Retro Review: Harvey tries his hand at international espionage in 1979's "Two for the Money!"

[about_faces]

One of the most distinctive aspects of The Bronze Age of Comics (early 70's to mid 80's) was how it mixed classic superheroics in a greater sense of realism.

Or at least, that was the attempt, more often than not. Even those results that were groundbreaking at the time now read as dated, ham-handed, and/or just plain silly. I mean, I know it's

Comments

[ext_241751]

Uh, Harvey? If you know the history of the term "double cross", it's not necessarily the best rhetorical choice to counter a charge of treason. Just saying.

[thehefner]

School me, please. How do you mean?

[ext_241751]

"Double Cross" is a WWII term, the name of a British espionage operation whereby the entire Nazi spy network was compromised, and false information was fed to Germany because the Brits knew full well who was a spy and what they were sending home.

(To emphasize, the *ENTIRE* Nazi spy network in Britain was compromised. Every single one.)

Sometimes the spies didn't know they'd been made, but many of them were willing turncoats, and actually were committing treason against their government. (From the Nazi point of view, of course.)

...and really, I don't see how what Harvey does in this story isn't treasonous. Not that, as you said, it doesn't take big brass ones to flip off both the US and the USSR at the same time.

[sara_lakali]

I always liked Irv Novick's Batman. There's something fluid about the action poses as opposed to say, Dick Dillin's art.

[ext_262094]

Now this comic i own, i still wonder how Two-Face could survive that great fall from the chopper.

[abqreviews]

Well, at least Batman still tries to reason with him. I don't mind such one-note depictions of Two-Face if Batman still feels compassion for him, unlike in DARK VICTORY and THE FACE SCHISM.

[thehefner]

And that's a very good point. Even if the Two-Face depiction itself is all-monster all the time, at least Batman should be shown believing that there's something in there worth saving. There's still a sense of tragedy, even if the tragedy is now more on Batman's shoulders.

[lego_joker]

Speaking of which, when are we going to see you rip apart The Face Schism? That one seemed like one big steaming piece of snark bait.

[thehefner]

Oh man, that one. Good question. I might first do Doug Moench's previous Harvey story, the Knightfall one with Klaus Janson art, but it isn't vital to read beforehand. I have no immediate plans for "The Face Schism" just yet, but you've definitely helped put it on the queue, so to speak.

It's certainly one of the worst Two-Face stories to date, although it seems it actually has its fans. I'd honestly like to know why.

[lego_joker]

Ah, Harvey. When written well, he's what I like to call "unpredictably predictable". As opposed to the Joker's "predictably unpredictable".

If I remember correctly, this story is vaguely referenced in Wein's Arkham story, where Batman notes that both Two-Face and Joker (who crashed his boat into some rocks in Batman #321) are believed to be dead. Thus creating an Arkham whose most famous inmate is Maxie Zeus.

Kinda interesting how, for all the hamfistedness of the Bronze Age, they were actually pickier about who was insane, heh?

(In fact, before the Crisis, Riddler and Poison Ivy both went to normal jail, as did Mr. Freeze.)

[thehefner]

Oh, right! I actually tracked down that Professor Milo issue because the very next issue was the very same Gilda story I mentioned! All the odder that his survival should go completely unaddressed, since it had just been questioned! But then, maybe guest writer Marv Wolfman didn't get the memo.

Man, that Wolfman story is so clumsily cobbled together. When I bought the Wein Arkham story, I was actually hoping it'd lend some insight on the events in the Wolfman one, but no, they're unrelated.