Batman Family Reunion Episode #4 – Merry (Very) Christmas!

Happy Holidays!  Robin and Batgirl are spending them apart, but you can join Paul Kien and Shawn M. Myers as they take you on a sleigh ride through Batman Family #4!   We have 2 new tales starring Batgirl and Robin, the first appearance of Fatman, and an extra-length epic guest starring the Elongated Man!

But most importantly, we have a special guest star - Chris Franklin! He drops in to talk about one of his favorite holiday stories (but we are mostly glad that he brought the casserole made by Cindy!)

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23 responses to “Batman Family Reunion Episode #4 – Merry (Very) Christmas!

  1. Fun show, boys!

    That cover is a very strange hue–I see it more as a deep, deep maroon, but for an Xmas issue what’s wrong with bright red or green?

    Regarding the “Justice is for Everyone” ad–I think the issue with the kid is the creeping up lighting. That’s always a shorthand for someone being weird or suspicious, so even when it’s applied to a kid, it looks off. Neal Adams was/is a genius but once in a while his adherence to realistic photographic style lighting didn’t work well in comics form.

    Regarding the toy ad–that Super Friends car is the holy grail for a lot of superhero toy collectors. I never had it, and if you find it on ebay now its like several thousand dollars. On a related note, we have a Patreon!

    Fatman–now there’s a concept that’s aged super well, eh? I wonder if his utility belt had a lot more doodads in it, because it had to cover so much more territory.

    This show is a continually joyous addition to the network.

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    1. Does this question mean that I’m going to have to do ACTUAL research
      instead of just looking things up on Mike’s Amazing World ?!?!?!?

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        1. Diamond Lil, AKA Diamond Tooth Lil (see Wikipedia entry) is the nom du joie de vivre of two Austrian immigrants to the North American West. They both had diamond insets in their teeth. One sang, one ran brothels. Now it is associated with tough, sexy dames with raucous lifestyles. Mae West wrote a play of the same name and starred in it. The U.S. Army Air Force named a B-24 Liberator Diamond Lil. In Vietnam, a young Airman on a B-52 named Diamond Lil shot down a MiG jet fighter (back when B-52s had gunners for self-defense). That particular aircraft was on static display at the U.S. Air Force Academy in the late 20th century.

          I’ll check back in to field any questions.

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  2. Great episode fellas, my segment notwithstanding!

    I have the 1976 DC Super Calendar, and it is a wonderful time capsule of the period. And as was pointed out in the episode and Rob’s feedback, that Super Friends Dune Buggy is one of the absolute holy grails of all grails…even if it’s kind of rough and dopey looking. That’s part of the charm.

    Speaking of toys, I may have to disown Martin Gray myself for calling the Six Million Dollar Man Steve Austin doll “rubbish”. Just never say that at a toy show Martin. I would fear for your safety!

    I appreciated the spotlight on Pablo Marcos. After not seeing his work in comics much after a certain point, I did see his name in those comic style YA classics adaptations. Glad to hear he’s still with us.

    Oh, and I do agree with Shawn about the cover. It’s not bad, and as far as “boxed” covers go, at least Chan creatively breaks the format up a bit. But it’s definitely one of those bait and switch covers. We need a Bat-Bobsled, dagnabbit!!!

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  3. Great episode, gentlemen. All these stories had their appealing aspects — charming new characters or great José Delbo art (sorry, Rob!) or what have you. That said, none of them will make it into my top ten stories starring these members of the Batman family. That’s okay. There isn’t a living embodiment of the night or vengeance or justice to be found in these pages, but that’s just fine, too. The heroes are all relatable humans trying to do the right thing, and I miss that.

    On a side note, not even LIDAR can explain that monocle.

    Can’t wait to join y’all ’round the horseshoe pit!

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      1. I reckon we are, partner. The family done held the reunion a mite west o’Gotham this year. But all the kinfolk’re welcome, o’course. You know the family’s always had lots o’ folks back east, Mart. Some o’ y’all just come from farther back east than others.

        Well, I’ll quit jawin’ ’bout things ever’body knows and head to the bunkhouse. This ol’ cowpoke’s plum wore out!

