This is the 100th post on HeroMachine.com, and nothing can express my celebration like this onomontoPOWia:

We’ve partied so hard, we’re bringing the building down with a mighty “Ka-Ramba!” Did I say ka-ramba? Aye, ka-ramba! Somewhere a Simpson is smiling, and I don’t mean OJ.

Thanks to everyone who’s taken part in the blog so far. I hope you’re all enjoying it, and please send a link to any friends who you think might get a kick out of bad super-hero costumes, creating an online application, making cool drawings, or other random bits of comic book fun.

As I’ve browsed through the archives looking for bad super-hero costumes, I’ve come across a number of characters previously unknown to me whom I had accidentally duplicated in my role-playing past. It’s a bit jarring when it happens — you’re flipping through a comic and all of a sudden someone appears who you thought you’d invented ten years back. Only instead of a man it’s a woman, and instead of being a villain it’s a criminal, and their costume is just all wrong.

I thought I’d share a few of those, and going forward I might take a crack at re-imagining other established characters, sort of a HeroMachine “OtherWorlds” experiment. Here’s the first accidental homage.

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OK, I know, he’s supposed to be a Batman rip-off, but seriously:

Cat-Man? Were Flat-Man, Fat-Man, Gnat-Man, Spat-Man, Hat-Man, and Rat-Man all taken by some other comics company and thus unavailable? I suspect this guy stole a Golden Age Batman mask and dyed it orange, because those ears look awfully similar, but the logo — well now, the logo must be 100% his own creation. The big ol’ C with the smaller M in the middle (his initials, get it? get it?) are the real stroke of genius that make it clear that this guy is no ordinary knockoff! I can’t wait till the issue where we go to his secret lair, “The Litterbox”. Or would that be the “Cat House”? I guess not, since he’s based in New York and we all know how the government there frowns on that sort of thing.

(Image and character ©1985, DC Comics, Inc., “Who’s Who” volume 4.)

First, the winner of Contest Caption 1 was … Hades! There were a lot of really good entries, but for some reason this one made me actually laugh out loud. I know, I’m weird.

Hades, if you don’t get an email from me shortly, please get in touch so we can start on your drawing. Hopefully it’ll turn out well, and I’ll post it next Tuesday.

And now, here’s your challenge for the second contest, the winner of which will also receive a free black and white illustration:

Like last time, please leave your entry in the comments below, with an indication of which dialog goes where. For instance:

Half-Brain Guy: You mindless twit!
Crow-Head Guy 1: ME, mindless!?
Crow-Head Guy 2: I think you should step over to this mirror, Gary …

I look forward to seeing what you all come up with this week, thanks for playing!

Each Monday I try to make a somewhat coherent story by taking one and only one panel from each of ten randomly-selected comic books. For this second edition, I’m going to introduce a couple of brief text transitions, hopefully that’s still within the spirit of the idea.

This week’s random bag of fun featured demons from the pit of Hell, a Native American super-hero adventurer, aliens from Venus, and a children’s book illustrator / freelance bounty hunter. Throw them all into a blender, mix with a couple of shots of Tequila, and you get the exciting adventures of an insane young man on the prowl for love in Sin City, Las Vegas!

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