Last week, we reviewed Booster Gold's sole appearance as the villain Bloodbath in a bit of pseudo-history. This week, let's take a look at some real history, Booster Gold's appearance in the first issue of Bloodbath.

If you're unaware, the summer 1993 DC annuals featured the Bloodlines storyline of an other-dimensional alien race who came to Earth to harvest humans spinal fluid. (Don't bother asking why a race of aliens would develop the need for human spinal fluid for their reproduction process. Comic books don't have time for your silly science.)

DC used the event to create new characters from the survivors of these alien attacks. These new super heroes -- all very '90s, if you know what I mean -- were called the "New Blood" and received the majority of the focus in these stories. That left precious little room for established characters like Booster Gold.

At the time, Booster was still adjusting to his new, post-Doomsday armor, and was arguably more hindrance than help to the Justice League. As a result, Booster confronts and is defeated by three separate aliens in this issue alone. Even if the story doesn't give our hero much of a break, it's still great to see Booster's commitment to heroics.

Yes, the premise is a bit ridiculous and smacks of market-driven storytelling, and yes, Booster Gold comes off looking washed-up. However, there will always be something satisfying about DC heroes banding together to save Earth from yet another alien invasion. If nothing else, the series deserves credit for inspiring the DC Bloodlines website, and that's got to count for something.

(P.S. The Boosterrific Forum is back online. Hopefully we'll get some good Booster Gold news to talk about from New York ComicCon this weekend!)

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