The Inevitable Challenge of the Dinosaur Uprising

If you’re the kind of person who keeps your finger on the pulse of comics news, then you probably already know that this July sees the return of none other than Cary Bates with a series called True Believers, and while it also includes the horrific grotesques of Paul Gulacy, I’m pretty excited.

Why?

 

 

Oh, I have my reasons.

I’ve mentioned Cary Bates and his work before, but for those of you who aren’t aware, I’ll explain: One of the comments on the ISB once referred to him as “the Grant Morrison of the ’70s,” and that’s not too far off. Along with Bobs Haney and Kanigher, Bates completes the triumvirate of DC’s bat-shit crazy writers of the Bronze Age, and really, the fact that we don’t have a set of action figures along those lines is a major failure on the part of DC Direct.

Point being, you can pretty much grab any comic from the man’s run on Flash and end up with something pretty mind-blowing. Like, say, a cover where the Flash and his kid sidekick are menaced by dinosaurs who–despite being “smart”–choose to attack by hurling logs rather than using their razor-sharp claws and fangs.

Before we get to the meat of the story, though, one quick word about that cover: You gotta love the way that the Flash immediately pinpoints the problem of advanced dinosaur intelligence, rather than getting hung up on the end results of dinosaur hero-bludgeoning. Just sayin’, if I was the flash, that sentence would’ve come out a little differently.

But back to the matter at hand: The whole thing gets started when Gail Manners, a young friend of Kid Flash who gained the power to sense impending disaster when she was vibrated through time by an earthquake–yes, vibrated through time by an earthquake–lapses into a coma. Clearly, the medical science of 1978 is just not equipped to deal with a time-traveling Tiresias, and thus young Wally West comes up with a daring plan.

Unfortunately, he doesn’t bother to tell us, instead using the printed version of an old cartoon standby:

 

“Here’s what we do… First, I’ll psspsspsspsspsst…

 

Why Bates chooses to keep us in suspense for all of three pages, we may never know, but before long, the Flash’s plan is made abundantly clear. And really, it’s what we should’ve expected all along: He’s going to hook up his treadmill to a boat and then run real fast until they get to the Mesozoic era.

No, really.

 

 

It should be noted that at this point, nothing has happened in this story that would be considered even remotely unusual, not even the trip through time on the Cosmic Treadmill. That one was a staple of the Flash’s Silver Age adventures, which gave us plenty of stories where Barry Allen–SCIENTIST!–would travel to the far reaches of time to discover their wonders and mysteries…

 

 

…and then beat the living hell out of them. Suck it, Butterfly Effect. Suck it hard.

Fortunately for the laws of causality, smacking the crap out of one sea monster seems to be enough to bring Gail out of her coma, much to the relief of her dashing yachtsman of a father:

 

 

Despite the fact that they’ve apparently solved their problem, this is where the story really starts to get going. Because really, when it comes to helping out a girl whose prophetic visions cause her to fall into a coma, you’re just going to have to keep running back to the Age of Dinosaurs until you deal with the root of your troubles.

And what, you might ask, is the root of their troubles? What else?

 

 

Aliens!

Yes, despite the promise of a cover, the Flash only spends about four panels wandering around while super-intelligent dinosaurs use ropes and drop rocks on each other before Bates chucks that plot and goes with his ol’ standby.

As it turns out, the aliens have come to Earth on a mission of world domination–one of roughly eighteen thousand such missions that Bates would chronicle over the course of his career–and I’ve gotta say, this one pushes even my suspension of disbelief.

The master plan is as follows:

 

 

That’s right, folks: The aliens come to Earth to stop the rise of humanity by putting a fantastically advanced machine in a volcano and using it to alter the minds of the native population, which has long-lasting effects on the mental health of today’s citizens.

And really… Who’s gonna believe that?

33 thoughts on “The Inevitable Challenge of the Dinosaur Uprising

  1. Bravo, Chris. Bravo. Hmm… Did Bob Haney ever write himself into one of his own stories (ala Kanigher, Bates, and Morrison)? Someone should write a post about such self depictions…

  2. Haney, Kanigher, and Bates are proof positive that comics don’t have to be “OH MY GOD ULTRA SERIOUS” to be good. They do, however, have to be fun, which those three also prove.

  3. It’s like . . . a war . . . that time forgot!

    Also, now that is a helluva kicker. Thetans are really not nearly as Caddyshack as they think they are.

