Hero Hotline (Ltd. 1989) (DC Comics [COMICS]

FROM THE ARCHIVES (Comics That Time Forgot) 

HERO HOTLINE

#1-6, DC Comics, Limited Series (1989) Script: Bob Rozakis (# 1-6) Pencils: Stephen DeStefano (# 1-6) Inks: Kurt Schaffenberger (# 1-6) Coloring: Bob Rozakis (# 1-6) Lettering: John Costanza (# 1-5); Agustin Mas (# 6) Editing: Brian Augustyn (# 1-6) 

With the enormously successful late-1990s revival of the classic Superman-led Justice League of America, many comics fans have forgotten just how popular 1987’s Justice League was at the time. The combination of relatively-obscure super-heroes and light comedy led to several spin-off series and helped cap the “doom-and-gloom” period of the mid-1980s. With Justice League’s success, comic publishers took a chance on other comedy-themed books, such as Marvel’s Damage Control, and most notably for our present purposes, DC’s Hero Hotline. Hero Hotline, a six-issue mini-series issued at the height of Justice League’s fame was created by Bob Rozakis, a long time DC production manager and the man responsible for introducing computerized color separations to comics.* 

The Hero Hotline mini-series revolves around a group of community-oriented super-heroes with low-level powers, all under the employ of the mysterious Coordinator.** Thus, we’re introduced to heroes like Microwavabelle, a single mother with the ability to shoot microwaves from her hands; Stretch, a hero with the same powers and origin as the Elongated Man; Voice-Over, an expert mimic and ventriloquist; and many more. Although the heroes tackle an occasional minor super-villain like Snafu, Firebug, and Quakemaster, much of the series focuses on their helping every-day people with every-day problems,*** like a cat being stuck in a tree or a ring lost down a sewer grate. 

Although nominally set in the DC Universe the book is written, and especially drawn, to be so light-hearted as to border on silly. For example, background characters are often drawn with heads resembling Popeye, dogs, and even yellow smiley-faces, with no attempt at an explanation. The script is slightly more serious, but not by much. The book has a few interesting facets. For example, the heroes are not amazingly muscular or attractive, the characters have a certain charm, and the idea of community-based heroes is a relatively original one. Unfortunately, Hero Hotline suffers from a major flaw: it’s simply not funny. Hero Hotline lurks in that unenviable grey area between comics that are dramatic and exciting like normal super-hero comics or laugh-out-loud funny like Justice League and other humorous takes on super-heroes. 

*The editorial response to a reader’s query in issue four’s letter page states that the proposal for Hero Hotline was floating around for years before Justice League came on the scene. However, it’s surely no coincidence that the proposal was finally approved after the latter book became such a big success.

** The Coordinator, never actually seen in the pages of Hero Hotline, always issued orders from a distance through a telephone or P.A. system. In a It’s BobRo the Answer Man! column for Silver Bullet Comics’ website, Rozakis states that the real identity of the Coordinator is Mister America (a.k.a. the Americacommando), an obscure Golden Age hero. It may also be worth mentioning that a four-part Hero Hotline prequel ran in Action Comics Weekly # 637-640. 

*** In this community-oriented approach to super-heroing, Hero Hotline looks like it may be a precursor to what Giffen and DeMatteis are attempting to do with the new Formerly Known as the Justice League series.