LNH: Classic LNH Adventures #209: Legion of Net.Heroes Volume 2 #40-41
Arthur Spitzer
arspitzer2 at gmail.com
Sun Jul 25 14:37:01 PDT 2021
You can sift through the racc list archive
https://lists.eyrie.org/pipermail/racc/
or you can try google groups racc for these issues of LNH v2.
First off is LNH v2 #40 another Saxon Brenton stab at being the
High Concept Champion. Saxon takes the two great tastes of
Gordon Lightfoot and Suicide Squid and mixes them together --
but will they merge into some Delicious Reese's Pieces Concoction --
or will this be another disaster to rival the Wreck Of The Edmund
Fitzgerald?!
And then we have LNH v2 #41 by me (Arthur Spitzer). Remember Obscure
Trivia Lad's heroic death in Beige Midnight -- well what would you
say if he came back from the dead? Well, I'd guess you'd want some
really great explanation for that that didn't cheapen that other
story, right? Will you get that great explanation here? And if not
will you have to wait years and years for that explanation in Hungry,
Hungry Sabertooths? (Okay, you're not going to get that great
expanation here -- go read Hungry, Hungry Sabertooths instead!)
Anyways...
_
| | Classic
| | =
| | ____ ____ _ ____ ___
| |__ | [] | | [] | | | | [] | | _ \
|____| \__] \__ | |_| \__/ |_|\_\
||
|_| OF NET.HEROES
ADVENTURES #209
=====================
Legion of Net.Heroes Volume 2 #40-41
=====================
From: Saxon Brenton saxonbrenton at hotmail.com
Date: Mon Jan 31 16:25:31 PST 2011
[LNH][Contest][Repost] Legion of Net.Heroes Volume 2 #40 HCC16
___ ___________________________
| |-| \
| |-| [] / #40
| | | [] egion of \ 'The Rescue Of The Edmund Fitzgerald'
| | | []__ [] [] [] [] / (Part of High Concept Challenge #16)
| | | [___][ \[]et.[]__[]eroes \
| | | []\ ] [ __ ] / written by and copyright 2011
| |-| [] [] [] [] \ Saxon Brenton
| |-|___________________________/
| |
| |
| | The cover is painted and depicts the deck of a violently pitching
| | ship deck in a storm. Suicide Squid is on deck and facing off against
| | a vaguely human figure with the features of a horned panther and
| | composed of water who is rising from the waves. The banner at the
| | top proclaims: Classic Reprint! Suicide Squid versus Mishibizhiw for
| | the souls of twenty-nine men in 'The Rescue Of The Edmund Fitzgerald!'
|_|
- spoken recitation to the tune of
'The Wreck Of The Edmund Fitzgerald'
by Gordon Lightfoot
[Publishing note: Reprinted from _Suicide Squid Adventures_ #159, March 1976]
.The legend lives on from the Chippewa on down
.Of the big lake they call Gitche Gumee
.The lake, it is said, never gives up her dead
.When the skies of November turn gloomy.
.From his lodge far beneath Mishibizhiw planned grief
.For Lake Superior and all of its sailors
.The nibiinaabewag dirged as their master prepared
.To drown more and so increase their numbers.
.With a load of iron ore - 26,000 tons more
.Than the Edmund Fitzgerald weighed empty
.That big ship was famed and a prize of be claimed
.By the manitou's gales striking early.
.Concluding some terms with a couple of steel firms
.The ship left fully loaded for Cleveland
.And later that night when the ships bell rang
.It was Mishibizhiw's winds they were feeling.
.A hero of fame Suicide Squid by code name
.Was recovering in those same waters
.Dr Calamari's defeat had left him quite weak
.But the Cabaret's fall was well savoured.
.The dire songs of merfolk and the rise of the storm
.Caught the Ten Limbed Avengers attention
.But the nibiinaabewag shoals weren't his overall foes
.There'd be a god to raise waves quite so threatening.
