In our last article, we saw that the 1970s version of Manhunter died in an explosion. Over a decade later, in 1988, John “Suicide Squad” Ostrander and Kim Yale, with penciller Doug Rice and early inks by Sam Kieth, brought him back as a totally different character. This time, he was public defender Mark Shaw, who hated when he got criminals off scott free and therefore would hunt them down at night using the power of a magical medallion from an ancient order of mystical vigilantes. And most of them were robots created by the Oa Guardians from Green Lantern. Yes, it was pretty stupid. It was also pretty “joke-y,” as shown in this sequence, which occurs early in the first issue:
It’s going to be hard for me to read every issue of this series. I imagine I’ll be skipping ahead. The whole reason I’m doing this feature is because I wanted to reread the Kate Spencer comics—but I do want to give this series a chance. I do like Ostrander as a writer. Usually.