Crisis Classics #3 - Vengeance Of The Immortal Villain!

1963 saw another team up of the two Flashes and this time a Golden Age villain with some real heft shows up -- Vandal Savage. "Vengeance of the Immortal Villain" in The Flash #137 again by Fox and the Infantino-Giella team give us another tale of Barry Allen going to Earth-2 after noticing a coincidence about some mysterious lights and some city names. He digs out his old Justice Society of America comics and checks that he's correct, the names are associated with the vintage group and so off he vibrates to Earth-2. It turns out that the mysterious lights are the work of Vandal Savage, and Jay is already on the case. He reveals that his colleagues in the JSofA have vanished. Soon enough the means of that mystery is revealed when Jay is bound in a cube of transparent material and transported across the sky. Barry rescues him and they confront the immortal Cro-Magnon Vandal Savage who quickly captures both Flashes after revealing he's already kidnapped the other JSofA members. The two Flashes are pitted against each other, but Barry's quick thinking reveals Savage's tricks and soon enough his plot is foiled and Justice Society members (Hawkman, Wonder Woman, Dr.Mid-Nite, Atom, Green Lantern, and Johnny Thunder) are out and about and thinking that a reunion might be in order. The stage is set. 

These are some whopping fun tales. They are sometimes burdened by Fox's intricate over-plotting, but somehow it all gels for the most part. It's clear that each of the three adventures adds a new dash to the mix. The first meeting is novel enough on its own with Earth-1 finding Earth-2, the second turns that on its head, and the third has the heroes battle each other for the first time. A Marvel comic of the time would've had them beating the stuffing out of each other in all three tales, and that speaks to key difference in the two companies and their approach to heroism. The comics of DC's Silver Age were pleasant and orderly and polite and polished. All of those traits are evident to a grand degree in all three of these Flash stories. Marvel was more vigorous and visceral at the time, latching onto fans left and right. This would be a problem eventually, but in 1963 it was only a small one. 

I've always liked Vandal Savage and I know I'm not alone. The immortal villain or hero is not necessarily novel concept, but Savage is one of the best examples of it in comics. Other heroes that leap to mind are Bloodstone and Logan. But a villain who stores up centuries of experience is a doughty foe indeed. It's the attitude that Savage has about humanity that makes him really dangerous; he regards humans as just so much livestock on a planet he intends to take control of. That dehumanizing aspect of his approach to villainy smacks of the worst of real-world villains who deny the basic humanity of those they cheat, swindle, and kill. It's also the method in which wars are fought, the necessary dehumanizing of the enemy is most pernicious and also does great harm to the those that participate in it. 

Next stop is the very first JLofA-JSofA crossover. See you then. 

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