.With the weather set in things looked mighty grim
.A wounded hero and a dark god to be confronted
.For it was false, what they say, that they could've made Whitefish Bay
.If they'd just fled with all engines full running.
.The horned panther god rose up from the lake bed
.And sent his minions to capture the hero
.Fighting past slave manitou circled 'round ship and crew
.Squiddy climbed aboard and spoke to the captain.
.Athwart pitch, roll and yaw the Squid stood straight and tall
.And from the main deck called out a challenge
.The lives of the crew and of the ship's cat too
.With the symbolic chess match spoke of in legend.
.Mishibizhiw agreed and then set the game's stage
.With a localised field of clear water
.In the eye of the storm the freighter sat calm
.A stable place to game with black and white pebbles.
.As the battle played long the spirits saw none
.Of the slow crawl of the Edmund Fitzgerald
.With her engines on low and with movement so slow
.And the storm wall hiding the approach of the shoreline.
.To Mishibizhiw's dismay the Squid won the game
.And in his arrogance reneged on his promise
.The storm wall closed in and tossed the ship once again
.While the nibiinaabewag howled with their blood thirst.
.At this prearranged point the great engines where gunned
.And the ship made a dash for safe harbour
.While the Squid did his bit and crash tackled midship
.Mishibizhiw to keep him distracted.
.They fell over the side as the freighter rolled wild
.With the merfolk further churning the waters
.The ship limped into shore and although damaged some more
.No loss of life was thereafter reported.
.The legend lives on from the Chippewa on down
.Of the big lake they call Gitche Gumee
.The lake, it is said, never gives up her dead
.When the skies of November turn gloomy.
.When ask the new dead: 'To whom do gods bow their head?'
.The answer is short and quite simple
.Suicide Squid, they do say, won that right on that day
.When he rescued the Edmund Fitzgerald.
====
Character credits:
Suicide Squid is Public Domain.
Author's notes:
Written for the 16th High Concept Challenge: The Epic Poem.
There are a number of background details for this one.
Technically this isn't a poem, it's a filk. I'm lousy at poetry,
mainly because I'm too unskilled (either from laziness or innate
inability, take your pick) to easily decipher metre. So instead of
creating something from scratch, I took an existing song whose beat I
was already familiar with and changed some of the wording. That said,
I was pleasantly surprised to discover some of the cheats that
Lightfoot made with his own rhymes, since it makes me feel less guilty
about my own crappy scansion. In any case, as a ballad it has a
variation of the a-b-c-b ryhming pattern, which my amature anyalisis
of 'Wreck' indicated had an aa-b-cc-b (the first and third lines had
a beat patten that broke the lines into two halves, with the final word
of each half ryhming).
The name 'The Rescue Of The Edmund Fitzgerald' comes from a throw-
away line in the Champions RPG supplement _Millennium City_ about pop
culture songs featuring superheroes.
Until I began researching for this story I had been unaware that
the Edmund Fitzgerald had been accompanied by a second freighter, the
Arthur M. Anderson, of which the original Lightfoot song makes no direct
mention. This story compounds the situation, since the shape of the
narrative not only doesn't refer to the Anderson but actively infers
that the Fitzgerald was alone.
The Chippewa mythology as used here has been bent, folded, spindled
and mutilated almost as much as Gordon Lightfoot's song lyrics.
Mishibizhiw is indeed an ill-regarded manitou who lives underwater and
causes drownings, but I included powers to cause storms and early
winters that make him more like the winter spirit Gaabiboonikaan. The
Nibiinaabewag and niibinaabekwewag ('watermen' and 'waterwomen') are
merfolk, but I decided that the ones that Mishibizhiw would use are
creepy undead/demonic versions that he creates from the bodies of his
victims after he's eaten their souls.
Suicide Squid... You know, there was a time when I wouldn't have
felt the need to explain Suicide Squid on a rec.arts.comics.* newsgroup.
But it was twenty years ago, and the Squiddy awards haven't been held
since 2005...
