It is Moon Girl, and yet - it isn't.
We saw this morning that with issue #9, Moon Girl Fights Crime changed once again to become this:
Now that A Moon, A Girl... Romance was the title, you might assume that Moon Girl was gone. Yes, and No. You see, they did this terrible thing to her - made her a background character who now fights heartbreak instead of alien invasions.
We learn of Mary Lou's tribulations in her generic romance tale with no sign of Moon Girl until the final two pages:
Better to have left her in publishing limbo than in this state.
And, yet... I can still find more of Moon Girl in that comic than i can in the 2011 revival-
The only connection seems to be pirating the old names to new characters and relations. I wasn't able to wade through much, so no full analysis here.
No Moon Girl (nor The Prince), either.
We saw this morning that with issue #9, Moon Girl Fights Crime changed once again to become this:
Now that A Moon, A Girl... Romance was the title, you might assume that Moon Girl was gone. Yes, and No. You see, they did this terrible thing to her - made her a background character who now fights heartbreak instead of alien invasions.
We learn of Mary Lou's tribulations in her generic romance tale with no sign of Moon Girl until the final two pages:
Better to have left her in publishing limbo than in this state.
And, yet... I can still find more of Moon Girl in that comic than i can in the 2011 revival-
The only connection seems to be pirating the old names to new characters and relations. I wasn't able to wade through much, so no full analysis here.
No Moon Girl (nor The Prince), either.
I have the first five issues of the "revival", but as near as I can tell, there was never a "hard copy" issue of the sixth & final chapter, so I have no idea how the "new" Moon Girl ends. They changed pretty much everything except some of the names, and the Princess of the Moon's exile to America had something to do with communists...
ReplyDeleteI got the impression they just used the Moon Girl name to be able to put Gardner Fox's name on the credits. Bill Woolfolk wasn't identified as the author on the original stories until 3 years later, i believe.
ReplyDeleteWhatever their reason for choosing Moon Girl, it's obvious that it had nothing to do with the original character & stories.
I was a bit more charitable, and figured that, while the original Moon Girl was basically Wonder Woman without the kinky bits (and that for whatever reason, Gaines' involvement kept lawsuits from DC at bay), the new publishers could not count on that same protection, so they got rid of most of the WWish bits, leaving them with basically just some character names, and at least something of a "legacy" property.
ReplyDelete-Mindbender
You are most charitable indeed.
ReplyDeleteI can't see any reason to publish a character if you can't actually use the character, unless it's for the name recognition, of which there's virtually none for the character. Ergo, my assumption they were just latching on to the old creator's reputations.
Interestingly enough, Satana - who they recast as Moon Girl's old mentor - seems to have started as a villain designed for Prince Mengu, with Moon Girl in the secondary role. It was a back-up story in the first issue, and it read like it was the first written - before they decided to rework with Moon Girl as the primary hero.
Interesting idea, but it seems to me that, while "Moon Girl" is clearly a "superhero name", "Prince Mengu" is not so much. My thinking is that, since The Prince was in the unusual (I'm pretty sure unique) position of being an adult male sidekick to an adult female superhero, the original intent was to give him a solo backup feature, where he could have adventures of his own, and be all manly & stuff without needing his lady friend to keep rescuing him--it was all well and good for the likes of Hawkgirl & Bulletgirl to need saving on a regular basis, but the Price's main goal in life was to just not be Steve Trevor. I can't help but think that, if the Prince had ever been intended to serve as a lead feature, he would have been given a stronger name--even "Son of Hercules" seems like a better bet to emblazon across the cover of a comic than "Prince Mengu". But at the end of the day, no matter how many times the Prince needed to be rescued, and how often he got tied up, he was still a better character than Steve Trevor, so at least he's got that going for him!
Delete-Mindbender