Happy 42nd Birthday, Tom Spurgeon!
Since Tom and The Comics Reporter wishes everybody else in the industry happy birthday, we have to make sure that someone wishes him one… and if we don’t, who will?
Go read his stuff and enjoy.
Tagged: Happy Birthday
Happy Birthday: Glenn Hauman
ComicMix’s production master is another year older and probably another inch taller today. Happy birthday, Glenn!
Happy Birthday: Two-Face
Harvey Dent was young, charismatic, idealistic, and driven—at 26 he was the youngest District Attorney Gotham City had ever had, and the press dubbed him “Apollo” for his good lucks and his meteoric rise.
Dent’s idealism was also flexible enough that he recognized the good Batman did, even if the Dark Night Detective didn’t always follow the rules. The two wound up becoming staunch allies, even friends, and their passions for justice actually complemented each other.
Until, one June 12th, Dent reached the high point of his career—prosecuting Sal “Boss” Maroni for murder. Unbeknownst to Dent, his own assistant Vernon Field worked for Maroni, and when Maroni was forced to take the stand Field handed him an antacid bottle filled with sulfuric acid. Dent got up to cross-examine Maroni, displaying his key evidence—Maroni’s good luck charm, a two-headed coin he always carried, which he had carelessly left at the scene of the crime.
Maroni then hurled the acid—Batman tried to intervene but only managed to deflect the attack so Dent caught the acid on the left side of his face and on his left hand instead of across his entire face. The attack did not kill him, as Maroni had planned, but did leave Dent permanently disfigured—in mind as well as body.
The horribly scarred D.A. snapped and turned to a life of crime and violence himself, scarring one side of Maroni’s coin and flipping it to determine his actions whenever presented with a choice between good and evil. And thus Two-Face, one of Batmnan’s most dangerous villains, was born.
Happy Birthday: The Creeper
Jack Ryder’s parentage certainly predicted his future—his father was the publisher of a successful union dispatch, while his mother suffered paranoid schizophrenia and died in an institution while Jack was still a child.
Growing up, Ryder followed in his father’s footsteps and became a television news reporter. Unfortunately, Ryder had a big mouth. Normally that would be an asset, but Ryder didn’t know when to shut up, and it cost him his job.
The network didn’t fire him, but they did demote him to working network security, a job Ryder found beneath him. He got his chance to prove himself again when mobsters kidnapped a scientist named Dr. Emil Yatz. Ryder guessed that Yatz would be held at the mob boss’ mansion. The boss was holding a masquerade party that night, so Ryder cobbled together a bizarre costume and snuck in.
He found Yatz, but was seriously injured in the process, and to save him Yatz injected Ryder with the serum he’d created. The scientist also hid the device the mobsters were after by concealing half of it inside Ryder’s wound, which then healed thanks to the serum’s effects.
The device can make matter appear and disappear instantly, allowing a soldier to walk into a place in civilian clothes and then have a uniform and full weapons with the touch of a button. In Ryder’s case it let him make his strange new costume appear and disappear. Ryder used his bizarre appearance, the strength and agility the serum granted him, his unhinged disregard for personal safety, and a disquieting laugh to bring the mobsters to justice.
They dubbed him "The Creeper," and so a new—and truly bizarre—superhero was born.
Happy Birthday: Parasite
Maxwell Jensen was the classic, small-time crook before his own idiocy transformed him into something far greater.
Jensen was working at a plant attached to a research center and opened one of the storage containers, thinking it might contain the company’s payrolls. Instead the biohazardous extraterrestrial materials inside transformed him, staining his skin purple and giving him the power to absorb the powers of anyone he touched.
The Parasite, as Jensen dubbed himself, became one of Superman’s most dangerous foes, especially since Jensen could not only absorb Superman’s powers but also learned his secret identity.
Happy Birthday: Golden Age Black Canary
Dinah Drake was born and raised in Gotham City, where her father Richard Drake was a detective with the Gotham City Police Department. He trained his daughter well, and when she was old enough, Dinah applied to the GCPD herself. She was turned down, however, and the disappointment crushed her father, who died a short time later.
Dinah vowed to use her skills and training to fight crime in his memory, and donned a blonde wig, fishnet stockings, pirate boots, a bustier, and a short jacket to create her new alter-ego, the Black Canary. Dinah also opened a flower shop, using the money her father had left her, and that served as both a day job and a cover story.
