Heck, Even Wonder Dog is Useful!

 

cover art by Ernie Chan

In the first issue of Super Friends, it appeared that the heroes had foiled the villains' plan to steal components for building a super robot.

But Super Friends #2 (December 1976) shows us that the villains aren't giving up that easily. E. Nelson Bridwell's script and Ric Estrada's fun art continue to bring this silly but entertaining story to life. 

Two of the villain kid sidekicks had been captured, but one of them (Penquin's sidekick Chick) has a radio hidden in his umbrella. Why a sidekick to the Penguin is even allowed to keep an umbrella is not brought up.

Wonder Dog spots the radio, but by the time the frustrated canine is finally able to alert Wendy and Marvin to the situation (eventually using Charades to do so), the villains have arrived. Wendy and Marvin are captured, but Wonder Dog makes a break for it, cleverly ducking into a dog show to foil Cheetah's attempt to catch him.

Wonder Dog sneaks back into the Hall of Justice (using a secret door that opens to the sound of his barks) and uses a teleporter to beam up to the JLA satellite. Flash is on duty there and he summons the Super Friends. Superman brings Krypto, who uses Dog Language to find out what's going on from Wonder Dog, then communicates this to Superman via a barking code they'd developed. Because this is so much easier than Superman taking a second to scan the Hall of Justice with his X-Ray vision.

It sounds like I'm making fun of the story and I suppose I am. But I hope it doesn't sound mean-spirited. The silly progression of the story is just right for the Super Friends and this issue (like the last one) is a lot of fun. The idea of Krypto interpreting for Wonder Dog via a barking code is absurd in just the right way to make it delightful. The universe would be a poorer place without such things.

Wendy and Marvin are rescued, but the villains have used this distraction to steal the robot components they couldn't get hold of in the last issue. BUT the Super Friends have attached tracking devices to those components. BUT Toyman's toys are causing disasters in different locations, forcing most of the heroes to deal with that. BUT Batman and Robin are still available to track the robot parts. BUT, though the Dynamic Duo is easily taking out the main villains, it turns out they are no match for junior sidekicks! They are, in fact, knocked out with embarrassing ease. 

Penguin wants the juniors to have the honor of killing Batman and Robin, but the youngsters shy away from the idea of murder. Wendy and Marvin jump in at this point--they had stowed away in the Batmobile. This convinces the juniors to switch sides and knock out the villains.

Penguin manages to activate the robot. It's supposed to be more powerful than even Superman, but the Man of Steel arrives to take it out without too much trouble. It was, after all, an untested prototype.

So that's it. Nobody with superpowers uses those powers effectively and the non-powered but highly trained characters are beaten up by barely trained teenagers. And, in the Super Friends universe, this is exactly as things should be. 

Next week, we'll look in on Prince Valiant.