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Boosterrific.com: The Complete, Annotated Adventures of Booster Gold
Boosterrific.com: The Complete, Annotated Adventures of Booster Gold

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Booster Gold

“The Tomorrow Memory: Epilogue”

Volume 2, Issue 31, June 2010
Released April 14, 2010

Cover Price: $2.99
Guide Price: $3.00 (as of 2011)
Estimated Issue Sales: 19,818

Boosterrific.com Rating
  • Currently 4.0/5 Stars.
Fan Rating
  • Currently 3.7/5 Stars.

Booster Gold, Vol. 2, #31. Image © DC Comics

 

ARTISTS

Writer: Dan Jurgens
Penciller: Dan Jurgens
Inker: Norm Rapmund
Colorist: Hi-Fi Designs
Letterer: Sal Cipriano
Assistant Editor: Harvey Richards
Editor: Michael Siglain
Cover Artists: Hi-Fi Designs, Dan Jurgens, Norm Rapmund

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CHARACTERS & SETTINGS

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ISSUE DETAILS

Cover Description: Booster Gold looks dejected as Goldstar flies away.

Brief Synopsis: Booster Gold must face the consequences of his actions.

Booster Gold's role in this story:
Featured (Booster Gold plays a prominent role)

Costume Worn: MARK I.v2 power-suit

Issue Notes: This is the last issue of Booster Gold written/drawn by character creator Dan Jurgens. Jurgens leaves the book to pursue other, higher profile projects.

This story has been reprinted in:
Booster Gold: The Tomorrow Memory (2010)

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ANNOTATIONS

Page 2, panel 1
Booster Gold and Skeets are in battle with agents of Skull in downtown Metropolis. Presumably Skull is behind the "Mysterious Thefts" of technology referenced in the Daily Planet headlines in the vending machines nearby. Skull is in many ways similar to the 1000, another scientifically advanced criminal organization long opposed by Superman. This similarity is no doubt intentional: Booster's battle with a squad of Skull in the streets of Metropolis bookends Dan Jurgens' work on the Booster Gold series. It is fitting that in Jurgens' last issue of Booster Gold, Volume 2, he should revisit elements from the very first published Booster Gold adventure in 1986.

Image Copyright DC Comics

Page 5, panel 2
PESL SIGHTING: Return of the name "Pesl" in a storefront sign in the background. The name "Pesl" has previously appeared in Booster Gold issues 23, 26, and 28. As previously mentioned, Pesl is a college friend of Norm Rapmund, and Rapmund includes his friend's name in his inks from time to time.

Page 6, panel 4
Booster Gold chased a Skull agent (riding what appears to be a Mattel Hoverboard from the movie Back to the Future II) through a park. Could this be Metropolis' famed Centennial Park?

Page 8, panel 3
POWER UP: Booster Gold's force field acts as an unyielding, low-friction energy barrier, causing energy weapons to ricochet off of its surface instead of being absorbed or dissipated on contact. Though this seems impossible in modern science, it's best to remember that the invulnerable force field was designed by an alien genius in the 30th century.

Page 8, panel 5
SPOILER WARNING!: Reveal

Page 11, panel 2
Booster meets with Rip Hunter on June 30, 1908, on the banks of the Podkamennaya Tunguska River in Siberia, Russia. On that evening, a meteorite exploded in the Earth's atmosphere, leveling forests and disrupting the planetary atmosphere. The explosion has since become widely known as the Tunguska Event.

Page 11, panel 5
See the previous issue for more details about Booster Gold's failures in Coast City.

Page 14, panel 2
POWER DOWN: It is unclear whether Booster Gold's force field would allow him to survive the estimated 10 megatonne explosion of the Tungska event. Booster has previously survived a less powerful nuclear explosion (in 52 Week 15).

Page 15, panel 2
SCHOOL'S IN: Booster walks past Rip Hunter's Chalkboard. Booster specifically refers to the location as the oddly specific "Rip's Arizona Time Lab," raising the question of whether Hunter may have other labs. The chalkboard always contains references to upcoming events throughout the DC Universe. In this case, the chalkboard writing includes the phrase "...And the Lord Taketh Away...," likely an allusion to events revealed in Brightest Day #0 (released on the same day as this issue) that will have a future bearing on Booster Gold in the pages of Justice League: Generation Lost.