While fighting crime, Dinah met and fell in love with GCPD detective Larry Lance—the two were later married and had a daughter, Dinah Laurel Lance, who would ultimately follow in her mother’s costumed footsteps. The older Dinah continued her secret life and became a member of the Justice Society of America.
It was during those years that Dinah fought the living star-creature Aquarius, whose radiation ultimately killed her.
Happy Birthday: Sargon the Sorcerer
John Sargent became fascinated with magic at an early age—and also gained fearsome powers. This was thanks to his discovery that his mother’s old ruby pendant actually contained the ancient artifact called the Ruby of Life, which let him control anything he touched.
As he grew older, Sargent focused his attention on stage magic in particular, eventually developing his own stage act as "Sargon the Sorcerer." Most of his “tricks” were real magic, however, and off-stage Sargent battled evil for real, eventually becoming an honorary member of the Justice League of America.
Unfortunately, possessing the Ruby of Life affected Sargent’s mind, and he temporarily became a villain. He later shook off that change, but died valiantly aiding Zatara, the Swamp Thing and others fending off a powerful evil.
Happy Birthday: Alfred Pennyworth
Alfred Thaddeus Crane Pennyworth was born the son of a butler—his father, Jarvis, worked for the wealthy Gotham City family the Waynes.
But the life of a domestic was not for young Alfred, and he fled as soon as he was old enough to strike out on his own. For many years, Alfred made a living as a stage actor, but he engaged in more dangerous occupations as well, working for British Intelligence in occupied France during World War II. He was summoned home by his dying father, however, and Jarvis made Alfred promise to continue the family tradition of serving the Waynes. Jarvis’s own employers, Thomas and Martha Wayne, had been tragically murdered many years before, but their son Bruce was now living in Wayne Manor with his young ward, Dick Grayson.
Though he had no desire to do so, Alfred obeyed his father’s last wish and presented himself at Wayne Manor, where he convinced the pair to take him on as a butler. Alfred’s tasks became far more interesting when he accidentally discovered that his employer was the Batman!
Since then, Alfred has been one of Batman’s most trusted friends and allies, and has served not only as a butler, but also as a medic, a scout, a spy, and a confidante. Not bad for a man hired to serve meals and draw curtains!
Happy Birthday: Golden Age Batman
The Bruce Wayne of Earth-Two was born on April 7, 1915. A crook named Joe Chill robbed and killed Bruce’s parents in 1924, when Bruce was only eight years old. Bruce dedicated his life to avenging his parents’ deaths and protecting others from criminals and their evil deeds.
After many years of training, Bruce donned a fearsome costume and became the Batman. He was a member of both the Justice Society of America and the All-Star Squadron, and despite not having any superpowers was considered one of the greatest of the American heroes. Bruce also reformed and married the former Catwoman, Selina Kyle—together they had a daughter, Helena Wayne, who later became the Huntress.
After many years, Bruce decided he was too old to continue as the Batman and retired from that side of his life, passing the mantle to his friend and student Dick Grayson. Bruce became the police commissioner of Gotham City instead. The fact that he had been the original Batman became public after Selina died in his arms trying to stop a former Catwoman henchman.
In 1979, Bruce was coaxed out of costumed retirement one last time to stop a super-powered crook named Bill Jensen, and the mission led to Bruce Wayne’s death. After his death, Doctor Fate erased the world’s knowledge that Bruce Wayne and Batman had been the same person.
Happy Birthday: Brainiac
Though not truly alive, Brainiac can date his creation to April 6, the day the Computer Tyrants of Colu created him. The green-skinned humanoid wreaked havoc across the galaxy, including shrinking several cities to subdue their populaces.
One of those cities was Kandor of Krypton. Years later, Brainiac encountered the man who would become his chief nemesis, Kal-el of Krypton—better known as Superman. It was a battle with Superman that forced Brainiac to destroy his original body and create a new, metallic skeleton form.
Brainiac has taken on several different forms since then, and his origin story has changed several times as well—sometimes he is an actual Coluan man instead of an android—but his twelfth-level intellect and his hatred for Superman continue unchanged to this day.
