Begin at the beginning: Detective Comics #1 (March 1937)

Oooh, don't you just feel a lovely tingling sensation starting at the tips of your fingers and ending somewhere inside your brain?



Maybe it's just me.



But, hey, first issue of Detective Comics! This is the comic that gave the famous publisher its name, and introduced us to Batman. Siegel and Shuster had comics in this magazine before they hit it big with Superman, and there were plenty more great things over the years.



But I'm getting ahead of myself. What's the first issue got to offer?



Mostly mediocre comics with poor art and dull plots, I'm afraid. It's got some comedy bits ("Silly Sleuths", "Gumshoe Gus") and a couple of western-flavored stories ("Buck Marshall, Range Detective", "Bret Lawton") and a bit of action here and there. Not so great.



Also, lots of racism. The Chinese must have been pretty unpopular in the thirties, because there are villainous 'chinks' wall to wall in these. Frankly shocking and highly distasteful.



Siegel and Shuster's contributions, "Spy" and "Slam Bradley", are pretty good. Slam is absurdly masculine, though.

Look at him! His bicep is the size of her whole body! Also, Comic Book Lesson #1: Never drag a Real Man out of a good fight.

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