Review: “The Challenge of the Headless Baseball Team”

In this, the 75th anniversary of DC Comics and the 40th anniversary of that brave and bold experiment to craft science-fiction stories for the pages of a superhero comic, BuckBokai begin its reviews of the stories inside Brave and the Bold nos. 45-49.

Issue #45 in DC Comics’ distinctly daffy plan to present science-fiction sports stories on a regular basis led with a story called “The Challenge of the Headless Baseball Team.”

Immediate thoughts upon seeing the cover of Brave & the Bold #45 (in no particular order):

• Boy, that’s actually really stupid looking;

• holy moley, were comics actually 12¢ one day?;

• wait a minute, i remember 35¢ comics. That’s sick;

• dude, terrible socks; and

• is “WORLDS’ SERIES” actually gramatically correct? I mean, we don’t say “World’s Series,” so shouldn’t it be “Worlds Series”? And since it’s only one game can you really call it a “series”?

Hey, maybe those weren’t your first thoughts, but they were BuckBokai’s. In any case, we’re thrown right into the action, namely the World Series, circa 1970. This is clearly a parallel universe in DC land, as evidenced by several obvious difference: The dominance of fictional New York Jets, not to mention this Earth’s much slower rotational period, which allows the daylight to remain at high-noon levels for hours on end.

After the Jets dispose of their World Series opponent – who go down and out in six panels thanks to ace relief provided by “ace relief pitcher Lefty Clark” and are thus denied even the indignity by called by name – we learn of “a new wrinkle the commissioner has introduced,” i.e. the Jets “get the flag right now – instead of waiting for opening day next season.”

(Further evidence that this tale is set in an alternate universe, as this “new wrinkle” stuff is obvious proof that aforementioned commissioner is actually Bud Selig. Key here is that the MLB commissioner will remain absent through the story, despite the crisis that soon engulfs the game, the deciding game of the World Series: sounds utterly Seligian to me.)

Running below are the opening panels, “designed for your reading pleasure.” The hype promised in the effusive “Letter from the Editor” column about the “ingenious solution” in the visual narrative, i.e. “The story captions […] placed in front of the picture panel and enhanced with a silhouette”, seems to live up to the hype. Such a style would ultimately come to dominate the industry, especially booming after Frank Miller’s seminal Dark Knight Returns series.

Check out how Lefty’s wicked slider in the fourth panel is only matched in physics bending by the word balloon of exclamation from a very loud dude in the stands.

Great, all well and good. The Jets continue the dynasty, Selig’s getting a good nap, and football season’s already started. Except … “To the stunned amazement of the players [but only the Jets, as their opponents have long since spontaneously combusted] and fans, a shimmering dome materializes over the stadium.”

This turns out to be a full-on first contact situation as the shimmering dome is indeed a UFO. Within a matter of panels, a bargain is struck: “We have come a distance of more than 50 light years to play you. We have studied and practiced your game and feel confident we can win. Do you accept our challenge?”

Well, it takes a few panels, but of course they will. After all, as little Timmy of Anytown, USA, puts it:

The manager – now apparently the saviour of the planet and just imagine if, say, Lou Piniella were world leader. Right. – accepts and the game begins against the alien team, who are invisible except for the uniforms as depicted on the cover. Apparently, the Jets have gone through all their starters in a grueling series of a ‘Series and are going to go with Lefty on the mound.

(Again, not to put too fine a point on it … but even if the stadium has been sealed off from the outside world, wouldn’t the unnamed vanquished team still be around? Couldn’t the exhausted Jets use an extra bat like that of “Home Run” Wilcox?)

The alien team may have “studied and practiced” and “feeling confident” playing baseball, they still don’t know how to hit. Through eight innings, they’ve managed a meager 1-0 lead against a member of homo sapiens (and just look what the Vulcan did to us and a bunch of other humanoids in “Take Me Out to the Holosuite”).

A nice Deus Ex Machina, or rather Plot Device Ex Machina, is then provided in the top of the ninth when, in going for a “topped ball,” Clark and “Chopper” the catcher knock heads! And Lefty goes unconscious!

Thanks to this apparently fortunate concussing of the noggin, Lefty is gifted with a vision of “the fourth dimensional world of Ilaran.” (So they have time there? Whoa, too weird.) It’s a galactic epic involving Ekko Guns, Kamma Rays, Dorea Beams, a Super X-Rayscope and the Protana Globe which can destroy the evil Krann.

(Seriously, this team wins the World Series in 1970? I think the entire league was raiding Dock Ellis’ stash in this universe.)

Despite the fact that the benevolent alien – Enath of Kalomoor by name – has blown Lefty’s mind for five full pages, he immediately removes all memory of the story immediately. Perhaps so the wily pitcher doesn’t actually discover one of the gaping plotholes, fall in and plunge to his death.

Predictably, Chopper unleashes a “Baltimore Chop.” For some reason, with the tying run on base in the bottom of the ninth and the possibility of at least minor brain trauma, the Jets manager *allows Lefty to bat.* Apparently, the ol’ skipper has also been visiting with Dr. Ellis.

Guess how Lefty does at the plate.

Anyway, now that the aliens have been stymied out of the pennant, which has a ball atop its flagpole that will destroy some planet or another, they’re leaving in a snit. Proving they’ve also studied and practiced our movies and feel confident they can properly drop science-fiction B-movie clichés, the aliens announce: “Fools! You won the baseball game – but lost your lives! For having defeated us, you will pay the penalty! We shall destroy your planet!”

Right, like they couldn’t just take the damn thing away.

Guess whether Enath saves the day, with a big explosion somehow involved. Nice guess. As they say, all goods things must come to end. This story, too. “Challenge of the Headless Baseball Team” concludes with a tearjearking bittersweet ending. (No, not the Tootsie Roll ad.) Poor Enath of Kalomoor removes his kinky-sounding rubberoid disguise to lament his fate.

What a hero! What a story! What a weird fucking time the 1970s must have been.

Next time: “Goliath of the Gridiron” – o, that one’s a classic, trust BuckBokai…

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