LNH: Classic LNH Adventures #14: The Omaha Project Part One

Drew Perron pwerdna at gmail.com
Thu Apr 28 22:59:03 PDT 2016


On 4/19/2016 9:52 PM, Arthur Spitzer wrote:
<snip>
> Its genesis sprang from this spam post.
>
>   Newsgroups: alt.comics.lnh
>   Subject: Omaha Project

Ohhhhhhh, I never knew that.

> This was way back in the Pre-Green Card spam days when someone
> posting to every single newsgroup was kind of amusing and not the
> horrible nuisance that it would eventually become.

Of course, hardly anyone nowadays even knows what the Green Card spam was. 
(Spoilers: Someone trying to take advantage of the people navigating the US's 
broken immigration system! Fun!)

> Benjamin Pierce (creator of the character Marvel Zombie Lad(Boy?))
> was the first to jump on this post and turn it into an epic storyline.
> Ben was one of the original Cosmic Plot Device Caper writers and I
> think this might have been his last LNH story.

Oh wow. Yeah, I didn't realize he was still around then. :o

> Following him, was Russ Allbery who way back then was still writing
> LNH stories (mostly about his Writer Character Windrider).  Russ
> would later become the rec.arts.comics.creative Moderator (which
> he still is) and runner of the eyrie archives, website, and lists.

And overall amazing human being! <3

> Co-writing with him was David Anastasion (who created the character
> Drifter).  I think David co-wrote all of Russ's stories and was
> one of those rare LNH writers that I don't think ever actually
> posted to RACC or ACLNH.

Ahhhhh, okay. :o I wondered about that, too.

> Following them, was Chris Sypal (who created the R-Men an X-Men
> parody as well as writing the R-Men series.)  Chris, as you can
> see by his chapter knew a bit more about Omaha than every other
> person writing the Omaha Project.  :)

I mean. That's important. >->

> And lastly, Rob Rogers wrote the chapter that ends this first part.
> Rob Rogers is creator and writer of the Easily-Discovered Man series,
> which he has been doing since 1993 (and hopefully will keep on doing
> for years to come).  And maybe he'll finish that Beige Countdown issue
> before Classic LNH Adventures gets to the Beige Countdown era.  :)

Rob is a masterful storyteller, who has both the writing ability and the 
deadline-meeting ability of Douglas Adams.

>      Somewhere, under a cornfield in America's heartland, lies a secret
> installation.  An installation which combines the cutting edge in
> ultramodern technology with an atmosphere of rampant paranoia and
> suspicion.  An installation dedicated to one goal: the mysterious agenda
> known simply as: the Omaha Project.

DUN DUN DUNNNNN

>      Deep in the bowels of the Omaha facility, two scientists strode along
> a corridor at a brisk pace, talking in hushed, urgent tones (one of the
> side effects of the all-pervasive air of paranoia and suspicion is that
> everybody tends to talk in hushed, urgent tones most of the time.)

I know, right? You gotta wear hearing aids just to keep up.

> "Emmerson! Help me!"  The figure gave no response, and on closer
> inspection, it didn't look very much like Emmerson at all.  It looked...
> wrong.
>      "...Emmerson?"

Oh that's a nice creepy opening. o-o;

>      Drifter chuckles and glances down the long hall.  Both walls are
> lined with more exhibits; and periodically people appear, add a new
> picture, and then disappear again.  Most of them attach a little post-it
> note with snide comments.
>      --You're right, a lot of these *are* funny.  Good way to spend a few
> hours.--
>      Windrider sends back a mental grin.  ==Yeah, I ran across this place
> a while back.  Still haven't figured out what a VAP is though...==

This sounds like a reference to a specific 1994-era Internet thing.

> In the center of the crater is a strange
> pattern of black and white, constantly shifting and difficult to look at
> directly.
>      --What do you make of this?--
>      ==That's one of the pockets of scrambled reality created during Master
> Workload's attack.  I though they would have all dissipated by now.==

Oh man, I love the low-level tie-ins throughout the stories of this era. :D

>      Random Man was busy working on a new RAM (R-Men Automotive Machine),
> and couldn't join, leaving Vari and Gelatin.

I've never read most of R-Men, but from bits I've seen in places like Retcon 
Hour, it's always seemed like one of those series that was someone who was 
interested in more traditional superhero stories flexing their muscles in the 
easy-access low-pressure high-weirdness environment of the LNH - something I 
very much support. <3

>      "That aviary was huge.  And all those different birds they had."
>      "That reminds me, I wondered what happened to the other people who
> were to find out what the problem was..."

That was pretty cute. XD

> If you
> weren't paying me overtime for this, Prof, I'd have to up and tell you
> that you were crazy."
>      "You have told me that I'm crazy."
>      "Well, yes, but you are paying me overtime."

Heeheehee

> The soft watermelon glow of the sun dissolving over the horizon...the storms I
> watched raging miles away, lightning tearing through the midwestern skies
> like an angry child...the deep, thick smell of earth and of spring and
> living things had softened my city boy's heart to the point where I could
> almost accept what the Prof was doing.  Which was when I began to check
> myself for psychological trauma, because what the Prof was doing was
> stupid.

Again, great stuff. :D

> Lite, this gentleman is the hero of my youth, the hero of many youths, the
> hero, once, when the world was a place vastly different from the
> burgeoning meglapolis it has now rendered itself into..."
>      "Please," said the figure, "no need for introductions.  Nice to meet
> you, Lite.  I'm Boy Lad."

GASP! :D That's such a great addition, tho. I highly recommend Boy Lad's first 
appearance (Particle Man Annual #1) to everyone.

Drew "a good mostly-standalone" Perron


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