Another Yankee Poodle Sighting, Ambush Bug: Year None #1 - Sept. 2008

So, I was sitting around today. I was supposed to be sleeping, not on facebook, but who can sleep these days? Not me, that's for sure. Anyway, I WAS on facebook, and noticed I had a new message from facebook friend and fellow Captain Carrot and His Amazing Zoo Crew fan, Carl Gibson. I know you're dying to know what it said, so here it is:

"I was just flicking through my comics collection and noticed Yankee Poodle appeared in Ambush Bug: Year None. Not sure if you already knew this but as a fellow Zoo Crew fan I thought you may be interested!"
Am I interested? Oh hell yeah, I'm interested. I had no idea that Yankee Poodle had made an appearance alongside Ambush Bug, who has long been another one of my favorite DC characters (Seeing a pattern? Yes, I love all the weirdo characters). Strangely enough, I had been looking to pick up all the Ambush Bug comics just a few weeks before, but the comic shop I was at was missing a few issues of each series, so I decided to hold off until my next online purchase. (I ended up buying some Jonah Hex mini-series instead.)

Quickly, I looked up Ambush Bug: Year None over at mycomicshop.com. Six issues, written by Keith Giffen and Robert Loren Fleming, with art by Keith Giffen and Al freaking Milgrom??? Yeah, sign me up. So I quickly placed an order for all six issues.

Yankee Poodle appears in issue one of the series. This is the synopsis for the first issue, taken from Wikipedia (I'm at work, and don't have time to write it up myself, so I'm taking the lazy way out).

From the wiki:
The first issue, "Hey, You Sank My Battle-Ax!", revolves around Ambush Bug trying to solve the murder of Jonni DC, a female version of Johnny DC. Through the course of the story, Ambush Bug encounters such DC Comics characters as Yankee Poodle, Egg Fu, Ace the Bat-Hound, and 'Mazing Man. Through the course of his investigation, he is pursued by his evil sock, Argh!yle!, and his minions bent on Ambush Bug's destruction. Also pursuing him is "Go-Go Chex", a mysterious being whose face is completely covered with the checkerboard pattern that appeared at the top of DC comic covers during the 1960s; he constantly speaks in 1960s phrases and slang, and refers to everyone around him as "Wonder Chick". Occasionally, the Source Wall, as a sentient slab of concrete, appears vacationing across time and space in places where Ambush Bug passes.

And here are the two pages of the book that pertain to Yankee Poodle:


She tells Ambush Bug to F.U??? SWEET!

Yankee Poodle! 'Mazing Man! Egg Fu! Al Milgrom! And of course, AMBUSH BUG! How can I go wrong with this mini-series? So happy I ordered it! Unfortunately, I can't say anything recommending the series to those of you who haven't read it, as I have yet to read it myself. But if you're an Ambush Bug fan, I'm sure you'll probably like it.

Thanks again to Carl Gibson for pointing me in the right direction. You totally made my day. And if any of you out there know of any other cameos by the Zoo Crew that I may have missed, don't hesitate to yell at me.

Zoo Crew ala Fred Hembeck

'Nuff said.

The New Teen Titans #16 - Feb. 1982

That's right, folks. It's review time! Finally! And what better place to start than at the very beginning. New Teen Titans #16 from February 1982 featured the very first appearance of Captain Carrot and the gang in a 16-page story preview and I'm gonna run through it with you. Please note that I will NOT be covering the Teen Titans portion of the comic (Which is a great story, by the way. Check it out!). That being said, let's get to it.

STOP! COVER TIME!

New Teen Titans #16 cover, and "This Bunny Unbound" cover.
"This Bunny Unbound" by Roy Thomas, Scott Shaw!, Gerry Conway (story), Scott Shaw! (pencils), Ross Andru (pencils on the Superman portions), Todd Klein (inks), and Carl Gafford (colorist).

Guest-starring Superman.

Our story starts off on Earth-1 with WGBS-TV reporter, Clark Kent, informing the television audience about a recent press conference during which the President of Mammoth Motor Company leaped over his podium and started to act as if he were an ape or a monkey. We soon find out that this is just the latest in a long line of similar occurrences all over the world. For some unknown reason, people are exhibiting signs of simian behavior and to date, nobody has recovered from the mysterious ailment.

This looks like a job for...Superman!
After finishing his report, Clark decides he needs to investigate as his alter-ego, Superman. Pulling open his shirt in the classic "Look at me, I wear my longjohns under my street clothes" action reveal pose thingy that Superman always does, our hero takes to the skies. While flying over Metropolis, he sees a strange ray of light shoot down from the sky and hit a man walking on the street. The man starts acting like a monkey and jumps in front of a car. Superman, of course, saves him. Realizing that nobody else saw the light beam, Superman determines that the beam originated from the planet Pluto. Deciding to head there to investigate, Superman discovers he can't leave the Earth. GREAT KRYPTON! There is some sort of energy barrier encircling the entire planet and it is weakening Supes, almost as if it were partly made of Kryptonite.

Suddenly a meteor appears. It had no problem getting through the barrier, so Superman grabs it and hurls it back towards space. Holding on for dear life, he manages to ride the meteor through the barrier. The barrier continues to make him feel strange and as they pass through the barrier, the meteor begins to glow. And then this happens.

POP goes the meteor!
Superman is nearly blinded by the sudden explosion. Spots dancing before his eyes, he can barely make out five fragments of the exploded meteor as they make their way back down towards the Earth. He tries to follow them back down to the planet, which, according to Superman's innermost thoughts "looks different somehow--even through these blasted spots!" But luckily, his senses are SO keen that Superman just has to use his Super Automatic Pilot power to zero back in on the Daily Planet building. Realizing he has a sixth chunk of the meteorite in his hand, he throws it away, because apparently having it in his hand as Clark Kent would reveal his secret identity to the world or something like that.

