BHOC: DOOM PATROL #104

I’d mentioned earlier that in my latest trip to Ed’s Coins and Stamps in the Sun-Vet Mall, I had started going backwards in buying back issues of DOOM PATROL, a series that I really adored. The reason for this move is very simple: the next issue that I needed, #103, wasn’t available. I don’t know whether the original collector who had sold this run of books to Ed simply had missed that issue or if it had sold to somebody else in the interim. Either way, it put an enforced gap into the run that I was putting together. Consequently, I decided to start going backwards and picked up issue #99. But I also continued on forward, getting the next available issue, #104. This one was noteworthy in that it contained the genuine no-bull wedding of Elasti-Girl and Mento, which seemed like a big deal (and a strange thing to be doing in an issue #104)

In point of fact, though, the marriage between Rita Farr and Mento was something that the creative team had backed into. The letters page in #98 indicated that “The Bride of the Doom Patrol” would be appearing in the very next issue, but it didn’t show up for another several months. And this is because the creators changed their minds about its outcome. As originally conceived, the story was only going to be the first 13 pages of this issue, the opening chapter, and end with Rita deciding not to go through with it. But it was writer Arnold Drake, editor Murray Boltinoff and artist Bruno Premiani who had a change of heart. Perhaps inspired by the wedding of Reed and Sue in FANTASTIC FOUR, they decided to rethink their plans and to actually go through with the nuptials. This required the team to add an additional chapter to the original story, hence why it took a few issues to turn up.

The lead chapter is almost entirely devoid of a threat or menace, though the Doom Patrol get to perform a few rescues and the like. Rather, the key element in it is character dynamics. It starts with Rita on a slow day unable to get any of her three partners to spend the day with her, as they’re all wrapped up in their own concerns. Suddenly, Rita finds herself being levitated out of the Patrol’s headquarters. This is the work of her sometimes Beau Mento, alias Steve Dayton, one of the richest men in the world who had created a telekinetic helmet and adopted a costumed identity in a bid to win Rita’s heart. The rest of the team follows in pursuit, smashing Mento’s equipment and poised to do the same to Dayton. But Rita tells them off–who she sees isn’t any of their concern. Chagrined, Robotman and Negative Man withdraw–but this doesn’t mean that Dayton has a clear pathway either, as Rita slaps the hell out of him when he tries to kiss her.

And we’ll take a brief pause here for this cool half-page ad promoting the latest SUPERMAN 80 Page Giant, compiling stories related to the Man of Steel’s Fortress of Solitude from across the years. While they were entirely reprint-filled, these 80 Page Giants were a real value for readers of the era in terms of catching up with well-remembered tales from the past.

As the days and weeks go on, Dayton tries a full court press with Rita. And he’s handsome, charming and wealthy, an overwhelming combination. And so her heart begins to soften towards him, and she agrees to marry him. Being good, supportive friends and partners, Larry Trainor and Cliff Steele immediately decide that they need to frame Dayton for some wrongdoing in order to break up the impending union. They arrange for a fake telegram to Dayton to be misdelivered to Rita that indicates that the only reason Dayton is marrying her is so that she can be lured into returning to work for a film studio that he owes. At the last second, Negative Man and Robotman have a change of heart and try to prevent the telegram from being delivered, but they fail completely. Nonetheless, they come clean about their shenanigans–and Rita is so touched by the lengths that they were willing to go to in order to keep her as a part of the team that she immediately calls off the wedding. It’s a complete farce of an ending, so you can see why Drake, Premiani and Boltinoff might have had second thoughts about leaving the story here.

And a pause here between chapters so that we can showcase this METAL MEN house ad dedicated to one of the most overtly racist characters that DC put forward in this period: Egg Fu, a evil Asian caricature who was literally a gigantic egg and who fought Wonder Woman is spotlighted here despite the fact that he isn’t a part of the METAL MEN issue in question. Rather, author Robert Kanigher, who was working on both series, put the mighty robots up against a similar threat, and maybe Kanigher saw an opportunity for cross-promotion. It’s a bit of a nasty moment, especially given that this was published in 1966.

The back half of the issue starts off with a page that slightly puts the lie to the end of the first part. Rita is back with the Doom Patrol, but she’s profoundly depressed. Turns out that she actually does want to marry Mento after all. Dayton, meanwhile, has thrown himself into his work, redesigning his Mento helmet and costume to give them “twice the impact as the old.” Which wasn’t really true–Mento’s new uniform wasn’t as good as his original costume, but what are you going to do. Anyway, armed with his new gear, Mento calls out Robotman and Negative Man, rightly blaming them for busting up his wedding and determined to kick their asses. This turns into a prolonged war between Mento and the Doom Patrol, where each party smashes up stuff belonging to the other and tries to punch out the other in comeuppance.

But something doesn’t smell right about all of this, and it’s right about this time that the story lets us in on what’s really going on. Having seen the discord between the Patrol and Mento, the team’s old foes the Brotherhood of Evil and Garguax teamed up to take advantage of it. It wasn’t Mento who called out the DP, it was Madame Rouge, using her shape-shifting powers to impersonate Dayton and Garguax’s super-science to mimic his telekinetic helmet. Their objective was to draw the two sides into a conflict that would weaken both and then step in and mop up on everybody. Which is pretty much exactly what happens, up to a point. See, thing is, Cliff, Larry and Dayton all realized that they were being manipulated and faked their battle. But Elasti-Girl, having been injured earlier, is unaware of this, and she winds up clobbering Mento for real. The only thing that turns the tide as the Brotherhood shows up is the chief foraying out once more in his weapons-laden Action Chair.

As I mentioned earlier, this was 1966 and the British Invasion was in full force. So it’s no great surprise that DC gave a full page spotlight to plugging its latest teen comedy series SWING WITH SCOOTER. The lead character was a teen musician from across the pond who relocates to the United States and gets involved with a whole regular cast of local characters pretty much straight from teen comic central casting. It was a fun strip, but one that lost a bit of its distinctiveness as time went on and the focus on faux-Beatlemania was referenced less and less.

Anyway, the Doom Patrol runs off the Brotherhood, Mento and Elasti-Girl reconcile, and the wedding now goes ahead as planned. It’s attended by Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman, Flash, the Teen Titans (whom Premiani makes look about ten years old) and Drake’s character Super-Hip from his BOB HOPE comics. And in the final panels, it becomes clear that for all that Rita is now married, she isn’t for a second thinking about giving up her life as a super-heroine to become a stay-at-home wife, much to her new husband’s chagrin. This is a better ending than the original, but still feels a bit truncated. This issue is overall a bit slapdash, which makes sense given that the back half was bolted onto the front midway through the process. Also, perhaps nothing more says 1966 and the rise of the camp movement in the DC books than this final house ad for CHALLENGERS OF THE UNKNOWN introducing Villo, the World’s Vilest Villain. It’s absurdly over-the-top and not quite meant to be taken seriously.

After the Patrol Postscripts letters page, the issue wraps up with another Direct Currents checklist of books soon to be on sale. And it gives a decent sense of the DC line at this moment, though not nearly all of it. It plugs an awful lot of Superman/Superboy plus Aquaman and Batman while also spotlighting two war series (CAPTAIN STORM, OUT ARMY AT WAR), a science fiction title (STRANGE ADVENTURES) and a historical western (TOMAHAWK)