We have made it to the 10th installment of everybody's favorite size shifting heroine. At least she's mine and since you're reading this I have to assume she's in your top five as well.
This brings us up to the 89th issue of Doom Patrol and marks a minor milestone for the character. Up until now we've seen Rita fighting crime in her green mini-dress. Toss a Star Fleet insignia on that thing, alter the color, and she could have walked onto the Star Trek set without anyone batting an eye. In a couple years since this comic came out in '64 well before the TV show launched in '66.
I've been of two minds concerning this outfit. On the one hand it has a sleekness that I can appreciate. And I'm not just talking about the short skirt on the frequently giant lady either. On the other hand there are times when I wanted more contrast. I love the pencils, but there are times when the colorist just doesn't live up to them and usually it comes down to the the splotch of green that is Rita's uniform.
Well this issue sees the end of the original uniform and introduces the one that 60's era Rita will be remembered by to this day. Before we get to that let's take one final look at the original outfit.
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| The very last time we see this uniform on panel. |
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| This is a fetish blog so I'm just going to assume that Rita has taken off the green uniform before handing this guy off to Cliff. |
Technically Rita isn't the only one getting a new outfit. The Doom Patrol has a team uniform similar to the Fantastic Four's so Larry gets new duds too and Cliff gets to bitch about being the mostly naked Ben Grimm of the team.
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| There's no law saying robot men can't wear clothes, Cliff. Just sayin'. |
On the whole I like the new outfit. The two tone color scheme combined with the short sleeves allows for the contrast that I sometimes found lacking in the earlier outfit. And she's wearing my favorite color on her belt and boots, so there's that.
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| It's like she's looking down a microscope or something. |
We also get to see the introduction of another classic Doom Patrol villain. We've had General Immortus and the Brotherhood of Evil. Now we have The Animal-Vegetable-Mineral Man. A man who can become any animal, vegetable, or mineral. Which sounds a little lame, but makes for some very fun comic fights. He really cements the Doom Patrol's reputation for 60's weird.
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| The look on her face as the little statue man turns into some sort of creepy creeper is priceless. |
And he gives us more giant creatures other than just Rita. Here we have a giant dandelion.
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| And proof that DC staffers were on some serious shit. |
And then a giant tarantula. Which of course makes me wonder if the creators saw the sci fi film of that name.
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| Not that Tarantula ever had the spider take down a train. |
Of course, just because he gets to be a giant spider doesn't mean that Rita can't just get bigger.
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| "Whose a big bad spider? You are. Yes you are." |
Then they turned up the weird again.
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| You won't see that shit happening in Atom. |
OK. I do have a problem with this sequence. Rita is freaking out over a tiger leaping at her and fair enough it is a pretty damn big tiger, but wasn't Rita casually picking a spider two or three times as large off a train just a few pages back? That would freak me out a whole hell of a lot more than something the size of a feral cat jumping at me.
They also have the Chief telling Rita how to do her job a lot in this issue. More than he usually does. I'm pretty sure sexism is combining with the creative team needing to give the "team leader" something to do. So science had to happen.
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| "Never order me around again, beard boy." |
And we end with the bad guy defeated, a good look at Rita's snazzy new boots, and Rita looking down on the boys in her life. All is good.
Until next time tall believers, make mine Rita.
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