CROSSOVER MADNESS

 I'm not a fan of the DC spook-books, but GHOSTS seems one of the weakest of the bunch. In issues #97-99, DC tried to pump some energy into it by having a meaningless "teamup" between Doctor Thirteen and The Spectre. The title concluded (appropriately enough) thirteen issues later.

THE WEIRDIE FILES

 

I came across a library copy of the 2012 cluster-crossover JUSTICE LEAGUE TRINITY WAR, and it's pretty standard for its purported architect Geoff Jones: just another sloppy smorgasbord of DC heroes doing stupid things. Its only point of interest is showing a version of Justice League Dark composed of John Constantine, Deadman, Black Orchid, and Frankenstein, though one line asserts that Zatanna was a former member. Whether this was ever a lineup in any other comic book I do not know.    

THE WEIRDIE FILES

 Here's a "DC Gothic" that, like DEADMAN, preceded my previous candidate for the company's second non-anthology "weird feature," which I had previously pegged as the SHOWCASE debut of the Phantom Stranger: the CHALLENGERS OF THE UNKNOWN, a failing book that the company strove to shore up with spooky content.

     One issue during this run had the heroes encounter both DC's private eye character Jonny Double and their high-wire haunter Deadman.   

THE WEIRDIE FILES

 JUSTICE LEAGUE UNLIMITED #14 did its own version of "the Trenchcoat Brigade," even though most of the characters aren't wearing trenchcoats. This version includes Deadman (occupying the body of Wonder Woman in this scene), Doctor Fate, Doctor Occult, Zauriel, Zatanna and Etrigan the Demon. These weirdie-heroes get the lion's share of action while the regular JLU heroes sit things out.

THE WEIRDIE FILES

 DC jumped feet first into the supernatural/Gothic thing after having generally avoided that type of story for over 20 years, and it seems likely that Carmine Infantino was the biggest influence, as he himself claims in a JOURNAL interview:

I was trying to prepare for the inevitable. In my mind, “What if these things die? What if we’re back in the old days and suddenly superheroes drop off?” The reason I threw out a mess of different titles was, I wanted to sneak in The House of Mystery and The House of Secrets without people much realizing what was going on. Which I did. And also we had a chain of them out there, if you remember, and they were all successful before anyone at Marvel realized what was going on. So we had those going for us, and the superheroes going for us. Meanwhile I kept experimenting with different things.

So in Evanier's book KIRBY, ME claims, maybe a little dubiously, that when Kinney Corp bought DC in 1967, they thought they were getting the top company, only to become displeased when they learned that Marvel was such a strong second. (I think Roy Thomas claimed Marvel didn't obtain the majority market share until the early seventies though.) Still, that story isn't absolutely necessary to put across the notion that someone in management thought it was time for some changes. Infantino was made first art director and then editorial director in 1966 and 1967, and it looks like promoting horror and the Gothic was his major "experiment." Not only did he get rid of the superheroes in HOUSE OF MYSTERY in '67, he also debuted DEADMAN in the failing book STRANGE ADVENTURES. The Spectre had been revived earlier under the tutelage of Julie Schwartz, but the initial format was so rationalized that any "weirdie" appeal of the hero was nullified. Spectre also got his own title in 1967, and though it didn't last long it soon converted into spookier stories before it died. In the late sixties and early seventies, even some of the "mainstream" DC superheroes began exploiting Gothic/horror themes on their covers, such as (obviously) BATMAN but also less obvious types like FLASH and TEEN TITANS. 

One fan attributed the big change to the influence of DARK SHADOWS in '66, but I think it was more likely that DC saw that the Warren magazines had been doing well since 1964 (EERIE) and 1966 (CREEPY) respectively, and that they hired guys like EC stalwart Joe Orlando to cut into that action. That also probably led to the revival of The Phantom Stranger in 1969, as well as another fifties character, Doctor Thirteen. The intersection of the two seems to be the first regular convocation of two "weirdies" at DC Comics, in 1969's SHOWCASE #80-- though the good doctor was dropped from the Stranger's adventures pretty quickly.

THE WEIRDIE FILES

Though Alan Moore wasn't the first writer to convoke weirdies, he was one of the guys who made the trope popular.

In SWAMP THING ANNUAL #2. for instance, the titular muck monster has to journey to Hell to save the spirit of Abby Arcane, and he gets the assistance of a former ally, The Demon, in so doing. Moore manages to work in Deadman, The Spectre and the Phantom Stranger, even though none of them are necessary to the plot.

In contrast, Moore's almost-final SWAMP THING story guest-stars all of the above weirdies, plus Doctor Fate and many others, and they are all necessary to the plot, so maybe he used the Annual to re-familiarize his readers with DC's resident weirdies just so they wouldn't seem yanked in out of nowhere.

THE WEIRDIE FILES

 Here's a prominent example of a convocation of weirdies with no monster content, the so-called "Trenchcoat Brigade" from THE BOOKS OF MAGIC.

THE WEIRDIE FILES

Technically the story "Brothers" crosses over Brother Power with a couple of Swamp Thing's support characters, but it counts.

A cool cover to a boring story in SPECTRE #11, featuring stature-characters Spectre, Doctor Fate, Zatanna, Phantom Stranger, Madame Xanadu, Deadman, and The Enchantress, and one charisma-character, The Gentleman Ghost.

THE WEIRDIE FILES

 In keeping with my new determination of "weirdies" as a subcategory of crossovers, THE WEIRDIE FILES are dedicated to this literary phenomenon. 

I'll start with the most recent iteration of JUSTICE LEAGUE DARK.

The superordinate ensemble is made up of Wonder Woman, Zatanna, Swamp Thing, Man-Bat, and Detective Chimp.

The subordinate ensemble consists of The Demon, John Constantine, Blue Devil, and the late great Zatara.

Subordinate guest stars with stature include Zauriel, Deadman, Phantom Stranger, Madame Xanadu, Andrew Bennett, and five Justice Leaguers. A few such characters show up for one panel and have no lines.

Subordinate guest stars possessed of only charisma are Traci Thirteen, Klarion the Witch Boy, Morgaine LeFey. Felix Faust, Nabu the Wise, Mordru, and the demonic trio Ghast, Rath, and Abnegazar. Traci, daughter of the ghost-buster Doctor Thirteen, attained a little stature in the backup series ARCHITECTS AND MORTALITY but I'm not sure it's consequential enough to designate her a stature-type.