  4. “Dashing Yachtsman” is, as of now, the name of my new imaginary band. We do glam covers of pirate songs.

  5. And when he went back in time, Barry ran so fast that super-intelligent dinosaurs were like “SLOW DOWN”, but he was like “F*CK YOU”, and kicked them in the face with his ENERGY LEGS!

  6. “Why Bates chooses to keep us in suspense for all of three pages, we may never know, but before long, the Flash’s plan is made abundantly clear.”

    Hey, back in those days three pages was like twenty minutes.

  7. Wait, wait, wait. The alien plan was to replace humans, average height and weight 5-foot-10, 180 pounds, NOT possessed of razor-sharp teeth and claws and replace them with dinosaurs, average height and weight, 15 feet, 5 tons, and, you know, possessed of razor-sharp claws, teeth, spines, etc.?

    This was supposed to help them take over the earth how, exactly?

  8. Haney, Kanigher, and Bates are proof positive that comics don’t have to be “OH MY GOD ULTRA SERIOUS” to be good. They do, however, have to be fun, which those three also prove.

    I think they prove that the greatest asset of comics has always been their ability to make you go “WTF? Are you kidding me?” The more writers try to insert reality and social relevance into these books, the further they go wrong IMO. I’ll take talking dinosaurs any day.

  9. Doctor Who’s gonna believe that, as the second last paragraph, bar the last clause, is more or less the plot of this past week’s episode.

    Do I win a No Prize?

  10. Douglas– Thanks for the info! How did I know he’d done that? It takes a certain kind of writer to go all self-referential like that. Steve Gerber wrote some weird stories in that vein, as well.

  11. I enjoyed Paul Gulacy’s work on Master of Kung Fu (a lot) — but ScaryHolly’s the sort of thing one draws with a migraine hangover.

    BTW: “Bobs Haney”? (Well, maybe he went to sock-hops.)

  12. BTW, Flash’s expression on the cover of this issue is 100% MAD Wally Wood.

    (I only noticed when looking at your “enhanced” cover, Chris.)

  13. Bravo, Chris. Bravo. Hmm… Did Bob Haney ever write himself into one of his own stories (ala Kanigher, Bates, and Morrison)?

    Covered that one back on ISB Classic: Haney’s Got a Gun.

    BTW: “Bobs Haney”? (Well, maybe he went to sock-hops.)

    No, not Bobs Haney, Bob Haney and Bob Kanigher, or Bobs Haney and Kanigher.

  14. This was my first Flash story ever. Needless to say, I am always vaguely disappointed when he’s *not* time-travelling to fight dinosaurs and/or aliens.

  15. Flash’s arms on the cover makes me think Gorilla Grodd is somehow involved…they’re as long as his legs!

  16. “Bates completes the triumvirate of DC’s bat-shit crazy writers of the Bronze Age, and really, the fact that we don’t have a set of action figures along those lines is a major failure on the part of DC Direct.”

    Maybe DC could have the Bates figure dressed up in that funky “super-villain” costume he wore in that JLA-JSA crossover he and Elliot S! Maggin starred in back in the mid-70’s.

  17. Flash Fact: The Rock-Spitting Pteranodon (P. Carybatesi) had a long, toothless mouth, like modern birds. Unlike modern birds, it was able to carry a 30 lb. boulder in its mouth as it flew. It could spit its boulder up to 30 yards, accurately enough to hit a target travelling at supersonic speeds. Now you know!

  18. I’m with Jason on this one. Unless the aliens have a magic anti-dinosaur ray that just doesn’t work on mammals or think the dinosaurs will be so pleased by their increased intelligence that they’ll line up to join the alien empire, I’m pretty sure I’d rather fight intelligent humans than intelligent dinosaurs. I mean, just imagine giant angry tyrannosaurs wielding huge firearms.
    Oh wait,we don’t have to:
    http://yeoldecomicblogge.blogspot.com/2006/01/i-demand-more-t-reich.html

  19. You’ve gotta give the guy credit though. I imagine you can only write for The Flash (high concept: “There’s this guy, see? And he’s real fast.”) for so long before you’d just go nuts.

  20. I’m pretty sure dinosaurs didn’t have prehensile tails, even the super-intelligent ones.

  21. man. they, quite literally and for very good reason, don’t make them like this anymore.