[ComicMike]

A nice reminder, thank you. The BSV Verlag published 25 German-language editions of the series between 1966 and 1969.

Link to the book: *** Link No Longer Exists: Mirakel Man 02 - Mechanische Slakken! ***

[Robb_K]

A nice reminder, thank you. The BSV Verlag published 25 German-language editions of the series between 1966 and 1969.
A nice reminder, thank you. The BSV Verlag published 25 German-language editions of the series between 1966 and 1969.

And this is a very interesting issue, in that it contains an unusual story, in which Mirakel Man's youthful alter ego is travelling on a crowded, underground train, and a petty thief (pickpocket) steals the boy's magic amulet (which gives the possessor the power of changing himself into the superhero, Mirakel Man).  And as is not automatically expected by the reader, the transformation into the adult, fully grown, super-strong being, does NOT automatically bestow a good and righteous character upon the changeling, but, rather, allows the new,powerful being to retain his alter-ego's natural, former character, in this case, that of an anti-social criminal, who, in every situation, acts only for his own gain.  As expected, based on his continued criminal behaviour, his actions besmirch the superhero's formerly good name.  It is unexpected that the "real" superhero's non-super alter-ego can change into the Superhero, as well, WITHOUT possession of the magic amulet, despite the usurper still possessing it, and being in the Superhero state, at that same time.  That makes for an interesting situation that I assume has not been used often in that genre, but, I would guess it has occurred a few times.  Naturally, the combat between the good and bad similar-identity powerful beings is the main feature of this scenario.  Unfortunately, the use of the "magical", automatic solution, that RIGHT must ALWAYS win out, so the TRUE Mirakel Man defeats the usurper (ostensibly because he must, by default, have more energy to put into his effort to defeat wrongdoing, than by employing wrongdoing for his own gain, because being honest and fair with others is Man's underlying nature, whereas the wrongdoer is going against his "natural" character, through fear of his own inadequacy to get along in The World, by playing the game applying the rules of "fairness".

Normally, I don't like almost all Superhero stories.  But this one held my interest, almost to the end, with only the too abrupt, disappointing ending, marring an interesting idea.  The artwork is quite good, and stands up in coloured ink and white (e.g. non-coloured pages).

I find it curious that The Dutch version refers to D'Artagnan as "one of The Three Muskateers", rather than an "Honorary member of The King's Muskateers", or, "The Fourth Muskateer".  Their cannot be four members of a group of three, that still is referred to as having three, while there are now actually four.  I assume that the original Spanish version made this same mistake, and it was an exact, ver batum translation.  It seems to me that near the end of Dumas' original novel, The King dubbed D'Artagnan as an official member of The Royal Muskateers, and so, from then on, that group of Four should have been referred to as "The Four Muskateers".