If a body lack a soul, only a statue can it be!

Boy am I glad to be back on a regular issue, albeit in the Karate Kid line. We are on the homestretch as after this one we only have two issues left in the series. I am starting to see where they are trying to go with the book, and there might be a bit more of an intertwinement with the Legion of Super-Heroes. But whatever they have planned will be short lived because after this, only a mere two issues left!

With that being said, it is time to get punchin’. If you forgot where we left off last time, Karate Kid met Superboy. The only problem was that Superboy did not recognize Karate Kid at all. And to make matters worse, the Legion of Super-Heroes showed up at the end, also not knowing our beloved martial artist! What gives? Read on to find out!

Tomorrow’s Battle… Yesterday

We are dropped right into the standoff from last issue, with Karate Kid seemingly having taken Superboy hostage and using him as a Kryptonian shield against the Legion of Super-Heroes, who are, oddly enough, in their old costumes. Lightning Lad fires off a few lightning bolts that Karate Kid blocks with the help of Superboy’s invulnerable body. Sun Boy decides to join in the fray, and turns up the heat. Superboy starts to heat up and it forces Karate Kid to put him in a spin from a maneuver he learned on Planet Parikan. Superboy spins like a top and hits the Legionnaires as if they were bowling pins. Karate Kid makes a run for it and he attributes the fact that his former colleagues do not recognize him to Major Disaster. But before he can finish that thought, a large hand grabs his leg and picks him up, bringing him face to face with Colossal Boy. Not one to stay and chat, Karate Kid delivers a swift kick to Colossal Boy’s enlarged forehead, knocking him down.

Back on the ground, he sees that Lightning Lad has recovered and quickly ducks as the bolt flies over his head, hitting Saturn Girl who was behind him. Before he can make his next move, Chameleon Boy moves in and wraps him up in a snake-like form. Karate Kid struggles and forces himself to concentrate and redirects all his energy and breaks free. As he continues to think about his predicament, Sun Boy and Cosmic Boy team up and create a quick imprisonment capsule. They finish it quickly and Cos hurls it at Karate Kid, which successfully captures him. Cosmic Boy is about ready to speak, when KK interrupts him to just kill him and get it over with. Superboy interjects and reminds him that they do not kill and have sworn to uphold the law.

Karate Kid is quite confused because if these were creations of Major Disaster they would surely have killed him by now. Lightning Lad demands to know who he is and Superboy mentions that he says his name is Karate Kid and that he is a member of the Legion. The Legionnaires laugh until Saturn Girl interjects and announces that Karate Kid is telling the truth, or at least it is the truth to him. She confirms that he will be a Legionnaire sometime in their future. Convinced, Superboy releases Karate Kid and they put their heads together to figure out what the heck is going on. 

While our heroes are comparing notes, we return to Major Disaster and his hidden ‘master’ who is upset that they figured out part of the sinister plot before they could be eliminated. But they will never guess that they were all transported by the Lord of Time (who we last saw in JLA #11 and #50). The Lord of Time reminds Major Disaster that their plan is multi-faceted and they are ready for the next phase. Disaster smiles and pushes a button and they expect their response to be immediate.

Superboy turns his head and he pics up a distress signal. And not just any distress signal. Three distress signals! There is a tornado sweeping through Metropolis, hail the size of boulders in Midvale and a volcano has erupted in Smallville, spewing forth a flood of water. Three disasters and Karate Kid confirms that Major Disaster is behind it. He can find him but he will need Saturn Girl’s help. Lightning Lad, as acting leader, agrees and splits them off into four teams. Chameleon Boy and Lightning Lad will handle the tornado, Superboy and Cosmic Boy the hail, Sun Boy and Colossal Boy will tackle the volcano, and Karate Kid and Saturn Girl will find whoever is controlling them. Classic JLA style!

While in flight with their flight belts (since their LSH flight-rings have not yet been invented at this point), Karate Kid thanks Saturn Girl for her help. Without it, he would have a hard-time convincing the gang not to rough him up pretty good. Saturn Girl agrees that it was quite convenient but it also helped her hone in on Major Disaster, and they jet after their quarry. 

Meanwhile in Midvale, Cosmic Boy and Superboy are trying to stop the boulders. Cosmic Boy reverses his magnetic power to repel the boulders but it is not enough. Superboy has an idea, and takes his cape off. He hooks it to the four corners of Midvale and creates the largest umbrella the world has ever seen.

