Marvel Comics fans have often made fun of DC Comics’s abundance of sidekicks and “kid” versions of characters. There’s a simple reason for the differing traditions, though. In the early days of superhero comics in the 1940s, child sidekicks were believed to be both a way to help kids identify with the situations and the comics as well as give them a role model (Robin’s early appearances in Batman comics featured numerous lectures about moral behavior).

It was also a simpler time, when the audience of superhero comics was entirely adolescent children. Sidekicks made sense from a business standpoint, and the simple nature of the stories–busting gangsters and petty thugs, rather than world-devouring demigods–made having a sidekick less like reckless child endangerment and more like plain old adventure. (more…)

Having reviewed Blue Beetle last week, it’s only natural to review Ted’s bromance buddy next.

While the Ted Kord incarnation of Blue Beetle was created by Steve Ditko back in the 1960s for Charlton Comics and Booster Gold was created for DC Comics by Dan Jurgens twenty years later, the two became famed best friends in the pages of Keith Giffen and J.M. DeMatteis’s Justice League International in the late 1980s.

Since then, Booster Gold’s popularity has waxed, waned and waxed again among DC fans. He’s currently starring in his own series, wearing the modern outfit shown in this figure. There’s also a variant “classic” Booster, featuring a slightly different paint scheme, a disco collar and non-opening Skeets (if you don’t know what that means, see below). (more…)