Wonderworld Comics #10 - pt. 3

Bob Powell really seemed to enjoy working on Dr. Fung, as he put his best early work into this feature.

Here we get to see a rare cutaway view map in a comic book panel, showing an underground tunnel complex. Note the tunnels at different levels, as evidenced in the last panel, where you have the dry level up above, and a water-lined tunnel at the lower level.

Hideouts & Hoodlums has lots of stats for giant fish in it already, but maybe there's room for one more. I'm not an expert on fish identification and the narration doesn't help. Is that a giant carp?

Dan's pretty funny.

I'm not sure how Dr. Fung knows the guard has the keys on him. Just a good guess? An expert skill check to notice things?

Dan is a 3rd-level fighter (sergeant) by now, which is how he's able to plow through sentries so fast with just his bare hands. He uses his surprise attack disarming the sentry. It appears that Dan can punch at the same time as being grappled, instead of grappling back, going against the grappling rules I wrote for 2nd edition. Stop that, Dan!

Sort of like the keys earlier, it seems like a big leap to say that a volcanic eruption is about to happen just because a subterranean river is getting warmer.

Powell must have become too busy in mid-feature, as we went abruptly from seven high-quality panels a page to this three-panel rush job. I can see what he was trying to do in the second panel, with the scientific accoutrements in the extreme foreground and the figures in the extreme background, but it also makes it look like the Chess Man is inside a giant glass sphere. Which is not a bad defense, if you know your opponents are coming in unarmed. Interestingly, Dan never bothered taking the sentry's rifle (or shirt).

I've seen lots of disarming attacks in comic books so far, but snapping a sweaty handkerchief in someone's face has got to be the most improbable yet. Maybe Karno has a flashback to being snapped with towels in gym class and freezes up. And then his guard is so shocked at Dr. Fung's sheer audacity that he does nothing to stop him. And then the other three guards are so shocked that the first guard was shocked that they don't bother attacking as Dan lunges at them (initiative rules are very loose in these situations for a reason).

Munson Paddock continues to set new artistic ground, this issue with his Tex Maxon feature. Note the creative way he illustrates a roundhouse kick in panel 2, a method that I've never seen duplicated since. And I love that insult in panel 4 -- "You insinuatin' snake!"

We've seen lots of examples of people recovering quickly from being temporarily stunned in comics -- so much so that I had to relent and put stunning rules in 2nd edition -- but this could be the fastest recovery in panel 2, as the outlaws revive while the fight is still going on and get back into it.

It's rare to see a comic book character stick around while the stolen loot is being identified, but the sheriff gives us a good excuse for why when he claims his own share "fer doin' th' work" -- which seems a likely excuse players would come up with.

This is Spark Stevens and, I'm curious, how Spark knows that those are secret Navy plans. I mean, maybe it's something super obvious and they say "TOP SECRET" across the top of them. He seems very sure of their authenticity at just a glance (skill check?).

It's interesting how they loosen the hinges first, to give them a bonus modifier to their open doors check. I wonder what they used on the screws, though -- their fingernails?

(Scans courtesy of Comic Book Plus.)