Batman and Robin Adventures Annual #1

“Shadow of the Phantasm”

Cover Price: $2.95
Bargain Price: $1.00
Cover Date: November 1996

I realize that this blog is in serious danger of becoming the blog that just won’t shut up about Mike Parobeck, but there is no better issue to spark discussion about the man and his art than this, his final work. The story, a sequel to the animated series feature film Mask of the Phantasm, features Bruce Wayne’s lost love cum murderous vigilante Andrea Beaumont/Phantasm returning to Gotham to tie up loose ends. It’s a nice enough story with Paul Dini providing some good character work for Beaumont and a nice moment about the Joker’s pre-acid bath identity. The story, however, is rather fittingly overshadowed by the loss of Parobeck, who is beautifully eulogized in the issue’s final page essay by Scott Peterson that describes the merits of the man and his work far better than I ever could and which is worth the price of admission alone. As Peterson says, Parobeck was, by all accounts, a hell of a nice guy with a style that was consistently solid and often amazing, displaying a storytelling craft that is often ironically missing from our favorite visual medium. As I’ve said before, Parobeck’s art was a true bright spot in the dark days of the mid-nineties and the medium as a whole is weaker for his loss. Personally, I wish I’d discovered Parobeck’s art when he was alive, but I’m always grateful that it remains preserved on the four color page to be rediscovered again and again.

Mutant, Texas: Tales of Sheriff Ida Red #1

Cover Price: $2.95
Bargain Price: 5/$100
Cover Date: May 2002

As the title indicates, this series focuses on Sheriff Ida Red, a character created by Paul Dini and featured in a few Jingle Belle back-up stories. The rub here is that Ida Red is not yet a sheriff, with this mini existing to tell her origin. The story, expertly rendedred by artist J. Bone, Dini’s frequent Jingle Belle collaborator, begins with a baby Ida, orphaned when her mother is eaten by a giant rattle snake. From here, we see Ida’s early life, raised by a talking bear in the imaginatively created world of Mutant, Texas, a town full of people and animals who were mutated by a radioactive meteor strike into cactus guys, plant people, and talking bears, coyotes, and armadillos and, sadly, Ida, the town’s only “normal” human, feels a bit isolated and yearns to explore the outside world. This issue also sets up her chance to do just that with the revelation that many of the town’s mutant inhabitants are being kidnapped and exhibited in freak shows around south Texas. Bone’s “animated” style, in the same vein as Darwyn Cooke and Bruce Timm, fits the content beautifully and brings it all to life, giving the world the charm it needs to really be memorable. Ultimately, this issue could probably be a bit more engaging, but as the first part of a mini, it more than does its job. I’ll definitely be keeping an eye out for issues two – three at some upcoming cons.