Making his way into the Daily Planet, he changes back into Clark Kent, revealing that all his civilian clothes are kept in a handy pocket in his cape. Nice! I'll have to ask Michael Bailey if this is the first time this fact was shown in comics. Anyway, Clark stumbles around for a bit, still having problems with his vision, and feeling a bit dizzy. He also realizes that the hallways and doors he is stumbling through seem smaller than they should be, causing him to wonder if he has turned into a giant. "Lord knows, it's happened before!" he thinks to himself, which is a reference to Superman #38's "Seven-Foot-Two...and Still Growing!" by Elliot S! Maggin (August, 1978). He decides to sit down and nearly crushes a...RABBIT! And not just any rabbit, but a talking rabbit! With glasses, to boot!

Silly rabbit, chairs are for...yeah okay. I got nothin'.
The next page reveals that Clark isn't in Kansas anymore. And also not in the Daily Planet. Or in Metropolis. (Guess his Super Autopilot Power doesn't work so well after all.) He is on Earth-C, a planet inhabited by funny animal people. Spying a newspaper outside on the street with his super-vision, he figures out he is in the city of Gnu York (later changed to New Yak, I believe, in the Captain Carrot series proper) and is currently in the Wombat Communications building. (Check out the cameo on this page by Hugo Hornspred, the "muscular marvel from Moon Mountain". He's the moose on the bottom of panel one of this page, and is a character that used to appear in old issues of DC's Leading Comics.)

The rabbit, a comic book writer/artist named Roger Rabbit (this would be changed later to Rodney, to avoid confusion with that other Roger Rabbit), is rather bothered by having a huge, pink gorilla in his office. Clark relates his story to Roger, and the rabbit reveals to Clark that the same strange things have been happening in Gnu York. Munching on a strange, glowing carrot, Roger tells Clark about how, just that morning, he saw a guy walking down Bark Avenue. This guy, a human-like dog, was hit by a strange glowing light from the sky, and promptly began acting like "a throwback to his prehistoric canine ancestors." Clark, once again in his guise of Superman, decides it's time to investigate further. As he heads to the window, his x-ray vision spies one of the meteor chunks in Roger's window box. The window box that Roger keeps his carrots in, one of which he is currently crunching away on. Superman swats the glowing carrot out of a startled Roger's hand and tells him not to eat any more of it. He accidentally knocks Roger off his feet, which makes the rabbit angry. Roger coldcocks Superman, and to the surprise of everybody, sends our intrepid hero crashing through a series of walls. The meteor-infused carrot has given Roger super-powers.

Suddenly, Roger, with his new super-hearing, hears sounds of distress coming from the U.N. Building (that stands for 'United Nature' on Earth-C). Supermac, as Roger calls Superman, decides that even though Roger now has powers, it would be better for all involved if he went to help by himself. Superman flies out the window in the direction of the U.N. Building, leaving a slightly ticked off Roger behind. The rabbit quickly decides he's not having it, and donning an old super-hero costume he had worn once to an office Halloween party, Roger stands revealed as...CAPTAIN CARROT!!!!

Captain Carrot...suddenly, muscles!
Captain Carrot bounds out the window after Superman. Quickly catching up to Supes, and after some more witty banter, the two arrive at the U.N. Building and discover that everybody inside are acting like...well, animals. Our two heroes quickly round up all the afflicted folk, in the process revealing to the audience a bunch of Captain Carrot's newly acquired super-powers. Afterwards, Superman hears a report on the television about five more super-powered heroes that have suddenly cropped up around the United Species of America (that's one for each of the other five meteorite fragments, in case you weren't paying attention). The second to last page of the story shows all the future members of our beloved Zoo Crew, although the coloring on Alley-Kat-Abra is way off.

THE ZOO CREW!
As you can see from the above page, Superman deduces that the other heroes were all located in areas of the US that are 'precisely' where he saw the other five fragments of the meteor land. I don't know how he saw this happen so 'precisely', considering he was practically blind at the time and could barely see, but whatever. It's a comic book, right?

Anyway, the story ends with Superman and Captain Carrot deciding to head (finally) to Pluto to figure out the source of the mysterious devolution ray. We are treated to an image of the Captain Carrot and his Amazing Zoo Crew #1, "The Pluto Syndrome", on sale December 24th, 1982. Don't know how I'm going to survive having to wait for this issue! I WANT IT NOW!! Oh, hold on. Riiiight. It's out already. Forgot it isn't 1982 any more.

Overall, a fun story and a great introduction to Captain Carrot. There's not much I can say about it, as I had NO problems with anything in the story. Art was great, story was great, everything about it was great! I can remember reading this for the first time, and loving it just as much back then as I still do today. I had picked up the comic because, frankly, I had been picking up The New Teen Titans on a regular basis at the time. And thus began my love affair with a rabbit.

So that's the review. Again, FINALLY! And the first post of 2014! Wow! I hope it convinces at least one person to go rooting through the back-issue bins to find some Captain Carrot comics.

One last thing. If you want an even more in-depth look at this story, I highly recommend that you go here:

Captain Carrot New Teen Titans #16 Annotated.
I wish I could take credit for all the hard work and research that obviously went into those annotations, but I can't. It's just a page that I stumbled across a long time ago. I'm not even sure WHOSE page it is. The author, I believe, refers to himself as Doc Quantum. If anybody has any information about him, please let me know.

That's it for this time. Be sure to tune in January 2015 for the review of issue one of Captain Carrot! Oh, all right. I'll try not to take that long.

No promises, though. :)