Who’s Hot and Who’s Not? Ep.6: Atom to Auron

A mighty mite. A tiny college professor. A guy who rides a Dalmatian. Siskoid’s reverse namesake. A golden godling. Which are hot, which are not? The Girls of the Hot Squad finish rating Who’s Who #1’s characters and even discuss George Perez’s cover as this first Hot or Not mini-series comes to an end.

Featuring permanent panelists Isabel, Nathalie, Josée, Shotgun, and Amélie.

Listen to Episode 6 below (the usual mature language warnings apply), or subscribe to the feed on Apple Podcasts or Spotify!

Relevant images and further credits at: Who’s Hot and Who’s Not ep.6 Supplemental

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15 responses to “Who’s Hot and Who’s Not? Ep.6: Atom to Auron

  1. Poor Al Pratt. He gets a not, but Atomic Skull gets a hot? In the history of the show I rarely recall times when Siskoid was flabbergasted by the Squad’s ranking, but you could tell this one got him.

    Siskoid, in regards to Jean Loring, thank you for sparing the girls from the pain that is Identity Crisis.

    I always pronounced X’Hal as “Exhale”, but I’m sure that was wrong. But since Marv Wolfman named Starfire after a spice…maybe not?

    Chris

    1. Maybe X’Hal will eventually open up a meditation studio with her brother N’Hal…

      On a serious note, X’Hal should have been reason enough to have a pronunciation key in issue 26 of Who’s Who. Dad pronounced it “EX-zhal”, because he heard it pronounced that way on a DC comicon panel. I think that was how it was pronounced on the Teen Titans cartoon too.

  2. An excellent wrap-up to the first issue! Looking forward to issue #2 when you come back from the break.

    I have to imagine that the original Atom had to be a challenge for artists, requiring a consistent sense of scale to make him shorter than all the other heroes he hangs out with…it’s kind of like the way many artists forget that Wolverine is supposed to be short as well. The discussion made me remember a diminutive wrestler/bodybuilder/character actor of years past, sending me to Google to remember his name: Buck Kartalian, whose credits include Cool Hand Luke, Planet of the Apes, and an episode of the Adam West Batman series…at 5’3″, he probably would have been the only actor both short and athletic enough to play the Atom if there’d ever been any live-action version of him.

    Favorite line: “falling into a pool of physics!”

  3. Amazing episode!

    Before listening to the episode I assumed Auron would be the big hot – adonis body, incredible hair, phenomenal cosmic power. Nope.

    Instead, the Atomic Skull gets a HOT! That came out of nowhere. As a kid, just starting to think about medicine, the idea that he could weaponize the abnormal electricity of his seizures into brain-bolts was fascinating. Don’t know if I could pull off the thigh high boots.

    And yes, thank you Siskoid for avoiding the details around Jean Loring. It never ends well when Jean Loring is ON your mind.

  4. “He should’ve got his powers by falling into a vat of Physics” was such a meta-commentary line, I’m now convinced that we are in the presence of the new Grant Morrison.
    Brava, OHOTMU team, this was your finest laugh out loud work. (That, and the penis jokes.)

  5. So good, everyone! Once again you brighten my day with some chuckles about comics. It’s always appreciated!

    The Atom (I) – I agree with the ladies, for a guy that’s supposed to short, have the picture really show it! You just can’t tell from this entry. I do think that’s a great idea, that not every superhero is 6’2″.

    The Atom (II) – That Gil Kane entry is amazing. Though I was never a big Atom fan, I recently acquired the Sword of the Atom series and am looking forward to reading it.

    Atomic Knight – Didn’t get it, still don’t get it, will never get it. The ladies had some great “insights” to what his costume is. Crotch-ssant!

    The Atomic Skull – This mort was in one of the very first comics I can ever remember, so he will always be awesome to me. It’s a colour scheme that works well together but isn’t that common in comics, that I know of. I don’t care what the ladies saaaaay what? They like him?? I’m sure Albert Michaels would take the “Hot” as a forgone conclusion.

    Auron – I hate everything about this douche canoe.

    I hope everyone has as much fun recording (and editing) as we do listening! Keep up the great work!

  6. Fun show as always. And thank you, Josée, for the suggestion of making tiny bubbles from the dishsoap bottle when doing the dishes. It is a new “little pleasure” I add when I have to do that chore.