Image Copyright DC Comics

Page 17, panel 1
Booster Gold tried to save Barbara Gordon from the Joker in Booster Gold, Volume 2, #5.

Page 17, panel 5
Booster Gold admits to his twin sister, Michelle, that his marriage to Gladys was a practical joke on Ted Kord, the former Blue Beetle II. This is the first reference to Gladys in the published canon of Booster Gold adventures since the Super Buddies disbanded. While this explanation is not entirely consistent with the past, it does not mean that Booster is lying. Note that Booster claims that he never married Gladys, not that Gladys doesn't exist.

Page 18, panel 2
Booster laments his loneliness, especially following the death of Ted Kord. In recent years, many of Booster's teammates of yesteryear have been killed, including Amazing Man, Batman, Blue Beetle, Dr. Fate, Elongated Man, Firestorm, Ice, Martian Manhunter, Maxima, Maxwell Lord (twice), and Rocket Red. Some returned to life even before the conclusion to Blackest Night, but that does not nullify the grief or estrangement Booster Gold has felt on their initial death.

Page 20, panel 2
A PAIR OF DOCS?: Booster Gold and Rip Hunter return to Booster's previous fight with Skull, seen earlier in this issue (page 6, panel 4).

Page 20, panel 5
BUSTER GOLD: The "Buster" Gold joke, first appearing in Booster Gold, Volume 1, #1, never gets old.

Page 21, panel 4
SPOILER WARNING!: Reveal

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REVIEWS

Boosterrific Review: Dan Jurgens' last Booster Gold for the foreseeable future is a bittersweet moment. Jurgens' run has been much like watching a slowly melting iceberg, waiting for the vaguely hinted mammoth inside to be finally fully revealed. The stories have been action packed and full of promise, but have done little to move the details of the past, future, or character of Booster forward in any appreciable manner. So while I hate to see the character's creator go, I do look forward to some fresh momentum to Booster's adventures.

The issue is full of action, great characterization, intentional references to the past, and confusing time-travel nonsense. The story has the air of an extended goodbye, an unexpected development following the revelations and finality of the previous issue that make this comic seem unnecessarily long and drawn-out. Jurgens leaves the book with several dangling plot threads and no promise for resolution. (Who invaded Ted Kord's lab? Who is the Black Beetle and what is his plan? Is Booster Gold ever going to have that long-promised fist fight with Brainiac 5 and a Tyrannosaurus Rex?) And despite resolving the relationship between Michael and Michelle Carter, her character is still paper-thin and directionless. There is nothing wrong with this comic book, it just fails to meet the lofty expectations that came with the departure of character and series creator Dan Jurgens.

Boosterrific Rating:

  • Currently 4.0/5 Stars.
Worth Its Weight In Gold.

Average Fan Rating:

  • Currently 3.7/5 Stars.
(3 votes)

  • Currently 4.0/5 Stars.
Erin (Jun. 19, 2010, 13:32:41)
I really enjoyed this issue although I will admit that the biggest thrill I got was on the last page where I was truly shocked to learn that Rip and Booster would be appearing in TROBW and a Time Masters series. Strange to say it but I do think Michelle came off as a stronger character in the first run. She wasn't afraid to break the law to save her brother, she was sarcastic and I liked seeing her differ from Booster by regarding Skeets as just a robot. And yes I'm ecstatic that the Gladys bit was explained away as that never made sense to me and I thought it only hurt the character. I liked the bit with Rip and Booster. While Rip did point out how Boosters' emotions were distracting him again he didn't preach and Booster didn't snap at him. It felt like a nice little bonding moment made a the better with Rips' ironic smile when he admits that he's not Boosters' father. The grown is hinted at with Booster seeming genuinely disappointed that Rip isn't going with them to cerebrate.

  • Currently 4.0/5 Stars.
Superman (May. 16, 2010, 10:47:53)

  • Currently 3.0/5 Stars.
KMD (Apr. 20, 2010, 20:22:17)
I may be knocking it down a star due to higher hopes since I was expecting a bit more. I read this, especially Rip's talk with Booster, with the sense of having read this before. The idea of directing time and explanations of the ripples a single event can cause are no longer fresh. I was expecting more of a bang for Dan Juregns' last shot-for now--with Booster. Michelle...not a deep character despite all the suffering she has seen. She is an odd spot-you can not make her a romantic lead but you can not make her too motherly either. Increased banter and bickering?

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