#wildcate

[nocternalrandomness]

The Royal Navy "Black Cats" demo team flying their HMA.2 Wildcats into RAF Fairford for RIAT 2024

[chernobog13]

I never tire of this "class photo" of the Silver Age-version of the Justice Society of America by Murphy Anderson.

This was when the JSA was still respected by DC Comics. Things went downhill for the group after Crisis On Infinite Earths, when some members (Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman, Robin) were erased from existence. DC then decided to remove most of the remaining members completely from the DC Universe with The Last Days of the Justice Society (1986).

The team was rescued from Limbo in Armageddon: Inferno (1991), but fans didn't get to celebrate long. During Zero Hour (1994) many of its members were killed off or aged to the point of incapacitation.

Of the members pictured above only Flash (Jay Garrick), Green Lantern (Alan Scott) and Wildcat are still active. Red Tornado 2 (the android, John Smith) has been retconned many, many times, but I believe in current continuity he/it was never a member of the JSA, but active with the Justice League.

[chernobog13]

Some pages from the origin story and first appearance of Wildcat, by Bill Finger (co-creator of a some guy called Batman) and Irwin Hasen, from Sensation Comics (vol. 1) #1 (January, 1942).

As a kid I only knew Hasen as the artist on the newspaper strip Dondi. I bought the New York Daily News every Sunday for my grandmother, and she let me have the large color comics section, which carried Dondi. The other Sunday newspapers my family read were Long Island's Newsday, which had a so-so comics section with no adventure strips, and The New York Times, which carried no comic strips at all (boring!).

It wasn't until I purchased Famous First Edition #C-30, the over-sized reprint of Sensation Comics #1, that I realized Hasen had been a comic book artist during the Golden Age. I really loved those reprints from DC, complete with the ads that ran in the books.

I liked the whole bit where Ted Grant is inspired to become Wildcat by "comic book character" (and his future Justice Society of America teammate) Green Lantern. That same bit is used in the Little Boy Blue origin story in the same issue. When deciding to become a costumed crime fighter, the hero is told by his best friend that Wildcat was inspired to do so by Green Lantern. So very meta.

Sensation Comics #1 included the original and first appearance of Mr. Terrific (another future member of the Justice Society), and The Gay Ghost (later renamed The Grim Ghost). It also featured the second appearance of some dame named Wonder Woman, who also snagged the cover spot.

[9nerv]

d.