MB30: HEMBECK #1

HEMBECK
The Best of Dateline: @!!?# (1980)

cover: Fred G. Hembeck

writer: Fred G. Hembeck
artist: Fred G. Hembeck
letterer: Fred G. Hembeck

director: Harold Heckuba

In a sequence where Superman reviews various potential new members of the Justice League, Man-Bat is considered along with more serious candidates such as Black Lightning, Supergirl, and the eventual actual new member, Firestorm. None of these are Hembeck's first choice, however.

Commentary: 

I came across this Man-Bat sighting when I was working on something about the Justice League and remembered that Fred Hembeck had done this "reviewing the applicants" bit. At this time Fred Hembeck was not officially employed by either DC or Marvel; however, in a few years he would work for both. At DC he would run a series of comic-strips in the house-ads DAILY PLANET, and in my opinion those strips were very much in the same vein as THIS strip. So on that consideration, I decided to reprint this page here in my Man-Bat series.
Hope it made you laugh!

Status: 

I believe this strip from this book has been reprinted in The Nearly Complete Essential Hembeck Archive Omnibus. The book itself for sure is included, but as I own the original I can't vouch if this particular page made it into the "Nearly Complete" collection or not. 

SKREEK!!
Man-Bat was created by Frank Robbins and Neal Adams