Pre-Crisis Bronze Age DC Comics!

Defenders of the Earth: Dark Destiny #4

The team-up absolutely no one asked for.

Art by Mike Sekowsky

Sekowsky, however, did do the first story in that issue, “Invasion of the Mermen part two.” After that, Sekowsky is off the book and the character until Adventure #421, and, there, he’s no longer involved with the writing.

Adventure

Swamp Thing art by Steve Bissette and John Totleben 💚

1985's DC Comics Presents Vol.1 #85 cover by Rick Veitch. Source

More annoyed at being called Hawkeye than having his secret identity revealed #priorities

Batman story #1,348

This photo seems awkward to me now since Anette O'Toole went on to play Clark's adoptive mother, Martha, in the television series Smallville.

In remembering Gerry Conway, the comics and TV writer whose death was announced today, people rightfully highlight his precocious work on THE AMAZING SPIDER-MAN in the early 1970s: killing Gwen Stacy, introducing the Punisher, etc. My own favorite Conway stories are from his intense run on the Batman books, climaxing with DETECTIVE COMICS 526 from 1983. Drawn by the great and gone-too-soon Don Newton, the extra-sized issue wrapped a storyline that introduced Killer Croc and Jason Todd while commemorating Batman's 500th appearance in the comic. Conway marks the occasion by unleashing nearly every Gotham villain in a quest to kill Batman and somehow preempt Croc's takeover of the city's underworld -- this being the OG Croc, a ruthless, brutal character who was never portrayed the same way again. Most of the villains are scattered like ninepins by a B-team of Robin (Dick Grayson) and Batgirl and an unprecedented A++ team of Batman, Catwoman and Talia. This mighty menage formed at a moment when the two antiheroines arguably had equal claims to be The One for Batman, with fond memories of Denny O'Neil's stories possibly giving the edge to the Daughter of the Demon with fans of the time. They stand on equal footing here because Conway had shown some time before that Selina Kyle had figured out Batman's secret identity, in a story that had her trying to kill Vicki Vale during a psychotic break. The women are uneasy allies and definitely not friends here, but as the page above states eloquently in words and pictures, all three protagonists are caught up in the thrill of the hunt -- as is their stowaway, Jason Todd, who is soon to lean that his parents are dead. The freedom conferred by omniscient narration, before first-person stream of consciousness became all too common, lets Conway tell a sweeping story with deft, effortless transitions as shown above. I'll never argue that this run was Conway best work, but it's great old-school comics storytelling. As noted, this concludes a slow-burn storyline, but my grumbly old self can't help suspecting that it'd take many modern comics writers a year of monthlies just to retell the events of this issue. So ave atque vale to a writer with an inevitably mixed record, who was nevertheless a master of his craft.