Back in 1991 someone posted a question to rec.arts.comics.misc
asking about events in the then-current _Suicide Squad_ comic - but
mistyped it as 'Suicide Squid'. Whereupon other posters ran with the
joke and began to explain in great detail what was happening in the
totally imaginary Suicide Squid comic. The Ten Tentacled Avenger Of The
Deep went on to become the mascot of rec.arts.comics.misc, and had their
annual awards (The Squiddies) named after him. Ty Templeton did the
artwork for the t-shirts.
Within the Looniverse, the Legion of Net.Heroes member Squid Boy
was the sidekick of Suicide Squid, and is a long time member of the team
that started out as the Secret Dvanders and later became Dvandom Force
(in the _Constellation_ and _Dvandom Force_ series). When Squid Boy
died (the second time), Suicide Squid sacrificed his existence in the
Looniverse to bring Squid Boy back to life (_Constellation_ #29 [cover
date June 1994), and Squid Boy subsequently took the code name of
Squidman. Since Suicide Squid can't manifest in the Looniverse anymore,
his subsequent LNH appearances have either been off-dimension (as in
_Limp-Asparagus Lad_ #49-50) or in the past (as this story is).
And on a personal note: I have often wondered why more Suicide Squid
stories (whether tied to LNH continuity or free from any continuity)
weren't posted to alt.comics.lnh and rec.arts.comics.creative during his
heyday in the 1990s. Just one of those things, I guess.
-----
Saxon Brenton University of Technology, city library, Sydney Australia
saxon.brenton at uts.edu.au saxonbrenton at hotmail.com
"These 'no-nonsense' solutions of yours just don't hold water in a complex
world of jet-powered apes and time-travel." - Superman, JLA Classified #3
From: Arthur Spitzer arspitzer at earthlink.net
Date: Fri Apr 1 14:58:30 PDT 2011
|-| \
| |-| [] / #41
| | | [] egion of \
| | | []__ [] [] [] [] / 'The Return of Obscure Trivia Lad'
| | | [___][ \[]et.[]__[]eroes \
| | | []\ ] [ __ ] / written by
| |-| [] [] [] [] \ Arthur Spitzer
| |-|___________________________/
| |
| |
| | The cover depicts a gloved hand reaching out of the ground
| | next to a tombstone with the inscription 'Obscure Trivia Lad --
| | R.I.P.' on it. On the bottom is text in bold print that reads
| | 'Not a Hoax!! Not an Elsewhirl!! Not an April Fool Joke!!'
| |
| |
|_|
April 1, 2011 ==
The LNHHQ --
"Obscure Trivia Lad is back."
Time Waster Lad; who'd had a grueling day of eating breakfast, screwing
around on the internet, eating lunch, screwing around the internet, and
was now relaxing in the LNH TV room with his fellow LNH'rs; turned his
head toward the voice. "What? Oh. Obscure Trivia Lad? That you? I
thought you were dead." [Obscure Trivia Lad died in Beige Midnight #4
-- Footnote Girl]
Obscure Trivia Lad nodded his head. "Yes, Obscure Trivia Lad was dead,
but now -- he is alive."
Time Waster Lad took a sip from his Mr. Paprika. "Really. How'd you do
it? Come back?"
"Obscure Trivia Lad doesn't know. Every memory since Obscure Trivia Lad
died is a blank. Other than that, Obscure Trivia Lad feels the same.
Still has same android liquid metal body. The only thing that has
changed is that Obscure Trivia Lad no longer has a shard of the Cosmic
Plot Device in his body. Everything else is the same."
Sarcastic Lad yawned. "Wow. A hero coming back from the dead. That's
never happened before. How daring. How original. I sure hope this
literary masterpiece wins every single Raccie."
"What has happened since Obscure Trivia Lad died? Has Obscure Trivia
Lad missed a lot?"
Time Waster Lad hit the mute button. "What's happened? Not much I
guess. Beige Midnight is over. Although since the writers haven't
posted the last five issues, we can't really talk about some of it.
Like the number of Arthur Spitzer characters that were slaughtered.
That sort of thing."