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  4. Sorry for the delay in responding to the latest episode of excellence, I am currently on holiday with Ralph and Sue, and there are shenanigans to be investigated. My bits were twitching like crazy. You know, when you’re with Sue you realise that everything’s all right in the world – and probably always will be.

    Regarding this issue’s cover, I also see that box as brown, not red at all. Maybe it’s to do with what end of the print run our copies were at.

    I wonder if lots of readers were disappointed that this issue didn’t have just one new story featuring Babs and her Dick. Surely that was the book’s USP, the main reason people were buying. Still, even with its fib status, that cover is a winner. And count me as another Jose Delbo fan, I think ‘journeyman’ is a rotten underestimation of his talents and worth.

    Are you sure that is a goatee on John Brooke’s head in the Elongated Man story? I interpreted it as shadow. There aren’t many pics of John online, so it’s hard to say how he looked back then, but that, to me, looks like chin shading … for one thing, it’s solid black rather than light brown, like his head hair. Whatever the case, at least it’s not a soul patch – I think we can all agree, they are the worst, the Twinkies of facial fuzz.

    You were asking us to suggest a new Bat History section title – how about Flashbat?

    It was fascinating to hear about the life of Pablo Marcos, he is an excellent artist – we got to see his inks work uncoloured in Captain Britain Weekly back in the Seventies. Great stuff. I really loved his rare pencilling jobs too. I’m so pleased to hear he’s still with us. As a newspaper person, I was especially excited to hear that he used to be a newspaper artist, sitting near the teletype and illustrating stories… I bet he was using it to hear about people who needed help!

    As regards the Robin costume designs, pish posh, the readers who submitted costume ideas would have been delighted to see their actual work in print!

    I don’t see anything at all the creepy about the black kid in the corner of the Justice for All advert. I don’t know what you’re seeing. He’s very Arnold from Different Strokes!

    The Robin stories in Star-Spangled Comics are absolutely smashing fun. And yes, that is the same Bob Rodi.

    Hang on, there was a Batman Family Digest… That makes no sense! Batman Family was a reprint format, as were the Digests – reprinting BF stuff in there is bonkers.

    I hadn’t realised you were going to have cousins on individual stories rather than hanging around for the whole show, what a good idea – we will get lots of variety from the family. Cousin Chris, as ever, was splendid

    That’s Fatman poem reminded me of the theme tune from Shaft.

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  5. Hey, Shawn said my name! Oh…he didn’t forget it, so I’m not extra special. He also pronounced it correctly, so I’m not even regular special. And I know my name isn’t exactly easy to pronounce to begin with… 🙁

    Oh well, I guess I still really enjoyed the episode. This podcast has inspired me to pick up back issues of Batman Family so I can follow along. I found about half a dozen at a convention last month and I am hitting another convention next month. Hopefully, I will find more. I forgot how fun these books were.

    Glad you guys are keeping the family business running!

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  6. Impressive podcast most impresses. The cover looks pretty cool to this comic. It seems DC the ECW and WW F to the evil Santa Claus bit. Sadly Robin does not give a stunner to any of the fake Santa Claus. Onto the first story one I think if they couldn’t give this guy witness protection. They could arrest him for crimes against fashion. Who wears a leopardprint with a green outfit? And it’s all green except for the ski cap. I refuse to call it a beanie. If it doesn’t have a propeller on it it’s not a beanie. His shoes or even green. Where in the world that he find green shoes? My favorite color is green, but there is no in the world I would worry that much about my ability to color coordinate that air have to wear everything green. Except that one time in college. And I had called out on it calling bidding called the Keebler elf. And they were right. And if you’re going to that line the world would you add an orange cheetah print vest? You’re going to this much trouble to make sure all your stuff matches. And somehow the one splash of color you had is this ugly Elton John Wood said notice outfit cheetah vest. Also how does that go drive the cycle with the handlebars character that big weird that thing connected to the tire?

