide a detailed synopsis of this one. This one is so good that I don’t want to spoil it for anyone who hasn’t read this. And if you don’t remember it well, I’d rather you re-read it than provide a poor summary. The gist is this: America’s most beloved war-time hero, Tex Thompson, a.k.a. Mr. America the Americommando, returns to the states under high acclaim and initiates a program that will produce the greatest superhero the country has ever seen, the exceptional Dynaman. Robinson weaves a complex and engaging story spinning from this seemingly-simple premise, one that involves an astonishing assortment of characters from DC’s large stable of Golden Age heroes (absent the ones like Superman, Batman, and Wonder Woman, who had been removed from history by the Crisis).

Robinson is able to work magic with almost every character he touches, turning one-dimensional characters borne from simple concepts into fascinating people, demonstrating that even a simple idea can be turned into an engaging story, if freed from the juvenile standards of the superhero genre as established in prior decades. The characters are recognizable, and true to their roots, but are allowed to be more than cardboard cutouts playing out a good vs. evil scenario. A human brain in a robotic body, a short man proving he’s a strong man, a manhunter who finds himself prey of an unrelenting pursuit, a man living with the constant presence of the ghost of his deceased brother…and, of course, a meek man with a pill that gives him one hour of emboldening enhancements.

Even with only a page or three per issue, the scenes devoted to Hourman stand out as some of the most striking and memorable things ever done with the character. For instance, consider this page from issue one, in which Hourman is disturbed to see that his hour of power has lasted only 24 minutes:



Now that’s the way to end a scene with impact! This is something of an obvious twist, but one that had never been done with the character, since it accentuates the comparison of Miraclo to illicit drug usage, with the user developing a resistance to its effects.

In issue 2, Robinson and Smith present a 4-page Hourman sequence. Rex Tyler has spent a year refining the drug so that his body no longer resists the full hour of effects, only to discover a new flaw in the formula: when he is struck with fear by the barrel of a gun pointing him in the face, his biochemical reactions trigger a psychedelic, hallucinogenic response. As he reflects on the experience, he concludes that he is an addict.



The addiction is not a new idea; Roy Thomas established that already, but Robinson’s description, with Smith’s depiction, give it a powerful impact that it hadn’t had before. Past attempts had struggled to explain what was meant by “addiction”, but hadn’t sold it like this series managed to.

In issue 3, Hourman trains himself to avoid triggering the psychedelic effects and maintain his Miraclo enhancements for a full hour:



With Hourman in full fighting form once again, he is ready for the final issue, in which he is recruited into a desperate cabal of heroes challenging the threat that looms larger than any they’ve ever had to face, leading him into conflict with a former ally, before the real heroes win a battle. Many casualties are suffered, but Hourman survives, given a grim but hopeful update for 1955 in the story’s epilog:



This is one I hold in very high regard, and it validates my conviction that so many of the characters Robinson used here—Robotman, Captain Triumph, Johnny Quick, Manhunter, The Atom, Dan the Dyna-Mite—had great potential. This is one series that will convince you of the old saw “There are no bad characters, only bad stories.” But the mention of greatness calls us to consider another major player in this masterpiece, Tex Thompson.
Despite Robinson’s spelling error, this is Tex Thomson, another creation of the same pair who created Hourman, Ken Fitch and Bernard Baily. While it was a little hard to swallow the idea that the mostly-forgotten (despite having outlasted Hourman on the stands!) Thomson, “Mr. America”, would be revered as the greatest of heroes by the citizens of 1947 Earth-1 America, it’s really quite a clever notion. With the real “greatest of heroes” written out of DCU history, Robinson has slotted in a character of the same vintage: Tex Thomson also debuted in ACTION COMICS #1!

SANDMAN MYSTERY THEATRE: The Hourman Acts I-IV ran in issues 29-32, Aug-Nov 1995, by the team of writers Matt Wagner and Steven Seagle and artist Guy Davis.



This cover of the final installment incorporates some Bernard Baily art from the original Hourman feature!

