Tag Archives: superheroes

THE BLACK CONDOR: THE OFFICIAL SUPERHERO OF BALLADEER’S BLOG

Black CondorRegular readers of Balladeer’s Blog know that words like eccentric, oddball, offbeat, weird and damn crazy come to mind when describing me. So, that being the case the most appropriate superhero mascot for this site is the Black Condor.

That’s the Golden Age Black Condor, who debuted in 1940 and is now in the public domain, not the newer comic book characters going by that name. The original Black Condor appeals to me in the same way that bad movies do. Here are the six reasons why this figure has long been my favorite weirdass Golden Age superhero: Continue reading

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Filed under humor

FORGOTTEN TELEVISION: THE SPIRIT (1987)

 This often-forgotten telefilm from 1987 was a pilot movie for a series that never panned out, but Spirit purists who complained about the 2008 movie version may actually prefer this unassuming little flick to the big- budget 21st Century version.

The Frank Miller movie from 2008 changed  the Spirit’s iconic costume to black instead of blue and “Millerized” him, making him a kind of Dark Knight clone instead of the lighter, quirkier hero that Will Eisner fans remembered him as being. For Spirit novices, the superhero  was detective Denny Colt of fictional Central City. In his origin story he ran afoul of the mad scientist Dr Cobra, and in the resulting struggle got drenched and drowned in one of the good doctor’s experimental chemicals.

In the “embalming-free” world of superhero fiction, Colt was buried in Wildwood Cemetery, but, as it turned out, Dr Cobra’s chemicals had Continue reading

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Filed under Forgotten Television, Superheroes