Charlton Comic's BLUE BEETLE #1

Review by noted comics colorist Carl Gafford, reprinted with permission.

Charlton Comics under Dick Giordano in 1966 was on a roll: they were expanding their super-hero line (called Action Heroes) during the Batmania explosion and announced at the end of 1966 that Steve Ditko's new BLUE BEETLE back-up series in CAPTAIN ATOM would be getting his own book in 1967!

BLUE BEETLE #1 hit the stands in February, 1967 -- and it was everything we were promised! Wild, exciting action scenes of a swinging super-hero in the Ditko fashion we'd loved in Spider-Man. Also with us, unfortunately, were many of the failings of Charlton Comics: the worst printing imaginable and lettering by "A. Machine" (a linotypewriter). No expense was spared to bring us this new comic -- absolutely NO expense at all! One part of the Blue Beetle team was missing, though: Gary Friedrich had scripted the backups in Captain Atom, but by late 1966 he followed his buddy Roy Thomas over to Marvel Comics. "D.C. Glanzman" was the credited scripter here in BB #1; that was the house name Charlton used, and in this case covered the fact that Ditko was now writing his own stories, as the title proclaims: The All-New Blue Beetle "Bugs the Squids!"

The cover has BB swinging to meet a NEW breed of wall-crawlers: a criminal gang known as the Squid Gang. They used suction cups in their wetsuit costumes to climb up skyscrapers and commit their burglaries. Thish starts with the gang raiding a society party, until the Blue Beetle comes swinging in. The crooks retreat, but when one of them uses his spray-gun to let loose a cloud of smoke in BB's face, they successfully escape into the river below. Even with the sophisticated devices in the BB's Flying Bug, our hero can't trace the gang's whereabouts.

The next day, at the lab of Ted Kord, police Lt. Fisher is still questioning Kord about Dan Garrett (the previous Blue Beetle)'s disappearance. Kord still refuses to talk, and Ted's lovely assistant Tracey can see the secret Ted's keeping is eating him up, but he won't come clean, either to the police or to her. Instead, he vows to himself to keep the secret of what happened to Dan on Pago Island, and to keep swinging as the Blue Beetle and put away crooks
like the Squid Gang,

Speaking of which, it's been announced that fabulously wealthy playboy Todd Van III is hosting a charity costume ball on his yacht. Natch, it turns out Van is really the head of the Squids, and he's set up the society suckers for plucking. With one of his gang posing as himself in an identical costume, Van robs his own guests and provides his own alibi.

Blue Beetle, wondering how the gang disappeared so easily from the yacht, investigates and finds crew members dressed in squid suits. It's a battle royal on the boat between the Beetle and the hordes of Squids. Finally, BB has to retreat into his bug to put the brakes on the escaping yacht. Fleeing at the sight of the Flying Bug, a gang member comes upon their chief Van
setting a dynamite trap (he'd planned to blow up the yacht and kill his gang to keep them quiet). The gang bails the boat (we never do see the yacht blowing up, if it does).

In a big action panel taking up two rows on the left half of page 16, the Flying Bug rises up out of the river, with the Beetle swinging out from underneath it at the fleeing Squid Chief below. Two pages of Ditko action spells the end of the Squid gang. As the police in a nearby boat gathers up the fleeing gang members, BB lowers the unconscious chief into the waiting hands of the police. As the Bug flies off into the night, BB wonders aloud, "So much for the squids! Wonder what... or who... I'll be up against in my next adventure?"

He might wonder, but we readers already know, because at the bottom third of the page is a promo blurb for issue #2, which promises to reveal the secret origin of the new Blue Beetle, what happened to Dan Garrett, and what is the
sinister secret of Pago Island!

Just as Blue Beetle rose from prominence as the back-up in CAPTAIN ATOM, in BB's own comic we're introduced to a back-up strip that will soon eclipse the lead feature in fan popularity: THE QUESTION.

In this first, untitled story (with just a question mark logo and QUESTION typed on the splash panel on page one) by Ditko (with typed lettering again), page one introduces the cast of characters: "VIC SAGE, hard-hitting TV newscaster for World-Wide Broadcasting Co. ... alias, the Question!" "Professor Rodor..." "Vic's loyal and hard-working news staff... Fred Pine, Al Kert, Bob Hasel and Nora Lace." "Sam Starr, President and Founder of W.W.B. His son, Syd... and his daughter, Celia."

We start with a scene at a womans' civic luncheon, where WWB PR director Syd is touting WWB's pledge to campaign for decency and revealing injustice wherever it may be found. Meanwhile, in the sleazy part of town, the police are raiding a gambling den. In the hidden office, a clandestine figure is conferring with the gang chief. "You've got to get me out of here, Dicer! I'm a respectible businessman!" says the figure. "You don't worry about your rep when you get your cut of the take," observes the head hood.

