This week DC released The Return of Superman 30th Anniversary Special, which reunites Dan Jurgens and the other creators who made the original event such a compelling read that it's worth revisiting three decades later. I enjoyed reading it, but I am duty bound to point out that Booster Gold is not in that book.

Of course, longtime Booster boosters know that's an appropriate omission. At the time, Booster Gold's superhero career looked to be just as dead as Superman with no clear signs that he would ever be returning.

Doomsday destroyed Booster's original 25th-century powersuit in Superman #74 (written by Dan Jurgens), and Booster spent most of the 1993 summer of "Regin of the Superman" on the sidelines as the Justice League put itself back together under Wonder Woman's leadership. Superman would be back at work by October, but it would take Booster another 4 years before his powers were even close to the what they had been before. In fact, the restoration came exactly 50 months later, in Superman #124 (written by Dan Jurgens).

Which is not to say that Booster plays no role behind the scenes in The Return of Superman 30th Anniversary Special. The 2010 story "The Tomorrow Memory," beginning Booster Gold volume 2 #28 (written by guess who), establishes that Booster Gold, in his role as Time Master, was in Coast City while it was being destroyed by Cyborg Superman.... to ensure that it was destroyed.

That may not seem very "heroic," but without Booster Gold, Time Master, it's possible that no one would consider The Return of Superman worth revisiting 30 years later. Being a Time Master is a thankless job, but somebody's got to do it.

Comments (4) | Add a Comment | Tags: dan jurgens death superman

When you visit your Local Comic Shop this week, you'll see a lot of Booster Gold!

Not only is Booster inside Dark Crisis on Infinite Earths #6 (as visible in the preview at AIPTComics.com), he's also on the cover:

As is increasingly the case at DC, there are several covers to this issue. Officially, that one is being called the "Cvr A Daniel Sampere & Alejandro Sanchez" Cover. You may have seen it recently in the DC house ad promoting this month's Dark Crisis tie-in issues.

Speaking of multiple covers, Booster is also appearing on several covers of Death of Superman 30th Anniversary Special #1:

Officially the "Cvr A Dan Jurgens & Brett Breeding Gatefold Cover"

Officially the "Cvr C Ivan Reis & Danny Miki Funeral for a Friend Variant"

You may have seen the wraparound cover in recent DC Nation columns promoting this month's "90's Rewind" tie-in issues. It's so nice, it's also being reused on the Death of Superman 30th Anniversary Special #1 "Cvr F Memorial Dan Jurgens & Brett Breeding Bleeding Bag Premium Polybag Variant"!

How many of these comics are you going to buy to make Skeets happy?

Comments (2) | Add a Comment | Tags: aiptcomics.com alejandro sanchez brett breeding covers dan jurgens daniel sampere danny miki dark crisis death ivan reis new releases previews superman

While Booster boosters were occupied with last week's announcement and pre-sale of the McFarlane Toys Blue and Gold action figure 2-Pack, DC Comics tried to sneak another announcement past us:

That's the "Gatefold Main Cover" by Dan Jurgens and Brett Breeding of The Death of Superman 30th Anniversary Special #1, coming to a Local Comic Shop near you on November 8. And, as you can see, Booster Gold is on it.

According to the press release at DCComics.com, Jurgens and Breeding are just part of the all-star cast of writers and artists from the original "Death of Superman" reuniting for this special. The issue also brings back Roger Stern and Butch Guice, Louise Simonson and Jon Bogdanove, and Jerry Ordway and Tom Grummett. Yes, please.

This is obviously a big deal for DC, so obviously there are multiple covers. Nine, in fact, if you count the "Premium Polybag Variant." What you see above is the main cover. That means it'll be the cover you'll find if when you open the polybag to get your updated armband.

(Personal side note: for many, many years, I've worn a black leather jacket modeled after the Tom Grummet cover of The Adventures of Superman #501 with a Superman #75 black arm band. That armband is not a particularly durable fabric [2015 pictures here], and I look forward to replacing it.)

Anyway, while not every cover has been revealed yet, DC's announcement does include the "Funeral for a Friend" variant cover by Ivan Reis and Danny Miki. Like the Dan Jurgens variant for Justice League #75 a few months back that homaged "Funeral for a Friend," this cover also pays tribute to the Superman #75 poster, also with Booster Gold:

(Yes, that *is* Blue Beetle behind Booster on that cover. I'm sure I don't need to remind you that Beetle was not present for Superman's funeral because Doomsday put him in a coma. But if I'm going to nitpick, I probably should say something about Martian Manhunter/Bloodwynd. And let's just not go there.)

So if you're counting, that's at least *two* copies of The Death of Superman 30th Anniversary Special #1 you're going to need to keep your Booster Gold comic collection complete.

I'll let you know if that number goes up.

Comments (1) | Add a Comment | Tags: brett breeding covers dan jurgens danny miki dccomics.com death ivan reis solicitations superman

Longtime Booster booster Morgenstern recently asked me a very good question:

Did you ever write an article about this dropped idea of making Tim Drake Blue Beetle and the Death of Booster Gold by Scott Beatty & Chuck Dixon?

The answer is "no." And I'll correct that oversight right now.

