Dispatches From London: Retrospect Roundup

Hello all. Johnathan here, back in Canada and fortified with a Thanksgiving meal of my own devising. My system seems to be in slight shock over the prospect of not eating at a restaurant for the first time in literally one week, but I'm confident that the wholesome foodstuffs will prevail.

As mentioned in my last post, I headed back to the British Museum one last time on Saturday night, long after it closed. You see, while admiring the treasures of Sutton Hoo earlier that day, I had espied one Johnny Spectacles, acting suspicious among the antiquities. I trailed him to the Assyrian exhibit, where he made a mysterious exit under the cover of a winged lion. My curiosity was piqued: after all, Spectacles was supposed to be aiding John Thane in investigating a rash of burglaries in an entirely different part of the city. I resolved to investigate further.

Upon my return, a shocking discovery! First, Johnny Spectacles was deep in conversation with none other than the Ghost of Darwin! Second, through snatches of conversation I was able to ascertain that Johnny Spectacles was not in fact the other-dimensional twin of John Thane but an artificially-evolved rattus norvegicus, created as part of one of that bearded fiend's unfathomable long-range schemes, one that was coming to fruition at that very moment! What's more, they had John Thane trapped in the bounds of a mystical tetrahedron, no doubt to be messily destroyed at some later date.

I'll spare you the details and nitpickery, but suffice to say that together with a freed John Thane I managed to foil Darwin, plus I got to fight some mummies! Well, I think that they were actually some sort of bandage-dwelling fungus that Darwin had spot-evolved to lurch around and attack us, but the point is that I fought mummies in the British Museum, and that's a memory that will last forever.

Dispatches From London: Dispatch the Third

Events have transpired!

On the more mundane end of things, I finally had the full English breakfast and it haunts me yet. Even through the haze of an enormous Spanish meal I can still feel the haunting presence of beans on toast, fried egg, tomato and all of their friends.

Big surprise, though! I spent most of the day at the Britsh Museum and have made a very interesting discovery about our friend Johnny Spectacles. Tonight shall be a busy time, oh yes. More on my triumphant return to Canada.

-johnathan

Dispatches From London: Dispatch the Second

Johnny Spectacles is still being a Thane-hog, so I have no tales of grand adventure to share (though Darwin's Ghost has been making nightly appearances in my hotel room to taunt me. I WILL find your evolvo-ray, old man! I swear it!).

In the meantime, I took in the Wallace Collection, and it was amazing. First, there was the art, of which this fine fellow:

 

was the highlight. But even more spectacular was the weapon collection. Remember in the AD&D Player's Handbook, how they had just pages upon pages of medieval-style weaponry? I have now seen almost all of them in person. Even the polearms. Hooray! 

Dispatches From London: Dispatch the First

Not much to report so far, I'm afraid. I made phone contact with John Thane, the Johnathan of Britain, but it turns out that I managed to show up right in the middle of his annual teamup with his Earth Z counterpart Johnny Spectacles.

Oh! And I went to Westminster Abbey, where I picked up some very valuable clues that will surely help me plunder the treasures of Darwin's Tomb. Wish me luck!

-johnathan 

Unfunny: John is Shirking

Yup, not only did I fail to post an Unfunny yesterday but now I'm taking the whole danged week off. In London, no less, and for my Canadian readers: yes, the real one.

I'll try to check in from time to time, for instance if I end up forming a crime-fighting partnership with a Scotland Yard detective and a couple of Mods, or maybe if I discover an evil genetics laboratory in the Scottish Highlands. In the meantime, enjoy yourself another dose of Kafloppos:

Not quite as cryptic as the last one, perhaps, but the meaning of kafloppos still eludes me. Is it overcoming your OCD to date a tall girl, or forgetting to weed your garden? What is the common demominator?

- from Action Comics No. 102

 

Zatara, it Turns Out, is Incredible

 Zatara is one of those characters that haunts the corners of the DCU, usually showing up just in time to sacrifice himself for the greater good. As such, I’ve never had a real feel for the character.

“Oh hey, it’s Zatara! I bet he’ll get some magic-style ass-kicking done soon and… oh, he exploded. For the greater good.”

Obviously the guy is the sort of super-power dynamite that you have to write out of your story a quickly as possible to keep him from mucking things up, but just what is it about him that makes him so threatening? Seems all I needed to do was to start reading Golden Age comics, such as Action and World’s Finest, where Giovanni Zatara got his start - I am now convinced that Zatara is awesome. It’s not just that he combines his magician’s showmanship with his nigh-unlimited powers to do everything in the most mind-bendingly entertaining way possible:

No, it’s the fact that despite the fact that he has no secret identity (easily spotted), no invulnerability or extraordinary strength (easily knocked out) and widely-known weaknesses (just tie the guy up and gag him), he is essentially unstoppable. I’ve seen him knocked out, tied up, turned into things and catapulted into alternate dimensions and whatever scrape he’s in he always gets out of it, usually by pulling something like this:

I think that Zatara might be Magic Batman – the guy is completely unstoppable. Not only can he escape your Death Maze using only a piece of twine and some pocket lint but he will then animate the maze, have it chase you down the street while shouting labrynth-based puns and then throw you in jail.

What’s more, because he always wears a tux, sometimes his solutions get a bit… suave. Like the time that he was stranded on an alternate world on which two nations were locked in war and his solution was to, well, get their queens to forge a binding peace, if you know what I mean.

Oh for the life of a magic man.