And in Metropolis Lightning Lad and Chameleon Boy have arrived on the scene. Lightning Lad attempts to hit the tornado with a lightning bolt but it has no effect. Chameleon Boy has an idea and turns into a giant Chameleon fan in an effort to blow it away, but it does not work. But Lightning Lad does see that it is moving the tornado, and tells him to try to push it into the water. Once the twister is in the water, Lightning Lad hits it with a bunch of lightning, causing the water underneath to steam and dissipating the tornado. Thanks science!

Meanwhile, in Smallville, Colossal Boy and Sun Boy are battling the water volcano. Sun Boy attempts to boil the water away but there is just too much of it. Suddenly, he thinks of the Netherlands, which gives him an idea. He instructs Colossal Boy to get as big as he can, then plug the top of the volcano like the mythological Dutch Boy. Agreeing albeit with a bit of fuss, he sits right on top of it, giving Sun Boy enough time to melt the base and turn it into a permanent plug. 

We now leave the scene and remind ourselves of the ongoing B-Plot from last issue, where Iris Jacobs agreed to be the subject in a strange experiment. Well, this experiment happens to be a series of injections as part of the Adaptability to the Future program. The injections are a simple hydrocarbon serum in order to help her body adapt to the amounts of pollution in the atmosphere, that must occur in the future. When Iris returns home, she falls asleep looking at Karate Kid’s picture. While asleep, she is unaware of an energy beam which penetrates her brain, radically changing the effects of the hydrocarbon injection. 

We return to the past and Karate Kid and Saturn Girl have tracked down the Lord of Time and Major Disaster. The Lord of Time attempts to blast Karate Kid but he ducks just in time, leaps, and delivers a high flying kick to his jaw, reminding us that he is the greatest martial artists of all the universe. Major Disaster tries to join in, but Karate Kid kicks him in the face too. He then turns his karate skills on the surrounding machines, and surmises that these are the ones causing all the disasters. So Karate Kid being Karate Kid, he punches them all to pieces, turning them off. Permanently. 

Moments later, Saturn Girl summons her fellow Legionnaires to observe a fallen Lord of Time and Major Disaster. However, the Lord of Time is playing possum and leaps up, announcing that he has a back-up plan. He returns the Legionnaires to their time, ensuring that a mind-wipe is in place so they will not remember what happened. Karate Kid attempts to deliver another high-flying kick, but he is not quicker than the Lord of Time who manages to press a button on one of his devices, and zaps Karate Kid mid-air, returning him to his current time in New York City, thereby making him experience the longest high-flying kicks of all time. 

When he lands he lands in the middle of chaos and people screaming and running in terror, he follows the source of their panic and he cannot believe his eyes. It is a large, diamond like monster, that just so happens to look like…

IRIS!?

Next issue: The strangest foe of all for Karate Kid in “A Dimaondeth is Forever.” On Sale the 1st week in February! 

Creative Team

We have arrived at issue #13 and it is not that bad, especially after a couple of read-throughs. It does have the formula right, such as some form of time travel, a Superboy team-up, and a bit of mystery that is cleared up. But on the flip side everything is a bit of a stretch and sometimes even a head scratcher. 

I guess the biggest head scratcher is that they continue to position Major Disaster as the major antagonist against Karate Kid. It is an interesting, albeit a very weird choice because those two just do not match. Perhaps you were wondering just like I did, whether or not Major Disaster ever had some form of time altering powers? Well, this is actually addressed in the letters section, and spoiler alert, he did not. So in order to accommodate that little mishap, I think they had to find someone who did, and they chose the Lord of Time, which as you can see from the issue itself, last appeared in Justice League of America #50. 

And I guess that is the theme of this book, if not the whole series. It is sort of an after thought, it keeps going, people forget the strings that they dangled, and then they are in a tough spot of trying to figure it out. The book is inconsistent and it is a pity. That being said, if I would take out the Legion of Super-Heroes from this issue what would I be left with? Not much. This issue is very much a Legion issue, albeit it from Karate Kid’s perspective.