Crimebuster and Slam Bradley discussed this arc in the Classic Comics Podcast episodes devoted to SANDMAN MYSTERY THEATRE, and I encourage anyone who hasn’t done so to listen to their full exploration, but here’s where they talk about Hourman’s debut in the series:



Published in the 90’s, but taking us all the way back to March, 1940, because, while the fact is not acknowledged in the credits, nor do I remember being aware of it when this was originally published, Wagner and Seagle are adapting the first Hourman story from ADVENTURE COMICS #48, as the basis for this 4-issue arc. It’s a relatively faithful adaptation, although Wagner and Seagle show us that readers of 1940 read a highly sanitized version of the event. The first we see of Rex Tyler, he is picking up mail from his post office box: just as in his debut, Rex is soliciting requests for help from the “Oppressed” via posts in the classified section of the newspaper:



(I hadn’t read SMT in a long while, so it took me a bit to figure out why Rex’s speech is frequently rendered in an off-kilter, “drunken” lettering style. It is not intended to suggest an unusual mental state, but is instead the series’ approach to indicate a character is talking, or perhaps mumbling, to himself. The venerable thought balloon was passe in the 90’s, so this served as SMT’s substitute to represent characters’ internal dialogue.)

As in ADVENTURE #48, Rex selects a letter from a woman whose unemployed husband has taken up with a criminal gang. But instead of the respectable Mrs. John Kennedy, this is the impoverished, abused, and slovenly Mrs. Jerry Kenton, mother of two grubby kids who is seeking assistance from the “Man of the Hour”.

Wesley Dodds, a.k.a. The Sandman, has also had Rex’s curious public notice brought to his attention.



Wes is scheduled for a tour of Bannermain Chemicals, as a guest of Mr. Bannermain himself who is wooing Dodds as a potential investor. Bannermain we all remember as Rex Tyler’s abusive boss (whose name eventually altered to “Bannerman”, but the ‘i’ was there originally).

Rex, disguised with dark glasses, visits with Mrs. Kenton, who sports a black eye from her abusive husband, and Rex agrees to intervene on her husband’s behalf. But first, it’s back to the factory, where Rex and Wes meet for the first time:



Later, powered up with his special pill, The Man of the Hour makes trouble with the leader of Jerry’s gang, escorting Jerry away from an angered and beaten-up gang, in order to coerce him away from a life of crime.



In Act II, Jerry spills what he knows about the upcoming job the gang had recruited him for, which is not much. Wes, though, tends to have premonitions in his dreams, and he has dreamt of Rex Tyler, a large clock, and hundreds of hoodlums looting treasure.

The next day, as Rex is working up some Miraclo, he gets a call from Wes, who invites him to lunch. The reader, meanwhile, learns that the gang is planning to steal the jewels belonging to Bannermain’s wife, which are to be displayed at the Beaux Arts Ball at New Year’s Eve. This will be a big costume party, and Wes, his girlfriend Dian and her Police Chief father have invitations.

Rex and Wes bond over lunch, both of them having some interest in chemistry (Wes, as The Sandman, uses a sleeping gas gun to disable his opponents).



Things go south for Jerry Kenton, who doesn’t have sense to stay away from the gang after all, and receives an unpleasant punishment from the gang boss, Lenny.
Hourman is trying his best to live up to his promise, although not achieving the best results, leading to a direct assault on Lenny but eventually suffering a gunshot to the abdomen and a tumble from the third floor which, thanks to Miraclo, he survives.

Before moving on to the second half of the arc, let’s pause to consider this depiction of Rex Tyler. While Wagner and Seagle have taken a lot from that original Hourman story, but they’ve departed from Rex’s original characterization. Rex is not the mouse transformed to a lion that Ken Fitch and Bernard Baily presented; this Rex is a cocky, over-confident extrovert, perhaps not the greatest judge of character, but it is implied that he is carefully planning the timing of his Miraclo (although Wagner and Seagle have yet to explain those pills thus far).

Mr. Bannermain is depicted not as the abusive boss he was in 1940, but as something of a weasel. I was amused to see him brag to Wes that the company deals with its waste by sending it downriver, then laughing at the idea that it might harm the fish. I guess that’s where Rex learned to ignore toxic waste when he took over the company back in the 60’s!

In Act 3, Wes, in his gas mask and double-breasted suit as The Sandman, is tailing Rex through the snowy city streets, but the Miraclo-powered Tyler easily eludes him. Lenny and the gang, though, spot the snooping Man of the Hour and chase him down in their car. In the 40’s, it was common to see Rex chasing after automobiles…this time he’s running from one:



Lenny’s car smashes into the Man of The Hour, who bounces back from the injury and terrorizes the gang into fleeing. Before he can pursue them, Rex finds himself gassed by The Sandman. Over several pages of interrogation, the drugged Rex spills his guts, revealing the secrets of Miraclo (and mentioning that he’s learned never to take a second dose to try to extend his Hour of Power).



