Okay, so Batman Beyond #48 is finally out, and let me say... it was totally worth the wait.

CBR.com has a preview.

Do yourself and Skeets a favor and buy this issue to make you happy.

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Xylob recently wrote to say that I didn't have an explanation of how I classified the different continuities on the Continuity List. I fixed that. (The definition now appears as part of the page text.) Thanks, Xylob!

While fixing it, I took another look at Booster Gold's first DCAU appearance in Superman & Batman Magazine #8.

Here is a very condensed version of the story, "Let Justice Be Done" written by Roger Stern, containing every panel that Booster Gold appears in. See if you don't agree with me that this is the very best his 1990s armor looked.

Apparently, when Booster Gold lost his original suit in the Animated Universe, he also lost his voice. But you have to agree that his then-new suit sure looks as good as it ever did under the pencils of Ty Templeton and pens of Rick Burchett! (Captain Atom's long hair is pretty cool, too.)

My new motto for the 1990s: "It wasn't all bad." Especially in comparison to the 2020s.

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In Booster Gold Volume 2, our hero became a time travelling policeman, someone whose job was to travel through time and ensure that history unfolds correctly. Given that the DC Universe has a propensity for frequent, reality-shifting Crises, the obvious question becomes "what is correct"? What history can be changed, and what can't?

Booster Gold #5 answers that question, which is why it is in my list of the twelve best Booster Gold comics.

To teach Booster Gold (and his audience) about the limits of interfering with history, the original Time Master, Rip Hunter, sends Booster back to one of the most known and respected stories in DC Comics history: The Killing Joke. Booster soon learns there is nothing funny about it.

What follows are about a dozen pages of Booster Gold (and Skeets!) having his shiny butt handed to him by the Joker and his goons. Over and over again, Booster tries to prevent the Joker from brutalizing Barbara Gordon. Over and over again he fails.

It's not always an easy read, but it is a worthwhile one — especially when you realize the gambit Hunter is playing and at what personal cost. It is also a valiant definition of true heroism courtesy of writer Geoff Johns. No matter how many times Booster Gold gets knocked down, he always gets back up again. What a guy!

It should be noted that a large part of what makes this light-on-dialogue book such a great read is the art, which Dan Jurgens and Norm Rapmund intentionally based on the original material drawn by Brian Bolland.

While legendary writer Alan Moore always gets most of the credit, Bolland's detailed and disturbing art is no small part of what has made The Killing Joke an enduring classic, and he deserves some recognition for making Booster Gold #5 one of The Best Booster Gold Stories Ever.

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Yesterday, I woke to an email from Booster booster Logan Peterson, who had spotted Booster Gold making a cameo appearance at the end of Batman Beyond #47 in anticipation of his guest-starring role next month!

Well, if Batman doesn't exist, DC will be out of comic books, so you'd better get to work, Booster.

Is it just me, or is it starting to seem that Booster Gold has a new role in the DCnU as the harbinger of series cancellation? He showed up as the new boyfriend of Harley Quinn just in time for that series to be canceled. Before that, he played a key role in Action Comics immediately prior to all the storylines of that series being abandoned to whatever it was that Brian Michael Bendis wanted to do. And now he's guest starring in Batman Beyond, a series already announced to be canceled at issue #50 in December.

The Justice League currently has its hands full with Perpetua and Laughing Batman, but maybe they should be more worried about Booster Gold, who may soon be coming to end an ongoing series near them.

Anyway, thanks for the info, Logan. Everyone buy that issue and make Skeets happy!

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If you've been keeping track of my list of the twelve best Booster Gold comics, you know that we've reached number 9. More importantly, we've reached a turning point in the history of Booster Gold.

By 2007, Booster Gold was widely recognized as a laughingstock, has-been as a former member of the long-derided Justice League International. Booster Gold Volume 2, Number 1 begins the story of how Booster started his second act as The Greatest Hero The World Has Never Known!

As it happens all too often, the real trouble starts when Booster finally gets what he has sought since his earliest appearances in Booster Gold Volume 1: the acceptance of his peers.

As you can see, this issue is a great jumping on point for new Booster Gold fans. Never read a comic with Booster Gold before? No problem. Writers Geoff Johns and Jeff Katz make the issue accessible to casual Justice League fans and longtime Booster Gold fans alike.

It's not an exaggeration to say that without the changes to Booster's status quo that were begun in this story, significantly fewer readers would even care which comics should be considered The Best Booster Gold Stories Ever!

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