The art is also a little hit and miss this time around. This is Juan Ortiz’s second outing on the book and he did do the origin story in DC Super-Stars #17. The decision to put them in their classic uniforms, much like Oritz had them depicted in DCSS, was a good choice and it complimented his style on the book very well. But it did look a bit like we regressed to the classic 60’s era, especially after we were getting a bit of flair from Ric Estrada and Joe Staton, and of course Mike Grell and James Sherman on the main title. So it does look out of place.

But it is not completely wasted and we do have some really great moments. Ortiz handled those action moments, in particular when KK took down both the Lord of Time and Major Disaster with some well placed kicks, and then turned his anger on the machines controlling the disasters. Also I do like how he depicts Superboy although he does look like a Superman at some points. 

All in all a pretty standard book in the series, and we have progressed the B-Plot with Iris going full on monster that he will have to take down next issue. Do they know this book will be over in about four months time? It is hard to tell. If memory serves, around this time in DC’s line of books, they were known just shutting down a series even if more issues were plan. The first series that comes to mind is the quite excellent The Secret Society of Super-Villains. But it will be interesting how things wind down starting with the next issue. But either way, the series has been frustrating in general, with the editors promising things and then not delivering. But I will hold off these thoughts until we get to the end. 

Karate Comments

In this issue’s letters page, we have a few letters with a few revelations. The first letter I will cover is from Ted P. Skimmer who comments about the so-called announced turnaround of the book. He agrees with us that Rick Estrada did some amazing things, so what is this new direction they are talking about specifically?

“[I]t was decided that KARATE KID should be given a new look, a new direction and a new tea to make the magazine appeal to a wider audience. We think that new scripted Bob Rozakis and the art team of Juan Ortiz and Bob McLeod are doing a superb job with Karate Kid and we hope you’ll enjoy the series even more as we place more emphasis on super-hero action and a little less on martial arts.”

I guess you should not have too much martial arts in a book called Karate Kid, based on a character who just so happens to not have a super-power but is the greatest martial-artists in the whole blasted universe. Yowzers. I guess they did not read their own response. 

We leave that head scratcher with the next letter from Bob Barnes who had scratched his head like we did, albeit from a different itch.

“It was great to see that Major Disaster is back and that he still holds a grudge against our hero. But I’ve got a question. Where did the Major, who could never do such things before, get the power to travel through time?”

Thank you Bob! I thought I was crazy and I missed something in the Who’s Who “M” issue. But thankfully I was not the only one who thought I was going crazy. The response? Well that is why we have the Lord of Time of course, who obviously gave the Major his power!

Again, I think this was another, uh oh, we have to figure this out and get ourselves out of a jam. I think we can say that whoever was responsible for this book just did not pay enough attention to it at the time and allowed conundrums to pop up all the time. 

The second letter is from fellow Missourian Arthur Johnson, who is quite disappointed in how they are treating Karate Kid. Also, the guy is living in New York City and surely he would run into other super-heroes or villains that were living there at the time? Basically his letter pretty much sums up what a lot of the letters have been saying in the previous issues. The book is a bit of a mess and does not know where it is going. Well, Bob Rozakis promises a few team-ups such as with Robin (which apparently is next issue) and the Man-Bat. Will these things come to pass with only two issues, well we will see! But if we take history of our DC team making promises and then breaking them immediately next issue into account, then probably not. 

And that is it for the letters page. Two issues left, and not a lot of hope for the direction or anything they promise at this point. 

Super-Karate Hour

Super-Karate Hour is a moment I choose that really personifies Karate Kid and is about action and how he is the greatest martial artists in the universe. I do hope I do not have to retire this section before the book ends because the new team does not like the martial arts angle. Also, we do not have many moments to choose from but luckily I can still find one.

Look, Val hates machines and he has destroyed them with his bare hands on many occasions. But before doing fisticuffs with his traditional enemy, he still managed to do a flying kick right to the Lord of Time’s face, and then did the same to Major Disaster’s face, before turning his rage on the machines. And that was a pretty damn cool moment and a nice little glimpse on what Ortiz is capable of with his pencilling. 

And that is it for this week’s installment fellow Legionnaires! The next issue of Karate Kid is the penultimate issue for the series, but we do have three issues of Superboy and the Legion of Super-Heroes to cover, one being that awesome Treasury sized edition, which will happen next week. I cannot wait!

But until then, remember, even when your favorite comic book decides to change direction and then you slowly realize that they have no direction, always, and I do mean always, keep kickin’!