    That’s where the steering is. How you steer a motorcycle you have a huge back thing in the front. The balance has to be also on that. Also that is impressive corporate. Diamond Lil’ must pay a fortune on reinforcing her vehicle. Since that only did Barbara do that amazing stunt cycle bit. But she landed at 800 pound bike right on top of the roof of that car in didn’t even dented. The story was decent enough. Though yeah I had already guessed that she switched the bullets out. When she allowed to go to get back into diamond’s hand. The other right this is much of a Christmas story. But, it’s a decent enough one. I’m pretty sure the kids didn’t know that there arts was well how a child. As a child you don’t see it to your older. Best of them just publishing it as is. That was probably oh clucks of the bit. Giving people a chance to have your stuff published. That and having something to put in the book. So they have to pay people to draw the pages. And having these redone by professional artist would have negated that. Thus why it’s just the children’s drawing. So DC could save money. And do a thing for the fans. Having their artwork show up in a DC comic. I like the second Robin costume. And the fifth one. The others are well oy.

    Not that Dick Grayson was exactly King of fashion back in the day. These 18 years old running around in pixie boots. Sorry, but the Nightwing constant was definitely improvement. Her that is the one that either has a bluebird already written on it. The recent costume. Not the one with the 70s collar. Or that weird thing he was wearing in nightfall. The ads are decent enough. Though I hate to break it to Mr. Grayson. Aiming at the charity box holding the man’s hat is not charity. That’s called extortion. If the man decides to be generous and donate great. But hang onto his hat until he donates is kind of the jerk move. After seeing what happened to Wendy and Marvin. I don’t think you want homegirl to come back to the comics. Moving on, Nightwing does have great legs. Though that’s not the part of his anatomy most fans focus on. Moving right along.
    I definitely think though he and homegirl will have a decent Christmas vacation together. Underneath the mistletoe and all that. So this must be aware Kevin Smith got his nickname from. For his podcast. They must’ve remembered this comic as a child probably in report form. And decided to use. The Phantom Journal thing is an odd bit. But, it works. I grew up in the 80s so John appearing in the comic is not that strange. After all during the 60s Jack and Stan would appear all the time in Marvel comics. Even at one point a bad guy held Apparo at gunpoint so to have Batman not survive the comic. As he was drawing it. Until Batman showed up to defeat the criminal. Are all the times John Byrne appeared in his comics. So it works specifically with elongated man. I think elongated Man and Sue are a life again. I lose track. They were good enough on the flash TV show. But, obviously don’t have to replace the actor. But, it does make me wonder why they haven’t replaced Ezra Miller with their many actions.

    The punch bit is pretty good. Though a few things. One of the criminal has his arm at the wrong angle. Also his foot snow ground so he wouldn’t be holding all that will. Still the escape is close enough. More than likely though Batman would have him in a hammer lock with that one arm that was around his neck. But he’d still have his other arm around the criminal’s neck. Not that it matters since the other guy hitting so hard it changed his hair color. And somehow transferred his hair color to the guy that hit him. Though the original criminals haircolor just disappeared. And somehow the first criminal he got hit was able to become a blonde. We’re not sure how the brown haired guy that hit him lost his brown hair and it turned red. Can’t wait to hear the next podcast. It was good here hearing Chris on the podcast with y’all.

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  7. Good episode as always gentlemen! I’ve been listening since episode one and I’ve finally listened early enough to comment!
    My favorite Robin costume would be the one by Frank on the bottom right, it just looks so cool! It has like a Two-Face / Harley Quinn theme to it which makes it that much more awesome.
    I also just wanted to mention how Shawn pronounces Gettysburg, I’ve just never heard it pronounced that way haha. I’ve always said Gett-ees-burg, but maybe that’s the wrong way, I’m not really sure now!
    Anyway, really good episode guys, can’t wait for the next one!

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  8. Also joker 6 is the weakest one in the series in the begining sherlock Holmes is fictional by the end he’s real! ANNND they never bring it up again!

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  9. Hey Paul & Shawn – Listening now, and it’s another great episode! For the “Back History” segment, how about calling it “Family History”? Or “Family Tree”?

    Keep up the great work! I’m going back to the reunion now to finish the episode (and the baked beans)!

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