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June - July 1977 |
"They're Back - in Their Own Magazine!" Having fared well in a three-issue tryout (teaser, Super-Team Family 8, STF 9, and STF 10), the Challengers get another chance to shine, as trumpeted in the Daily Planet (house ad in other comics, including Plastic Man 18).  |
The Challs' sleek jet, a modified SST (Super-Sonic Transport) flashes over the Gulf of Mexico, and out dives Prof in a Kirbyesque diving helmet. He thinks grimly, "Have to angle my dive just right, or when I hit the water, I'll snap my spine!" (What, he couldn't jump with a parachute?)  |
"Cleaving the water like a hot knife through butter" (Whoo!), Prof dives deep and flashes back on his mission. Multi-Man snuck into an atom bomb test and survived. Immune to atomic weapons, he overrode every TV network and declared himself Supreme Dictator of the world. "Multi-Man's really gone bananas this time!" says Rocky. The Challs chased him down but couldn't grab the ghost-like villain. MM grabbed June as a hostage... (Super-Team Family 10) Now Prof follows "an electronic trail" under the Gulf of Mexico to rescue June while his buddies fly to Los Angeles, MM's first target. And there's the lair. "Like a giant glassine spider it squats..."  ... and as Prof swims closer, he
gets ZAPPED by a ray! |
Coincidentally, at the moment Rocky is worrying about Prof. "Sometimes that guy just tries too hard - know what I mean?" Red argues, "Taking risks is the whole point, right, Ace?" Ace snaps, "Shut up and let me drive!" Meanwhile, elsewhere, notes an ominous dark panel, "A town waits..." Crossing the USA in 70 minutes in their SST, the Challs arrive in Los Angeles. They're greeted by an Army Colonel who's been "burning up the wires to Washington! You've got to stop that man - or we'll all die!" The Challs resist slapping him and get the story. A giant has thrown a force field around a power plant outside the city. Driving into the mountains, the
crew sees a hidden nuclear reactor. The colonel admits, "It's
the most advanced reactor in a secret government plan. If anything
happens to it, the radiation could wipe out Southern California!"
Ace lectures, "Colonel, it's insanity placing an experimental
reactor so close to people!" He's told, "Preach later,
Flyboy!" |
Red analyzes the force field. "It's a field of negatively charged protons... and as far as science knows, that's impossible!" Red dons another goofy helmet and aims a "neutron gun" (shown on the cover). When the stream of positive neutrons (oh, boy) strike the negative field, "for one split instant, the gates of Hell are thrown wide open... Then, without a second thought for his own survival," Red dives in! (What happened to teamwork?)  (Gotta love that Mike Nasser art. Look how Red almost leaps off the paper! The screen shot is the entire width of the page, and it can barely contain the action!) Meanwhile, in the soggy one-color
town, the people wait... |
Also meanwhile, under the Gulf of Mexico, we see Prof wake up under June's gentle ministrations. June is fine, but they're prisoners "and there's absolutely nothing we can do about it!" (Some cheerleader!) Prof replies, "That's a philosophy I stopped believing a long time ago... when I walked away from what should have been a fatal plane crash!" There's an airlock! June yells to stop. Prof grabs it - and get's knocked silly by an electrified charge. All the exits are juiced. Prof admits, "If I hadn't been so groggy from that weird ray, I'd have figured that out for myself." (Or if you hadn't been gassing.) "It's just so hard for me to think of Duncan Pramble a a scientific genius." June asks for the full story. Prof quickly sketches how Pramble, an archaeologist's assistant, got his hands on an alchemic formula for Liquid Light. He gained weird superpowers, got killed, was instantly reborn with different weird powers, got killed, etc. (COTU 14) June recoils. "That's - that's horrible! How can we ever hope to defeat him?" Prof announces, "I don't know, June, but I promise you this - I'm sure gonna try!" (C'mon, June! Haven't the Challs defeated Multi-Man like 347 times before?) Meanwhile, in Sog City - yeah,
yeah - a man waits... |
In LA, Red races where "the very forces of Hell rage unchecked", and bashes in a door of the nuke plant. MM aims a cone-thingy. "Die, Challenger, die!" A ray blasts the wall. Red ducks, zaps MM with the neutron gun, and snatches the cone-weapon. MM demands, "You bumbling fool! That device represents months of study and design. Give it to me!" "Ugly, I thought you'd never ask," says Red, and POW! right across the jaw! Except MM takes the round by growing, and growing, and GROWING 30 feet tall. "I hold more power in my very hand - than you shall know in a lifetime!" With no other weapon, Red zaps MM with more neutrons - THOOM! - and, "inexplicably, Multi-Man is gone!" Ace and Rocky arrive. "You did it, Red! You blew that baby to kingdom come!" Red wonders, "Did I?" Nope, says the Army Colonel. The Denver nuclear plant is under attack RIGHT NOW - from Multi-Man! Meanwhile, in that one-color city,
the waiting ends. A bony guy orders the girl taken to the church.
