Book Review: Showcase Presents Adam Strange

Showcase Presents: Adam Strange by Gardner F. Fox

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


Adam Strange is one of those creatures of the Silver Age that no one has really manage to get right since then. This book collects Strange's first 30 + appearances from the Late 1950s to mid-1963. This book collect's tales from Showcase #17-19, and Mystery in Space #54-84.

The set up is simple enough. Young Earth archaeologist Adam Strange is struck by a beam of Zeta radiation that takes him 25 trillion miles away to the planet Rann. There Strange meets and falls in love with Alana, the daughter of one of the planet's chief scientists. Adam is returned to Earth after a while and has to plot to fined the next Zeta beam to take him to Rann. Adam has a keen intellect and also is courageous enough to to be the Champion of Rann, which is good because the people of Rann need saving---a lot. Every trip over, there's a new world-challenging peril.

The adventures in the book are a lot of fun. If you like old Buck Rogers stories, you'll enjoy this. At the same time, I do get reviewers who say this book is repetitive. There is a definite formula of events. However, to writer Gardener Fox's credit, he does manage to vary the on-going themes of Zeta Beam his Adam Strange, he travels across space to Rann with little hitches coming up or Adam having to race to meet the Zeta Beam or make a tough choice about addressing another crisis with his spaceman gear or going to Rann that it doesn't feel too repetitive to me.

In addition, the character of Alana and the romance between Adam and Alana is enjoyable. In an age when women in comics were clueless and helpless, Alana was thoroughly competent. and also helped Adam often in his missions. The romance between the two was straightforward and uncomplicated. Given that this was the Decade with Lois and Lana were making fools out of themselves over Superman, while the entire male Marvel contingent was hiding their secret identity from the women they loved and who loved them, this little bit of sweet romance was actually kind of refreshing.

The adventure are mostly quick and easy to read affairs. There are only two comic length adventures. Mystery in Space #75 is the only story here where Adam Strange battled a villain who was anything like a big name in the DC universe as he faced off against Kanjar Ro and Mystery in Space #81 which seems to finally give Adam what he wanted as Alana comes to Earth, but it's something far more sinister. Both of these are great. The first three issues of Showcase printed two stories each that were between 9-15 pages long, the next 17 stories were 9 pages each, and with the exception of the two previously mentioned stories, the other stories in here were between 13-17 pages which means the writing is tight and action packed.

I like how Fox used these fun stories to teach children readers scientific principals. There also was a key message of the book: don't become too dependent on technology. Early on, it's started that that's why Rann and its inhabitants don't know what to do in the face of all of these crisis because they've become too dependent on technology and have forgotten how to operate, think for themselves, and solve their own problems.

The book does have a few repetitive moments. Also, villain quality is pretty low. The villains are mostly one use. They're interesting, but usually they have just a single gimmick. The one attempt of Fox to give Adam Strange a supervillain rivial in the Dust Devil doesn't work.

Overall, though, this is a fun back. It'd be great to read to young kids at bedtime, or to just read yourself if you want to recapture the wonder of better days.




View all my reviews