"And after Beige Midnight? Well, Toony Stork took a leave of absence
and now there's this new person wearing the Irony Man suit -- we don't
know who it is though. My pick for the pool is the chick who's Captain
Killfile's mother -- but that's me."
"And the Legion of Net.Villains split up into two groups. One called
the East Coast Brotherhood of Net.Villains is being led by Mr. Homage.
The other -- The West Coast Brotherhood of Net.Villains -- led by Lagneto."
"And in 2009 there was a fourth Saxon Brenton Imagine Thingee called
'Just Imagine Saxon Brenton vs. Andrew Perron in the Return of the
RACCies!' I think. Can't really talk about that either."
"And 2010 and 2011 -- well nothing much has really happened -- at least
as far as I can..."
"What do mean?!!" said Obnoxious Ame.rec.a Boy storming into the room
with a lot of wet tea bags in his arms. "We're suffering our greatest
Cry.Sig ever!!! Right now as we speak, a socialist muslim community
organizer has stolen the reins of power!! He's not even Ame.rec.an!!
He was born in some weird country called Hawaii Land or something stupid
like that!!! We were living in a Golden Age before this 'Even Worse
than Hitler' decided to run for President!! And now it's all gone to
Hell!!! All our glorious freedom occupations have become bloody costly
quagmires!!! He destroyed our entire economy before he was even elected!!"
"And now he is in league with fat cat firemen, policemen, teachermen --
to destroy the Ame.rec.an Dream with their greedy obscene Collective
Bargaining Rape Machine!!!! I mean he came this close to taxing to
death every struggling working man that makes over $250,000." Obnoxious
Ame.rec.a Boy put his index finger and thumb as close as they could
possibly be without touching. "That close!! Yes!! That close!! I
mean, it didn't happen. But it could have!!!"
"God help us, every day we get a little closer to being like Cuba or
Canada. Every day!!! And now we're deep in Obama Care-Death
Panel-Socialislam-Cry.Sig Crisis -- and the cliff we're driving towards
is getting deeper and deeper!!!! The end could very well be nigh."
There was silence for a bit as all the heroes digested this rant.
Sarcastic Lad twirled a finger near his head, while he made goofy faces.
"Obscure Trivia Lad would like to ask why you're carrying a bunch of
used Tea Bags in your arms."
"Because I'm saving the country. I'm saving it for all of us.
Palin/Bachmann 2012!!!! Hell Yeah!!!" said Obnoxious Ame.rec.a Boy
pumping his fist in the air. As he walked away, he began to sing Lee
Greenwood's 'God Bless the USA'.
Time Waster Lad hit the volume button. "Yeah -- that's about it."
=======
Credits:
Obscure Trivia Lad -- Brian Perler
Time Waster Lad - Ray Rich
Footnote Girl -- Saxon Brenton
Sarcastic Lad -- The Saint
Obnoxious Ame.rec.a Boy -- Jamas Enright
Writer's Notes:
I wrote this just in case I never finish Beige Midnight (I will finish
it -- I will -- but you know). You see Brian Perler did give me
permission to kill Obscure Trivia Lad, but only if I brought him back.
And while I had a cool way to kill him off -- I couldn't think of a cool
way to bring him back -- so there's this -- the probably lamest way to
ever bring back a hero. And aren't stories where superheroes are just
watching TV the worst superhero stories of all (well I'm sure there's a
good one somewhere).
As for Time Waster Lad saying that nothing has happened in 2010 and
2011, I'm sure he just meant no big events and stuff. He wasn't dissing
all of your fine stories.
The only characters that will probably die and never come back in Beige
Midnight are characters that I created. So possibly Ripping Dancer,
Mynabird, Vector Sublime, Building Suspense Lad, and whoever.
Please feel free to come up with some clever reason why Obscure Trivia
Lad is back and alive. Because you can bet that I sure won't. :)
Arthur "100 in Yuma" Spitzer
==========
Next Week: Possibly More LNH v2 issues!
==========
Arthur "Same Classic Channel. But Same Time? Probably not." Spitzer
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