Without a doubt, Kanigher seemed disinterested with Wonder Woman through most of his tenure on the title. Some of those stories are goofy to put it kindly - case in point that last cover posted by Hepcat!


Meanwhile, over in the Weisingerverse...

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"Clark Kent's Super-Father"

Writer: Robert Bernstein

Artist: George Papp


One day at the Kent house, we find Clark and his dad puttering about his trophy room, while Ma Kent is off visiting her relatives. But when Pa curiously inspects a weird space jewel on display, something strange happens:
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As Jonathan flexes his new super-muscles, he soon discovers that he also has heat vision, flight, and thanks to a quick test with his buzz-saw - invulnerability:
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Clark thinks it's great that his dad now has super-powers, as he envisions the two of them patrolling Smallville together, but Pa has other ideas:
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That's right - Jonathan has decided that being a super-hero is a man's job, and Clark must resign himself to living life as a normal teen! Clark is devastated, but as he wouldn't think of disobeying his father, he meekly obeys.

Jonathan then shows his son his new super-duds, "chemically treated, fire-proofed and indestructible" (not sure where he had quick access to that sort of material, and the ability to whip up a costume, but OK!). To show Clark that he means business, he then goes to work smashing all of Superboy's robots, much to his son's dismay:
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Later on, Clark remembers a super-assignment that he had promised to carry out:
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But Super-Dad makes it clear that he will not tolerate it:
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Pa tells Clark to go home, and that he will drill the tunnel. The following day, Clark is working at the general store when he looks in on Professor Lang, who is attempting to create an historical air balloon ascent. Naturally, something goes awry and the balloon collapses, sending the unfortunate professor plummeting earthward:
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Clark immediately changes to Superboy and races to the rescue, but once again, his super-father intervenes:
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Pa Kent then takes care of Lang's balloon, and bawls out his son once again.

The next day, Clark discovers that he can't use his x-ray vision to see out of any of the walls or windows of the Kent home. When he questions his father, Jonathan tells him that he painted the entire house and general store with an invisible coat of lead paint (!!).

That afternoon, while Clark and his dad are working at the general store, the radio broadcasts an alert for Superboy to rescue some rangers trapped by a forest fire in a nearby park. Clark pleads with his father to let him answer the summons as his dad must sign for an order being delivered to the store. But Jonathan brushes his son off, and hurriedly signs off on the receipt:
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Suddenly, things are beginning to make sense to Clark, and he runs out of the store (due to the lead paint) to check on what his father is up to. He observes that after rescuing the rangers, his Super-Dad has other devious plans:
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Clark watches as the robot begins carrying out the command, but just as the kryptonite is being flown over a quicksand pit, Clark uses his x-ray vision to short circuit the robot, burying it and the deadly K under the ground.

With the immediate menace taken care of, Clark changes to Superboy and goes on the offensive:
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After being rescued, the real Pa Kent then reveals to his son how Jax-Ur kept taunting him while he kept him prisoner, and in doing so, we finally get the gory details of the villain's past:
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And so that is how readers were introduced to the evil Jax-Ur back in 1961. I don't know about you, but any guy capable of blowing up a moon definitely commands my attention!

Unfortunately, the writer (Robert Bernstein - who was more in his element with comical, light-hearted tales) and Mort left us with a couple of holes in this story.

First, it seems too unlikely that after waiting for his big opportunity, Jax-Ur would create this elaborate subterfuge without first taking care of an important detail, namely the Phantom Zone projector!

Second, we're casually told that Krypton had an inhabited moon! But Mort - they didn't have the ability to travel in space, remember - that's one of the essential ingredients to Jor-El's predicament in the origin tale! This little gaffe was never addressed by Weisinger - it would be up to continuity cop E. Nelson Bridwell to fill us in years later on the lunar colony of Wegthor, and how its destruction curtailed Krypton's budding space program!

Nonetheless - warts and all I like this story. There is of course the ironic touch of how the villain gives himself away with his signature (although he should have signed in Kryptonese!) and the comical way "Super-Dad" overplayed his hand (Superboy must have had a heck of a time scrubbing off all that lead paint afterward!).

Of course, the surprise ending doesn't dazzle us like it did to the kids of 50 years ago, as we're well acquainted with the PZ baddies. But back then, the Phantom Zone was brand new, having been introduced just 6 months earlier, so this was the first time Superboy met up with a real live criminal from his home planet, and I imagine that would have registered as a big deal at the time.

As I mentioned, ENB tied up a lot of the loose ends regarding the ramifications of Jax-Ur's crime, but there's one angle that even he didn't think of. I would imagine that the elimination of one of Krypton's satellites would have had a destabilizing influence on the planet itself - food for thought, huh?



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"As for contentment, that is a myth.  Give a man everything he wishes and he will be unhappy, because he didn't wish for more; give him more, and he will die of his worries.  Only a turtle, asleep on a sunny log, knows contentment!"
-Merlin to Prince Valiant

            Hal Foster 3-7-43
Last Edited By: Osgood Peabody Aug 16 11 5:21 PM. Edited 1 times.