Together, the two flee out a secret exit, but a cop is waiting for them. Dicer shoots and wounds the cop, then the two drive through a crowded street (nearly killing pedestrians) to make their escape. Later, Vic Sage takes to the airwaves in his nightly newscast: "As usual, you, the enraged public, wonders how a leech like Dicer and his ilk can thrive so readily among you! How many of you willingly support Dicer's illegal gambling operations? How many of you frequent his gaming tables... or play a number daily? You don't need their kind... they need YOU! Part of the responsibility lies with YOU! You are willing partners in Dicer's crimes!"

That dose of reality doesn't sit well with the public, who gripe at Vic's accusation. Nor does it sit will with the network weasles at WWB--with Syd Starr their leader. "We have to remain neutral" bleets one sheep. "A bleeding heart like Sage will only antagonize the public and scare off sponsors. We've got to be practical." "Get rid of him, Dad!" urges Syd. "Vic Sage Stays!" replies Sam. "He's not afraid to stick his neck out! Which is more than I can say for you gentlemen!"

After the broadcast, Vic tells his crew he's going to run down a hot tip on Dicer's hideout. Alone in the snowy alley outside a run-down hotel, Vic removes a rolled up piece of plastic from his belt-buckle. It unfolds into a mask with one-way plastic eyeholes and a breathing screen. When applied to Vic's face, it looks like one solid, blank face. A touch of a button in the belt releases a gas that adheres the mask to Vic's face and changes the color of his suit and hair. Now, in place of crusading reporter Vic Sage stands the mysterious crusader, The Question.

Inside the hotel room where Dicer's mob is hiding, a card is thrown in through the transom above the door. The card's blank, but smoke brings out a large question mark--the Question's calling card! In bursts The Question, who makes short work of the gang in a page of Ditko action. He saves the ringleader for last for questioning. At first, the deputy hood won't talk, but when an ominous smoke comes out of the Question's hand, coming closer to the crook's face, the creep cracks.

Cut to a scene of the Question on the snowy ledge outside an office high up on a building. Inside, Dicer is pacing when the phone rings. It's Dicer's "respectible" partner on the phone: Dicer threatens to blow the whistle on his partner if he doesn't bring the loot to Dicer in a rendezvous by the old stone bridge. The Question alerts the police to set a trap for them both.
At the appointed hour, the mysterious figure hands Dicer a briefcase. While Dicer's hands are full, the figure pulls a gun on Dicer to shut him up. "You dirty double-crosser!" exclaims Dicer. But the figure never gets the chance to fire, because just then they're caught in a police spotlight. THIS is an unexpected bit of storytelling: the hero has tipped the police and it's the
cops who catch the villain, not the costumed hero. Our hero isn't far away, though...

Dicer gloats that "Mr. Respectable" just had his cover blown-- he's Jim Lark, one of the board members of WWB, and Vic Sage is right there with the video camera, catching it all on tape. Vic's ready to show the tape on the nightly news, much to the chagrin of the other board members: "We can't let Sage show that tape of Lark being arrested. He was one of US... how will it look for us?" "Why go to extremes? A brief bulletin will do!" "Dad, you have to forbid Vic from runing it..." pleads Syd, "it'll make us all look bad!" Sam replies: "I will not suppress the truth! It's Vic's show... and his decision!"

Vic fires back: "If this mess didn't involve someone you know, there'd be no protest! I'm running the tape!" As Vic leaves the board room, the weasles harp behind his back: "We'll have his job yet!" "Nora, everyone's against him! Why is he doing it?" Syd asks Vic's beautiful assistant. "Ask your speech writer to explain it, Syd," answers Nora. "I stand with Vic!" That night, Vic does his report: "Tonight you will witness the climax of a police hunt which spelled the end of one gambling ring... will another rise in its place? Only YOU can answer that question! Now... the TAPE!"

But who's listening? In three small inset panels, we see one viewer's already snoring asleep, another one thinks to himself "Hmm, didn't finish the crossword" in the newspaper while he chows down in front of the tv, and in a street scene we see a final word balloon: "Hey, Mac, place a bet for me!"

A sad, sobering ending for an unusually told story of an unorthodox character.

Here's a series where the masked man is only the scarecrow that the even more heroic civilian character uses. With this little 7-page story, Ditko eclipsed the meteoric rise of the New Blue Beetle and introduced a hard-hitting hero who can get down and dirty among the grim and gritty "reality" of the criminal world and still stay loyal to his core beliefs. It goes without saying this is a lesson lost on the current crop of comics polluting the newsstand today.