Rex awakens having been deposited back at home, with a note from The Sandman, and some new notions in his head:



As the night of the Ball arrives, Wes and Rex are both ready with costumes. Rex has sewn his own costume for his debut under the name “Hourman”, and Wes has squeezed into a purple-and-gold rental “acrobat” costume that suggests the superhero garb the character would eventually adopt in the 1940’s ADVENTURE COMICS feature:



In the concluding Act, the events at the Ball play out as suggested in the original Fitch & Baily story, with the gang orchestrating a black-out in order to steal jewelry. The objectives are more ambitious in this telling, as the gang is after far more than the single string of pearls they sought in the simpler original telling. Hourman and Sandman meet in costume, with Rex recognizing his new friend Rex despite the disguise (Hourman recognizes Wes’s gas gun as that the masked Sandman was wielding). The two heroes have a productive discussion, then return to the Ball.



The adventure culminates in a rooftop battle, with some impressive demonstrations of Hourman’s abilities. The original ending, in which Hourman fulfills the desperate wife’s request by scaring and sparing the husband, isn’t here. The last we see of Jerry, he’s been apprehended in the act of cutting off the lights at the Ball by The Hourman, who tells him: “You remember me, Jerry. I was the one who warned you about walking the straight and narrow—though it seems we need to have another little talk.”

I don’t recall whether Jerry cropped up again in later issues of SMT—he’s the kind of minor character that very well might have—but for now I’ll assume that Hourman did indeed scare him straight and let him return to his wife rather than face the fates of his fellow gang members, as occurred in that first Hourman tale.

Once the villains have been defeated, we close with another meeting between Rex and Wes. Rex is very battered and bruised, but he has survived and succeeded. Rex has decided he’s not quite ready to use Miraclo in superheroics, yet, and the heroes part hoping that their paths will cross again.

And indeed they will…not only as founding members of the Justice Society, but in the pages of SANDMAN MYSTERY THEATRE, as we’ll see in an upcoming post.

Funny thing, when I re-read this for the first time in many years for this thread, Hourman's portrayal wasn't what I remembered. I'll go into what I remembered as being "the best way to do an Hourman story" later on. But it was a cracking good rendition of the character! I liked the portrayal pre-costume, with Rex operating as "The Man of the Hour" in dark sunglasses and identity-obscuring clothing. We saw a bit of that in one of the early installments. If the character had found his way into some low-budget films, this could have been an effective look!

Hourman's powers are more formidable than they were originally, with him recovering from gunshots that don't pierce the skin, taking blows to the head that routinely took out Baily's version of the character, but it does ignore some of the enhanced sensory abilities that were mentioned in the first telling of this story. 

The character was a great fit for this series, blending neatly into the noir sensibilities of SMT, introducing superpowers without overdoing it. Hourman was originally a hero for the impoverished, so it's neat to see his debut here represent poverty in a seedier, more genuine way than Fitch and Baily were able to in 1940. For the superhero fans, it's a kick to see the two features from ADVENTURE COMICS crossing over after so many decades.

I've speculated that, should the upcoming Netflix Sandman series be a hit, they might well look to SANDMAN MYSTERY THEATRE as a spin-off some day. "The Hourman" wouldn't be so unlikely a choice for an episode adaptation, leading to the third TV depiction of the character in the 21st century...and we'll get to those first two depictions in a while!

As you know, I've been eagerly awaiting your SMT reviews, and I have a lot of thoughts on the issues.

So, from the firs issue of his series, I loved the way they portrayed Wesley. The idea of a sort of plain, dumpy superhero (to me, a plain, dumpy guy) was enormously appealing … and it also sort of fit his suit and sort of ugly gas mask.

But I also noted that in his second or third arc, he was drawn by a different artist, and was much slimmer and, while still bookish, closer to mainstream attractiveness. That's fine, I thought; how he looks depends on the artist drawing him. No problem.

But by having Wes dress in the Kane/Kirby outfit in this issue … and look ridiculous … that annoyed me. I felt like it was rubbing my face in it, and also unnecessarily disrespecting the original 40's comics from Simon & Kirby, which were actually quite good. I wish they'd just left the costume part out entirely. It wasn't necessary.

As far as the "Hero" arc … nothing particularly bothersome here. I have a lot of thoughts about the "Phantom of the Fair" arc in which the Crimson premiered, but that's off-topic for tis thread.

By the way, it was shame this arc was truncated, especially because the series was scheduled to be wrapping up soon, anyway. Did I ever tell you what the final story arc was intended to be called? When I was told this I swear it made me want to chew my arm off or something.