Cort Carpenter has returned to once again give us a look at the latest additions to his already overstuffed Booster Gold sketchbook. Feast your eyes on these:

Scott Kolins

Todd Nauck

Richard Pace

Dan Parent

Andrew Robinson

Craig Rousseau

That Craig Rousseau piece really blows me away. You can see it and all the rest of these and more at imgur.com.

Thanks for sharing, Cort. I can't wait to see what you come up with next.

Comments (1) | Add a Comment | Tags: andrew robinson commissions cort carpenter craig rousseau dan parent imgur.com richard pace scott kolins todd nauck

Let me go ahead and say this up front: While Justice League #4 is my personal favorite comic book of all time, Justice League Quarterly #1 is a very close second. That makes it an obvious choice to be in my list of the twelve best Booster Gold comics.

What makes Justice League Quarterly #1 so great? I'll let Claire Montgomery explain.

In hindsight, a corporate-sponsored super team seems like such an obvious idea. In the late 1980s, corporate America was ascendant. When the Justice League went international with the backing of the United Nations, it was inevitable that private industry would want to strike back with super heroes they could control. Who better to lead such an endeavor than Booster Gold, the DCU's original Corporate Crusader?

In a Justice League issue, it would be easy to treat the Conglomerate as either a bunch of bumbling boobs (like the Injustice League) or as a souless gang of misguided thugs (like the Rocket Red Brigade). Instead, writers Keith Giffen and J.M. DeMatteis present the new team — including a couple of faces and names that will be familiar to "Justice League Detroit" fans — as a group worthy of respect, trying to do good inside the structure of an imperfect system.

The villains in this story aren't the corporate super team but their big-money bosses. With names like Mr. Whiteman and Mrs. Karpedeim, it's perfectly clear what we're supposed to think about a Capitalistic culture that values heroism as useful only so long as it sells another gallon of gas.

What happens when a group of well-intentioned heroes are confronted with the very difficult reality that saving money is more important that saving lives? Read on to find out.

If you think a story of super hero ethics isn't interesting enough to hold your interest for 70 pages, this issue has a few surprises for you. In addition to a very cynical look at American business culture, there are several character-driven subplots playing out around around that core, most importantly including the relationship between Booster Gold and his former BFF, Blue Beetle.

I love this book. I love the art by Chris Sprouse and Bruce Patterson. I love the Conglomerate's team uniform is a leather jacket covered with corporate patches. I love that team manager Claire Montgomery is Max Lord's ex-wife. I love that Booster Gold is forced to appear in a publicity photo with former business rival Lex Luthor. I love that Green Lantern foe Hector Hammond thinks he's not evil enough for corporate America.

And most importantly, I love that Booster and Beetle are making an effort to work through their differences.

In other words, I love Justice League Quarterly #1, and that's all the reason I need to include it among the The Best Booster Gold Stories Ever.

(Just so you know, this issue has very recently been reprinted — for the first time! — in the Justice League: Corporate Maneuvers collection. Next time you visit your Local Comic Shop, consider picking up a copy. I love mine!)

Comments (1) | Add a Comment | Tags: best of bruce patterson chris sprouse claire montgomery conglomerate j.m. dematteis justice league quarterly keith giffen

Boosterrific Note: the following was sent to me in response to my April 10 post asking for Booster Gold fans to write in and tell us a bit about themselves.

Everyone, say hello to Fin.

Hello!

I'm a bit of a Booster newbie, seeing as I've only been a fan for about a year and a half now. (To be fair, I've only been into comics for about... wow, has it been three years? It feels both longer and shorter than that!) I've had this website open in my tabs for about half that time, and love that this place exists for us to get the latest Booster-news, see art, and have fun and interesting commentary on his appearances (even if we don't agree sometimes; example one — sorry, but his second hairstyle was grossly militaristic and way too Sergeant Rock-looking, bring back the over-idealistic curl! XD). When you posted asking for fans to write in, I though, "nahhh, I'm not interesting enough," but then I thought about how Booster would use it as a marketing opportunity and decided "what the heck!"

I actually can't figure out what my first introduction to his character was. When I got into comics, I kind of splurged into a lot of different things at once, and then my old Lieutenant (that's a different story) gave me a huge box of his old comics around that time, too. I could've first seen him in Justice League Action; it could've been in the Death of Superman issues (I know I have the JLA one after the Doomsday fight); it could have also been in the more memorable AIDS PSAs of that time period, but I distinctly remember being somewhat appalled by his character in those (in my defense, I didn't know him!); but it was most likely through the Blackest Night event.

As was the case with Booster, I'm not sure when I found this website, and probably found it a few times before I really FOUND it. It was, in all likelihood, when I was looking up a specific picture and clicked the link, purely because the bit of text from the website that Google images offers intrigued me. I really love it; you are ridiculously dedicated to the point where it's inspiring, you offer fresh, informed, and actually interesting reviews, and above all you're a pretty nice guy! (See: the aforementioned disagreement I have with you, and how you were respectful and kind when someone else disagreed in the comments. It's very refreshing when most people will just get angry whenever you disagree.) Your catalogue of appearances is very helpful to the new fan like me, and even more than that I appreciate the fan works that you spotlight, and finding him in fansongs and the like that you have listed is always a treat.