He'll get the book... |
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Since you can never have too many subplots in a 17-page comic, we cut to Challenger Mountain. Gaylord Clayburne, in a green jogging suit, pokes around in the Challs' headquarters. He complains, "Blast them! Just because I'm rich, they think I'm a fool... That's why they won't let me join their petty little private club..." (Or maybe it's because he's a whiner and a sneak. Besides, if their club is petty, why does he want to join? Just because he can't?) Clayburne finds a medical report
on Prof. Since it's private and confidential, he naturally reads
it... |
Speaking of Prof, inside an underwater dome, he's fooling with electricity. He rips a grounding wire loose. But he's winded, and June privately worries. Prof worries too, hoping June will think it's the ray that's hampered him, because he doesn't want the Challengers to know the truth... Prof jams the wire against the
electrified door, shorting the door - and the entire dome. It
goes black. Or rather, "The beast which is the machine around
them heaves in its death-throes - screams in its final agony
- and dies!" (The genius MM never thought of circuit breakers?)
June and Prof are plunged in deathly dark and silence, but have
succeeded better than they know... |
Because... Zipping to Denver are the three other Challs. They speculate that, since MM never had teleportation before, he must have a mechanical transporter with a million-killowatt generator sending power via broadcast beam. Rocky says, "Who cares how he gets his vitamins? We beat him once - we can do it again!" Red's exhausted, so it's Rocky's turn. In Denver, Multi-Man strides around smashing buildings. (He must really be nuts, to pull a random Godzilla.) Rocky parachutes down and aims the cone-thingy - and misses!  MM swats Rocky like a fly and takes away the cone-weapon. Which was lost in LA, so MM thanks Rocky for returning it. It's needed to detonate the nuke plant to destroy Denver! "Not if I can help it, creepo!" Rocky sees the jet zooming in. As a distraction, he jumps feet first into MM's face. "Pramble, you can take your little speech - and stick it in your ear!" At that PRECISE moment, Prof short-circuits the undersea dome - and cuts off the beam of broadcast energy. Suddenly Multi-Man can't teleport, or remain gigantic or invincible! He wobbles. At that same PRECISE instant, Ace dips the jet and whacks MM with a wing! MM falls from a cliff. (We're in downtown Denver, but suddenly he's atop a cliff.) And Multi-Man dies. Or does he? Yes and no. Duncan Pramble, archaeology
assistant, stands astounded. "I - I died again! And returned!
B-but I'm normal! No powers left!" Rocky laughs. "You
said it, has-been!" |
Meanwhile, we finally see that the citizens of Perdition, Massachusetts. led by Doctor Heathcliff Monroe, are sacrificing a virgin to a tentacled god named M'Nagalah! (Is that a crime, even in Massachusetts?)  More on monsters next issue... |
Three hours pass before the Challs return to Challenger Mountain. Very-human Duncan Pramble is in jail. The boys have picked up Prof and June from the undersea dome. But there's no happy reunion. Gaylord Clayburne rants that "One of you great heroes is a dying man... only he's too much of a coward to admit it!" The Challs know. Prof collapsed in the dome and is running a fever. They'll get the best doctors in the world for him, even S.T.A.R. Labs if necessary. Clayburne objects. He ran Prof's medical record through the computer. Only one man can save Prof - Doctor Heathcliff Monroe in Perdition, Massachusetts! "Definitely not the end!" |
The letters column, Challenger Mountain Mail Room, trumpets, "They did it! Yes, the legendary Challengers of the Unknown, who have faced the mysterious and dangerous for twenty years, finally conquered the most devastating challenge of all... NON-EXISTENCE, and beat it out!.. We have to thank YOU for making the revival of the Challengers possible! Stick with us and you'll learn that anything ELSE is possible too!" Letters talk favorably about the Super-Team Family issues. The editor notes that former artist Jim Sherman has switched to Legion of Super-Heroes, while Bob Brown is doing Wonder Woman. So what do you think of Mike Nasser's art? The editor notes "we don't
know if Corinna Stark will return, but the occult will! We're
going to be experimenting with different themes for the Challengers,
from supernatural to science-fiction. Tell us what directions
YOU like best!" So send mail. |
Comments The story is busy and full of action, but Gerry Conway never understood the difference between taking calculated risks and doing damn fool things for false bravery. And some of the concepts are mindlessly dumb. But the Mike Nasser art is sweet, if sometimes cramped, and suits the Challs well. All in all, these tales are better
than no adventures at all. |
 (A tiny house ad in other comics
announces their return.) |
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