Deadman # 4

Writer: Steve Vance
Artist: Josef Beroy
Cover: Mike Mignola
Publisher: DC
Published: May 2002

Boston Brand is a dead man.

Nope, that's not a line out of the Sopranos. It's an introduction to DC's favorite ghost. Boston Brand worked at a circus as a trapeze artist and would dress up in a red outfit with white makeup. His moniker was Deadman. Brand ended up getting murdered, and in the afterlife Rama Kushna gave him the power to possess living souls to find his murderer. Pretty cool, right?

Well it is cool.

Issue # 4 has Brand on a mission to find some baddies. He ends up possessing the body of a local convict and is able to get some info on a group of terrorists who plan to nuke Glad City via a submarine unless some cash is coughed up. Brand infiltrates the submarine, possesses a few of the terrorists and saves the day, much to the displeasure of the bad guys, as the sub takes on a bit too much water and they all drown.

One of the best sequences in this issue is when Deadman is contemplating possessing the body of Clark Kent. He visits Clark and Lois who are about to eat dinner. As the two sit down to eat, Deadman watches Kent burst back and fourth from the table. Each time Clark comes back he mentions what catastrophe he had to avert, all the while Deadman stares on flabbergasted. By this point, Deadman leaves, not bothering to possess Superman as he already has a full plate.

Get it - Lois and him are trying to eat dinner! On plates! Clark's is full 'cause he is too busy rescuing folks! I wonder: Does Superman need to eat? I don't think he needs to, because he is pretty much a solar battery; and if he did need to eat, then technically he could suffer from starvation, which could lead to a lame way for the mightiest of heroes to exit stage left.