Detective Comics #294

Issue Details

Synopsis

THE VILLIAN OF 100 ELEMENTS Professor Higgins has designed an element-converter, but his assistant, John Dolan, is accidentally exposed to it. The exposure causes his body to change unpredictably into different elements. The professor makes a control belt for him, but the power warps Dolan's mind causing him to become a criminal. While the professor works on a cure, Batman and Robin try to stop Dolan and his newly recruited gang. They lure Dolan to a location where the professor has built a machine to cure him. It doesn't work, and Batman is exposed to the machine as well. Fearing Batman will become a criminal as well, he is locked up. As he continues to transform, Batman's body eventually changes into liquid mercury, which allows him to escape prison. Once outside, he teams up with Dolan, but then leads his partner into a trap which removes the powers from both of them. Without the power, Dolan's mind is restored to normal and the criminals who assisted him on his crimes are captured. THE FANTASTIC FISH THAT DEFEATED AQUAMAN While on patrol, Aquaman and Aqualad learn that modern day pirate Harry Black has somehow gotten control of giant sea monsters which he is using to rob ships. Boasting that he will defeat Aquaman, he sets his creatures to attack the hero and his ward. During the battle, the creatures seem to be able to counter any attack made by Aquaman's undersea friends. Realizing that the creatures are really robots controlled by Black, Aquaman uses sea-gulls to pull him out of the water so he can swing aboard the creature that Black is riding and knock him away from the controls. He misses, but the creatures all stop and are easily destroyed by whales. After Black is defeated, Aquaman explains that he figured out the secret when he saw that one of the creatures didn't bother to shake off the seaweed that was caught on it, and that he really was just distracting Black long enough for his electric eels to short circuit Blacks controls. THE MARTIAN WEAKLING J'onn J'onzz pursues a gang of crooks into a cave during a thunderstorm. A lightning bolt opens a freak spacewarp between Earth and another dimension and hurls them all through it. In the other world, J'onzz discovers that he seemingly has no powers, the crooks have powers like Martians, and all of them are threatened by a gigantic beast. But the Manhunter soon learns that his strength has merely been sapped by flame-flowers growing nearby. He dupes the beast into trampling the flowers, thus restoring his power. After vanquishing the beast, J'onzz manages to return them all to their normal dimension, and the crooks are more than willing to be captured by him after their ordeal.