Dr. Mid-Nite was, in a way, the child of the Black Bat and the father of…
Dan Hagen
Dan Hagen is a retired newspaper journalist and editor, a former journalism professor, and a mighty comics presence in print and on the web. You can find Dan's work at... danhagengreatcaesar.blogspot.com, justimaginedanhagen.blogspot.com and captaincommentdanhagen.blogspot.com
September 1959: How Superman Got a Swelled Head
Why bother being a mere Superman when you could be an “Ultra-Superman?” The Superman of 1959…
JUST IMAGINE! July 1940: The Cryptic Mr. Mystic
The Spirit was sort of an anti-superhero, just a guy in a fedora and a domino…
JUST IMAGINE! July 1963: Spider-Man Lives — And Learns
In a convention charged with psychological significance, superheroes frequently fight distorted mirror images of themselves. Spider-Man…
JUST IMAGINE! July 1954: This Objective Earth
Colonial imperialism is satirized in Interplanetary War Base! (Strange Adventures 46, July 1954). With artist Gil…
JUST IMAGINE! May 1965: Mann and God at Charlton
Charlton Comics had their own shameless knockoff of Mighty Mouse (Atomic Mouse), their own Lone Ranger…
JUST IMAGINE! November 1941: Batman With a Bow
I wonder if Batman ever thought of installing a people-catapult in the Batmobile? Borrowing an idea…
JUST IMAGINE! Oct. 1962: Bell Bottoms, Book and Candle
Archie Comics’ winsome witch Sabrina was an intriguingly ambiguous character when she first appeared, poised morally…
JUST IMAGINE! January 1972: The Undignified Demise of the Scarlet Beetle
One of my favorite foes for Ant-Man was the Scarlet Beetle — not only because…
JUST IMAGINE! April 1964: The Dying Detective
Though readers didn’t know it at the time, the pages of Detective Comics 326 (April 1964)…
JUST IMAGINE! August 1957: The Martian Manhunter’s Lois Lane
A romantic interest, a snoop, and a pest — Lois Lane filled all those roles for…
JUST IMAGINE! May 1967: Lois Lane’s Bizarre Boyfriends
In the 1950s, superhero comics didn’t bother much with continuity. Reasoning that their audience quickly outgrew…
JUST IMAGINE! The 1950s: Great Gadgets and Assorted Allies
The 1950s saw a substantial elaboration of the Batman mythos. “Batman lightened up a bit from…
JUST IMAGINE! August 1962: The Red Reptile That Wasn’t Red
You might think that giant monsters wouldn’t have much interest in political or economic systems, but…
JUST IMAGINE! September 1949: The Dark Phantom of the Prairies
“In the western — as, of course, in most hero stories — the child can imagine…
JUST IMAGINE! January 1961: Bizarre Characters and Fantastic Weapons
Sometimes the comic books you didn’t see were the most intriguing. For example, I spotted Detective…
JUST IMAGINE! September 1972: Gone, Gone, the Form of Banner…
They were men cursed to share their existences with monsters. Jack Kirby’s The Demon, a supernatural…
JUST IMAGINE! January 1964: The Enemy Within
When you form a superhero team, those champions will inevitably run into a team of super-villains.…
JUST IMAGINE! January 1949: The Son of Captain Marvel Jr.
I have long suspected that Superboy’s real father was Captain Marvel Jr. Created in 1941, the…
JUST IMAGINE! December 1966: Erasers and Mistakes
In 1966 and 1967, Batman comics were caught in the middle of a creative tug of…
JUST IMAGINE! November 1933: In the Depression, Was Doc Depressed?
The Shadow fought the gangsterism that grew out of the still-current Prohibition, but his Street and…
JUST IMAGINE! November 1965: THUNDER in the Distance
What if costumed crusading wasn’t a mission, but just a job? That was Tower Comics’ interesting…
JUST IMAGINE! March 1962: When Four Take Flight
Some of the Fantastic Four’s flying vehicles were less fanciful than others. Their pogo plane was…
JUST IMAGINE! February 1961: The Robots You Can’t Refuse
Adam Strange foreshadowed Gold Key’s Magnus, Robot Fighter and echoed H.G. Wells’ The War of the…
JUST IMAGINE! November 1967: The Banality of Good
The runaway success of ABC’s Batman show in January 1966 prompted CBS and NBC to come…
JUST IMAGINE! January 1970: Endings and Beginnings
In the late 1960s and early 1970s, artists Neal Adams and Jim Aparo helped bring Batman…
JUST IMAGINE! January 1970: When Power Breaks Free
Some sequences simply stick with you. And for me, that was the case with Gil Kane’s…
JUST IMAGINE! March 1964: The Mage and the Imagination
While all Marvel superheroes were outré, Dr. Strange struck a special note of eeriness. For one…
JUST IMAGINE! July 1962: The Other Menace in the Metal Mask
We can safely say that Jack Kirby liked the look of a heavy metallic face mask…
JUST IMAGINE! November 1966: Power, Purity and the Pulp Hero
Three years after Bantam’s Doc Savage paperback reprint series began, its popularity inspired Gold Key to…
JUST IMAGINE! A pril 1963: Iron Man vs. Stone Age Man
Comic book superheroes often fight enemies who are either their mirror images, or their reverse mirror…
JUST IMAGINE! June 1952: The All-Seeing Eye of the Jungle Skies
Swinging through the trees was all well and good, but Tarzan required a way to fly.…
JUST IMAGINE! February 1912: Under the Moons of a Dream World
Edgar Rice Burroughs was a professional daydreamer. It was a career for which constrained circumstances had,…