Random Back Issues #120 - Hourman #12

 

Haven't looked at Hourman in one of these in over three years. Then, he had just given one of the original Hourman's old foes a chance to do some good, only to be whisked to the 853rd Century by the JLA of that era.

Two issues later, he's a pile of scrap. The JLA are fighting what are described as "Else-Men". Spheres of energy that, if they make contact with you, become a perfect version of you. Which means the Else-Men Hourman is Hourman as he was at the start of this series, a near-omnipotent god of time. Else-Hourman talks a lot of shit, daring him to try and use his time powers, but Hourman won't take the bait, recognizing it wouldn't work against a being with control of time who's expecting it.

Not that headbutts work any better. But since DC One Million Superman has super-telepathy, they worked out a plan where Superman tries to fry Else-Hourman with heat vision, but it's really cover for Hourman to use his time vision and de-age himself to a single chronometric drive. I'm not clear on how he then used a second burst on Else-Hourman and the other Else-Men to send them to wherever they were that long ago, but he managed it.

Superman takes him to Tyler ChemoRobotics for repairs, but before the foreman can begin, Hourman pleads for him not to. The android regrets throwing away godhood to hang out in a 20th Century coffee shop with Snapper Carr and his weird friends. He wants to be how he was before all that, but that's gonna be tricky, and costly.

Or not. With time vision worn off, Else-Hourman arrives, perfectly pissed. Then perfectly shutdown because, as the foreman explains, even a knockoff of a Tyler Co. product has a kill-switch. Well, that takes care of a body with similar abilities for Hourman, if the unseen boss will approve the work. The unseen boss, as we saw in Random Back Issues #30, is the original Hourman, and he's all for it.

So while the Justice Legion prepare for an imminent ass-whupping at the hands of the Else-Men, and Snapper and the others drift through time in Hourman's time-ship, the foreman prepares to transfer Hourman's head to the Else-Hourman's body. Amid this process, Hourman sees Metron, who is rather standoffish. Metron considers Hourman rejecting godhood a betrayal - proving he is the New God of Drama - but now Hourman has seen the light, and promises to forsake selfishness forever!

Or until next issue. Whichever.

{5th longbox, 192nd comic. Hourman #12, by Tom Peyer (writer), Steve Scott (penciller), David Meikis and Walden Wong (inkers), John Kalisz (colorist), Kurt Hathaway (letterer)}