It looks like Mr. Mind in getting in the mood for this week’s They Might Be Giants show in KC by rocking out to his favorite tune! Enjoy the official video for “Doctor Worm” here.
My friend and Double Dip co-conspirator Tom Cherry is at it again, declaring today “Draw Mr. Mind Day”! This wicked worm plagued Captain Marvel and the rest of the Marvel Family, most notably in 1943’s epic “The Monster Society of Evil”. I really love the Marvel Family of characters, and miss reading new stories featuring them. While I enjoyed the original Fawcett stories, the pre-Crisis stories put out by DC, and Jerry Ordway‘s fantastic 1990’s run with the characters, they’ve fallen on hard times since then. I’ve never understood why DC can’t seem to make better use of the characters, who are so much more than the mere Superman Family clones they’re treated as. Sadly, they’ve lost all of their unique flavor by this point, and “Shazam!” is pretty much unrecognizable in both form and tone from the character’s lighthearted origins.
Fortunately, I can always reread the back issues in my collection…
Smeary Soapbox Press 
Wow! That’s great, Dale! Mr. Mind and They Might Be Giants are two pop culture sensations that deserve to go together! Thanks for participating in Mr. Mind’s big day! I’m sure your membership card to the Monster Society is in the mail as we speak! Plus my feelings towards the Marvel Family and DC’s current handling of them match your sentiments! Makes me wish Fawcett won that lousy lawsuit back in the 50’s! So are you attending the TMBG show in KC?
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Thanks, Tom! This was a great subject– Mr. Mind (the classic design, at least) is fun and easy to draw. Weather permitting (it’s outdoors), I plan to be at the TMBG show; they’re a great band to see live, and I’ve been fortunate enough to see them once on this tour already!
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I’m with both of you, Dale & Tom, on how much fun the Ordway/Krause run on Power of Shazam was, and how badly the characters have been misused in recent years. The Jeff Smith Monster Society of Evil mini-series a few years ago was also pretty good, but fun stories like that are, unfortunately, few and far between for the Marvel Family these days.
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That’s right! The Jeff Smith version was really well done, and it also led to a few nice Mike Kunkel issues of Billy Batson and the Magic of Shazam! The title floundered for a few issues after that until artist Mike Norton joined writers Art Balthazar and Franco for a fun run beginning with issue #13 (until DC cancelled the title with #21)…
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Thanks for mentioning Jeff Smith’s miniseries, Ivan! I really dug that! His version of Mary Marvel was fantastic! And, Dale, I should have known you were a TMBG fan!
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