    ATOM I: All this time I thought Al Pratt just “packed quite a wallop.”

    Al Pratt’s outfit, sans mask, is similar to what circus strongmen wore in the 1930s and 40s. I suppose it was given equal prominence to his fin-headed costume in the entry because he appeared more often in the All-Star Squadron comics than the Infinity Inc. ones being published at the time.

    Amélie, while rounding up your height may be deceiving (though mathematically sound), it’s not a lie to say that you are taller than the Atom Al Pratt (even if it is by a half an inch).

    ATOM II: Gil Kane originally based the look of Ray Palmer on actor Robert Taylor, so maybe that was who Shotgun thought he looked like?

    My dad showed me the Sword of the Atom comics after I saw the four Cartoon Network DC Nation animated shorts that adapted part of the story. No more shorts were made and I wanted to know how the story ended. My dad said he didn’t care for this take on the Atom when this series first came out, but in showing it to me, he said he appreciated the “John Carter of Mars in the South American jungle” idea more.

    Interesting take of Josée’s that the classic version of the Atom costume would look better with the exposed hair mask. That is just how the Atom looked when he returned to civilization in the Power of the Atom series in the late 1980s.

    ATOMIC KNIGHT: The “crotch-saunt” was laugh out loud funny. Good thing it wasn’t silver, because then it would match those things by his face.

    Dad told me that the reason the Atomic Knight was “brought into modern times” in the 1980s was because in the 1960s stories, their “future world” took place a few years after a world war that happened in 1986.

    ATOMIC SKULL: So the Girls find the Atomic Skull hot, but they also said that he looks like his reverse namesake Mike. So Mike, I guess you’re hot?

    We can only hope that the following event never takes place:

    A truck carrying radioactive waste collides with a truck carrying chlorine bleach, the resulting explosion knocking a now-bleached blond Michel Albert into a vat of physics hidden inside a secret government-sponsored thigh-high boot factory… leading to the creation of the crafty cuissarded criminal, the Skullish Atom!

    And if the Hot Squad thinks the Atomic Skull had Skeletor vibes, wait until they meet Dr. Destiny. (Nyah!)

    AURON: Auron does look better when drawn by George Pérez, but then, so does any character. Auron first appeared with a cape in that Green Lantern story, which was one of the two “not sucky” Omega Men stories I had read. The other one was in the New Teen Titans series (also drawn by George Pérez, and also featuring Auron with a cape).

    Cannot wait for Volume II, though I know I have to.

    1
  7. Is it OK to say I enjoy the DC shows more than the Marvel ones? The freeform artwork is so much more fun to look at than Marvel’s standard poses and reprinted panels.

    The Golden Age Atom was hot with his leather shorts, like lederhosen. The girls were right to say he looks like a baddie in the second costume, that was originally the costume of (reluctant) supervillain Cyclotron.

    Gil Kane’s original Silver Age Atom costume was a classic – simple, elegant and fitting. His Bronze revamp was an abomination, the artistic equivalent of self-harm. Normally I’m all for loincloths, but over superhero tights? Dearie Lord.

    The Atomic Knight’s armour is terrible, another unnecessary reinvention. No wonder he wound up in The Outsiders.

    Yellow and green must always be seen… the colour scheme gives Atomic Skull a head start when it comes to me liking it. And the boots seal the deal. Curt Swan had a knack for design weirdly sexy antagonists – see also Master Jailer and Vartox. Perhaps not Toyman II.

    Auron looks a proper prat.

  8. Martin, I agree. These shows are even better than the Marvel OHOTMU ones — and I enjoy those quite a lot.

    I pronounce X’Hal two ways: “Auron’s mom” and “that goddess Starfire is always taking about.”

    The Al Pratt Atom is one of my favorite characters from the All-Star Squadron. I think if the girls read those stories, they’d rate him a “hot.” He’s an upbeat, friendly, exceptionally strong short guy who always wants to do the right thing. His powers are the ability to recklessly jump into danger, never quit, and pummel bad guys to the point of submission — and maybe *just* beyond. He is a role model of courage, good cheer, and cathartic violence. There should be more stories with Al Pratt.

    Eager for the next episode as always!

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