Now, since I started this with the tease of a self-marketing campaign, let's do another horrible segue into that! I'm a kid (well, technically adult, but actually a child) trying to eventually get into a minor editorial position at DC (with the lofty goal of one day establishing that long-ago, way back in the eighties talked-about Blue and Gold series), but I need some exposure before I get that far. As such, I'm currently working for a small independent press (traditional books, not comics) called Apprentice House. We can always use more manuscripts, and we've got a new batch of books I've worked on through acquisitions, editorial, marketing, and a bit of design! Check us out; we've also got more coming out in October! Beyond that, I'm currently writing a short comic that will be up on Webtoons in the coming months. It's for a short story contest, so views and likes and such are greatly appreciated (30% of the judging criteria, too, dern!). The title is "The Tree of Life is Rotting"; the plot is the same. Check it out, hopefully you'll find it interesting and a good read!

Thanks for your time in reading this long rant; I'm ending it now for everyone's sake! I hope you're staying safe, sane, and happy during this chaotic mess of a time, and I wish you a good day. Cheers!

Thank you, Fin. I'm sure you've already realized I only posted this because you said I was a nice guy and not because you're so wrong about hairstyles.

If anyone else would like to share and/or self-promote, please drop me a line through the Boosterrific.com Contact Portal or directly at walter(at)boosterrific.com.

Comments (0) | Add a Comment | Tags: fans fin hair

DC will be releasing Harley Quinn #72 tomorrow whether your Local Comic Shop is open or not (and whether your shop is accepting non-Diamond shipments or not).

Some of you young 'uns with your newfangled digital devices may want to forego buying a floppy and instead opt for the digital edition somewhere like Comixology.com.

In any event, know that the issue will soon exist in the wild for you to hunt down at your convenience. And I know that you'll want to, because Booster Gold is definitely in it, as the preview at DCComics.com proves.

Golly, does everything have to be about death these days? I mean, COVID-19 trigger warning, people.

Hey, wait a second, are they holding hands? Gasp! They're not social distancing!

No, seriously, Booster. I'm doing you a favor, man. Stay away from her. She's bad news. She literally tried to kill you. Multiple times. And not with a disease, with a mallet. That's a relationship red flag, buddy.

Buy this issue (sooner or later — but safely!) and make Skeets jealous.

Thanks to Michael Stalans for the preview link.

UPDATE 2020-05-11: Eskana put this link in the comments below, but I'm going to repost it here so everyone can see it. From CBR.com: "Harley Quinn's Sam Humphries Explains Her Budding Romance With Booster Gold". Just say no, Booster!

Comments (7) | Add a Comment | Tags: cbr.com dccomics.com eskana harley quinn michael stalans new releases previews sam humphries

What makes a hero super? The super powers! From awesome strength to zero-to-sixty speed, great superpowers are the most useful tricks in every famous costumed crime-fighter's tool kit. Michael Jon Carter knew this, and that's why he started his career with a telepathically-controlled flight ring.

As a student of history, Michael "Booster" Carter modeled his superhero persona on Superman. In addition to strength, invulnerability, and long-range energy beams, he'd also need to be able to fly. To that end, he stole a Legion of Super-Heroes Flight Ring, created by Brainiac 5 in the pages of Adventure Comics #329 (1965).

In its original design, the ring was a simple metal band that provided a telepathically-controlled anti-gravity effect for those Legionnaires who could not fly under their own power. They soon became standard issue equipment for all Legionnaires. Even Superboy had one, though he rarely had need of it except in those few cases where he lost his powers, such as the time he visited Earth's past and found it lit by a red sun.

(If you squint at the panel above, you can see a flight ring there on Superboy's hand in this panel from Adventure Comics #133, also in 1965. This is the first time Superboy wore a Flight Ring.)

Brainiac 5 wasn't content with having a ring that only allowed flight. He eventually gave the ring other abilities, including sending emergency distress signals. He also improved its appeal by converting it to a gold signet-style ring showing a raised letter "L" in the center (first appearance in Adventure Comics #347). That's how the ring looked when it found its way into Booster Gold's arsenal in Booster Gold #1 (1985), and that's more or less how it looked when Booster Gold joined the Justice League in Justice League #4 (1987) and escaped from a Bialyan prison in Justice League International #17 (1988).

Booster's ring was originally depicted with a letter from the Roman alphabet. However, it sometimes was seen showing Interlac, the "inter-galactic universal language of the 30th century" which first appeared in Adventure Comics #379 (1969). By Booster Gold volume 2 #1 (2007), Booster's ring had changed to the stylized "L" on a black background that had been in use since Legion of Super-Heroes #41 (1993).

How could one ring alter its appearance so much? Well, the Legion of Super-Heroes have a tendency for getting involved in reality-warping time travel shenanigans. In fact, that's how a Legion of Super-Heroes ring from the 30th century ended up in the 25th-century Space Museum in the first place.

When Booster's debut in the 20th century drew the attention of the Legion of Super-Heroes, Brainiac 5 realized he had to leave his own flight ring in 1985 for Booster to be able to steal it in 2462 (as seen in Booster Gold #6). Therefore, the ring was available for Booster Gold to steal only because he had already stolen it. (It's best not to think too hard about that.)

If it sounds like Booster Gold creator Dan Jurgens was making things up as he went along, he was. His original plan, as revealed in Booster Gold: The Big Fall, was that instead of stealing Brainiac 5's ring from the Space Museum, Booster would have stolen Superboy's rarely used original ring from the Superman Museum!

That plan was scuttled by the events of Crisis on Infinite Earths, which erased Superboy's adventures from history. Thus the original origin of Booster Gold's flight ring became just one more casualty of the universe-destroying Anti-Monitor. What a jerk.

If you'd like to read about the origins of other powers in Booster Gold's arsenal, check out previous spotlight posts on his Force Field Belt and Booster Shots.

Comments (0) | Add a Comment | Tags: adventure comics brainiac 5 dan jurgens justice league international legion flight ring legion of super-heroes powers superboy superboy superman