Booster Gold #11

Booster Gold #11
Cover Date: December 1986
Creative Team: Dan Jurgens (Writer and Pencils)/Mike De Carlo (Inks)/John Constanza (Letterer)/Gene D'Angelo (Colors)/Barbara Randall (Editor)

Previously....

The Director started his millionth plan to kill Booster/conquer the world. It involved kidnapping as many members of Booster Gold's supporting cast as he could get his hands on...

Summary

Some of the 1000’s goons break serial C-List villain Shockwave out of jail as part of the Director’s larger plan to crush Booster.

In Goldstar Inc.’s offices, Booster has a complaint to register with the guy who made the Boostermobile. It turns out they’re going to mass market it, which Booster isn’t happy about, because it makes his own car less special, as well as causing other headaches, like villains using it, or any number of other problems that might arise from a fleet of Boostermobiles on the road. The guy who made the Boostermobile doesn’t care, and the contract states that he can do this, so he’s going to, and now he’s going to leave.

Booster then reams out Dirk, whose job it is to prevent things like this from happening. Dirk tries to apologize, but his mind is fixed on the fact that the 1000 have kidnapped both his daughter and Trixie and forbidden him from telling Booster.

Trixie’s aunt then shows up to ask where her niece is, and Booster asks Dirk, as he had asked Dirk to take her home at the end of last issue, right before she got kidnapped. Dirk asks about Booster’s fancy new haircut. Way to play it cool, there.

STAR Labs! Dr. Soo is making that suit that Dirk had ordered for a potential sidekick, and thinks about how cool it would be to be a scientist to the super-heroes. Yeah, right up until some asshole writer had you brutally murdered to add “emotional resonance” to a middling story.

On top of the Goldstar offices, Shockwave, having gotten plans for the building from the 1000, starts attacking.

In the offices, Booster asks Dirk point blank what the hell happened to Trixie. Dirk is going to have to think fast, and all he can come up with is saying that Trixie ran off by herself before asking for “the lowdown on that outrageous new haircut.” Booster fires Dirk, either for losing Trixie or for questioning his new haircut.

Dirk, feeling bad, realizes that he still has to give the 1000 access to the office computers, and rushes off to do that.

The offices of Goldstar, Inc. suddenly come under attack by Shockwave, though, so Booster doesn't notice, as he takes the fight to Shockwave. They trade blows on the roof, but Booster is still losing power, so the fight doesn't go all that well.

In the 1000 Base under the docks, the Director threatens to have Trixie’s aunt killed unless Trixie tells him everything she knows about Booster. She does, but doesn’t know much, other than that his real name is “Michael Jon Carter’, and that he might be from the future. The Director finds the future origin theory plausible, and orders her back to the holding cell along with Dirk’s daughter.

The battle between Shockwave and Booster reaches a crescendo as the building itself collapses on them, though both emerge from the wreckage to continue fighting. Dirk, deciding that he has to do something to help Booster, who’s almost out of power, tries to garrotte Shockwave with a hose from a nearby lawn. Booster takes that plan a modifies it slightly, pouring the water into the inside of Shockwave’s power armor, destroying it and defeating the villain.

But the Director isn’t done, as he takes control of Skeets via the computer access given to him by Dirk, and challenges Booster to one final fight. Booster accepts…with a vengeance! To be continued!

Continuity!

-Shockwave was last seen in the pages of Blue Devil, where he amassed an 0-2 record against the titular character.

-Booster does get a new haircut this issue, as seen on the cover.

Review

Well, at least the seemingly endless Director storyarc is over as Booster and the Director are finally primed to have their first face-to-face confrontation ever. Still, I can't say I care much about the Director. He's just some vague enemy with plans to conquer the world and/or killing Booster. He's got some minions, he's got himself a nice high-tech base, as befitting

I think the other problem is that Booster Gold works best when it's only semi-serious. I mean, it's a comic about a guy who stole a time machine so he could go back in time to make loads of money by being a super-hero. That's not a premise that really lends itself to genuine drama. Now, this issue does attempt to sort of lighten the mood by having Dirk try and play off Trixie's disappearance by making a series of catty remarks about Booster's hair cut, but it doesn't come across as funny even in the context of the story, as Booster points out how out of place those jokes are, and fires Dirk because of it.

Also, having the Director hack into Skeets is a pretty dumb resolution, if only because it really makes very little sense, even by comic book logic, for a robot from the future to get taken down by a hacker in the era of MS-DOS. 

Booster Gold should haven been a comic about the absurdity of Reagan-era capitalism, maybe even a satire on the comic book industry itself. Booster fighting some megalomaniac with a grudge makes this comic just another comic, albeit with some above-average art. 


This is an okay comic, but it's just not very memorable, and that's a shame, because there's at least some potential with this set-up.