Before I can explain, let me set the stage. The early 2000s were a lean time for Booster Gold. He made exactly two in-continuity, non-flashback appearances in 2001, both in very small parts (just a few panels) as set dressing for the "Our Worlds at War" and "Joker's Last Laugh" crossover events. Although Booster was still friends with Ted Kord, the Blue Beetle was finding much greater success as an associate of Oracle's Birds of Prey. That's where this story begins.

In Birds of Prey #39 (released in January 2002), Ted Kord is diagnosed with a heart condition that forces him to hang up his tights. However,Birds of Prey and Robin writer Chuck Dixon and his "Joker: Last Laugh" co-collaborator Scott Beatty didn't intend this to be the end of the Blue Beetle, just an opportunity for a passing of the mantle.

The plan, as Beatty revealed on his blog in a 2019 post titled "THE CLIP FILE: How Scott Beatty & Chuck Dixon *ALMOST* Turned Robin Into BLUE BEETLE!," was that "a gravely injured Ted Kord would find a replacement Blue Beetle while he convalesced... assuming that he would survive at all. It would be a *paid* position occupied by a cash-strapped Tim Drake (a.k.a. Robin III)." Christopher Irving's 2007 encyclopedic The Blue Beetle Companion confirms the plan, quoting Dixon as elaborating that eventually "an invalid Ted Kord would direct a half dozen Blue Beetles (all with different talents) to battle international crime."

What makes all of this relevant to Booster Gold fans is exactly how Beatty and Dixon intended to launch this enterprise in the pages of a proposed mini-series they called Blue Beetles. Quoting from the mini-series pitch proposal on Beatty's blog:

We throw down the gauntlet with the death of Booster Gold.

Really.

With ground-support from Ted, Danny and Star begin an investigation into the events surrounding Booster Gold's demise, a mystery which provides the backbone to the first few issues. Their trial-by-fire begins as Ted launches an ambitious campaign to reel in any Beetle foes still at-large, sending his apprentice Beetles to capture a string of rogues and offer them clemency if they swear to renounce villainy; otherwise it's a one-way ticket to the Slab. And now that it's tucked away in polar isolation at the bottom of the world, NOBODY wants to go to the Slab.

Meanwhile, Booster is celebrated on the evening news, showered in fifteen minutes of celebrity as unofficial biographies are published, how-to videos are hawked, and the promotional machine grinds dollars out of heroic sacrifice.

The kicker is this: Booster's death was faked by Maxwell Lord in order to capitalize on the cult of celebrity surrounding young stars dying young and leaving beautiful corpses. Lord plans on marketing the Booster Gold bio and telepic, then engineering a ballyhooed superhero resurrection.

Booster and Max are in cahoots, hoping to spike interest in the hero's eventual resurrection and subsequent product endorsement deals. What's worse, both Booster and Max were willing to silence Ted Kord in order to maintain the ruse.

That's... just.... Wow.

Although this particular pitch was denied by the Powers-That-Be at DC at the time for unspecified reasons — and I can't say I'm too saddened by that particular decision — it's amazing to see how many of these ideas presage what would actually unfold in the hands of other writers. Remember, this was 2002. Max's villain turn in Countdown to Infinite Crisis was still three years away, and Booster's death would be a key component of Infinite Crisis-follow up 52!

For more information on this particular footnote of DC history, I encourage you to read Beatty's full proposal for Blue Beetles on his blog, scottbeatty.blogspot.com.

Thanks for helping me correct my oversight, M.

Comments (0) | Add a Comment | Tags: blogspot.com blue beetle blue beetles chuck dixon death max lord morgenstern robin scott beatty ted kord tim drake

It is a cliche in superhero comic books that characters die and then get better. The trope was well established by the time Superman's funeral ignited the general public's imagination, but ever since 1992, you simply aren't a real super hero until you've returned from "the other side" at least once.

Booster Gold joined that not-so-elusive club on this day in 1994 between the panels of Justice League Task Force #13.

At the time, the Justice League had been fractured into three groups with incompatible philosophies about what constituted "justice." Wonder Woman's "international" faction was most in line with the historic methods of the team as the strong arm of traditional, established political authorities. Martian Manhunter's task force was also aligned with the United Nations, though it preferred less direct means of diffusing problems. Captain Atom, on the other hand, championed more unconventional and forceful means of "extreme" justice, fighting fire with fire, so to speak.

These internal differences were exacerbated by the threat of the alien Overmaster, who had returned to Earth (after a previous encounter with the Justice League a decade earlier) in order to eradicate humanity. He had the power to do it, too. The dysfunctional Justice Leagues America, International, and Task Force have to put aside their differences to stop him. The crossover event, titled "Judgement Day," reads better than many of DC's official "Crisis"s.

Usually, comic book deaths are used as a cheap trick to ramp up the stakes, tug at the heartstrings, or inflate the threat posed by the bad guy. Booster was lucky. He died in a good story that respected established characterization. Specifically, his death was a side-effect of his overconfidence that history couldn't ever be changed, a misunderstanding with tragic consequences.

Of course, that wouldn't mean much unless Booster recovered to learn from his mistake. Spoiler alert: he did.

Comments (6) | Add a Comment | Tags: blue beetle death justice league