It all started with the Big Bang! Part 11 (issue #18)

I'm skipping again, because this issue is the end of the exciting three-part epic that is the Big Bang/Savage Dragon crossover. I almost have to wonder if the Mighty Man stories in #1 and #7 were intended to foreshadow this.

Clearly the fine folks behind Big Bang (that is, Chris Ecker and Gary Carlson) knew a winner when they saw one, hence the return of the Pantheon of Heroes, whom Dragon briefly met back in #12. Also, the cover is drawn by Dave Cockrum, who was best known for his work on LoSH before that whole "Giant Size X-Men #1" thing. Oh, and if you're wondering, there is a tribute to the Legion's iconic first appearance cover (as well as that other one where the Legion of Super Villains sentences Superman to death)

But that's not actually in the story. No, the story begins just where #14 left off, with Dragon in the Time Being's palace, having discovered a room full of helpless, dying Ultimen being sapped of their powers. 

Clone Boy of the Pantheon of Heroes shows himself, explaining that the Time Being was the Pantheon's greatest enemy (so basically the Time Trapper), and that he's been playing Dragon this whole time. His plan is to destroy an Ultimen-empowered Infinity Orb to create a new Big Bang. This will create the universe all over, with the Time Being as its supreme ruler, its god. Oh, and those aren't really Ultimen; the Time Being has been forcing Clone Boy to create duplicates of the Ultimate Human Being to this end for a while now.

The Time Being walks in on this, and reveals how he expects to survive destroying the universe. See, he's not technically alive -- he's the temporal anomaly created when Grandfather Clock accidentally met himself in the past. He has the power to be anywhere and everywhere throughout time, but naturally this grew boring pretty fast.

As the Time Being prepares to end Dragon's life, Clone Boy turns himself into Ultiman in order to save his new pal. This was just an excuse to get close enough to duplicate the Time Being himself, which had the unintended side-effect of rupturing the Infinity Orb and putting the finishing touches on the Time Being's plan. The energy backlash will gradually erase the current timeline, starting with the most recent date and going backwards. Dragon escapes through the Time Being's time portal, hoping he'll be able to stop all this from happening by going to the past. However, the Time Being sends his lady friend Oblivia to follow Dragon and eliminate him.

There's a couple of completely meaningless stuff while Dragon careens through the time stream; you'll thank me for skipping it. Also, wasn't this thing supposed to be in color?

Anyway, eventually we hit... an apology and a summary of the five missing pages that didn't make the deadline. It says they'll print the missing pages in a future issue, but I couldn't find anything. Long story short, the Earth-B Blitz and Dragon head to the past before the era is erased, and meet Venus and Ultiman in the 70s. Also, Venus and Ultiman are dating or something; man, that's prescient, huh?

70s Venus? Obviously this business is nearly finished, then. Venus and Ultiman take Dragon to the moment of the Time Being's creation to stop him once and for all; the Brave and the Bold style Knight Watchman/Dr. Weird team-up from the end of #12. However, they're too late, and the Time Being starts wrecking everybody and everything. Oblivia shows up, too, to finish off Dragon with her kiss of death... until the Blitz pushes her into the Time Being. Her kiss erases him from existence, ensuring the universe's safety.

With that settled, Dragon has equipped himself with another Time Bomb (lifted from Grandfather Clock, no doubt) and heads back to his own time, with some stops along the way. Oh, and Venus takes Oblivia away to the Godrealm to get her help.

Here's where the cover comes in; back at the End of Time, Dragon finds, well, nothing, no sign of the Time Being's existence. He did it, he changed history... and before he can finally get home, he's attacked by the Pantheon of Heroes, as he's obviously their archenemy the Timebomber.

Dragon handles everything they throw at him until he sees Clone Boy and is momentarily floored. This gives the Pantheon the opening they needed to bring him down, and they're ready to lock him up and throw away the key once they do. Brain Boy and Tele Girl analyze him back at Pantheon HQ; it turns out that he's considered a great villain based on records of him fighting the RTA and the Badge. He's sent to trial, where he is found guilty because there is no one who can corroborate his "Time Being" story.

That is, until Ultigirl and Thunder Girl interrupt the trial, coming from the past to tell how they know Dragon's a good guy. Ultiman always told his daughter about how Dragon was a great hero, and Thunder Girl's memory was unaltered by the time shift because of her magic power source. Unwilling to doubt Ultiman's word, the judge changes the verdict to Not Guilty. Dragon is sent back home via a "time bubble" invented by Brain Boy, and finally defeats the Wicked Worm-possessed Mighty Man before hitting a bar with his cop buddies. The end... or is it?

I'm gonna go out on a limb and say that really is the end of this storyline, if not the Time Being himself, because I'm close enough to positive that he never showed up again, ever.

I do know that this isn't the last time Big Bang crossed over with Savage Dragon, though; members of the RTA were present at the wedding of Barbaric and Ricochet in SD #41, and would meet Dragon again in the Wildstorm-severing Shattered Image event. 

It all started with the Big Bang! Part 9 (Issue #12)

Skipping more issues BECAUSE I CAN. Also, I kind of wanted to get to this, the start of a Savage Dragon crossover, right away. I'm no massive fan of Dragon, I've read little of his comic, but I watched the cartoon as a kid, I enjoy what I've read of it, and I think I understand Dragon's character more or less.

Similar to the Knights of Justice origin issue, this one comes with a pre-packaged gimmick, and as such it's a really goddamn amazing comic. Basically, Dragon warps back and forth between various eras, and his encounters in those eras are based on the comics that were around at the time. Each story has its own art style, too.

The story gets underway with a secret meeting of the Society of Evil Minds, the equivalent of the Monster Society of Evil. Its members include Hy Q. Binana, Cortex, the Wicked Worm (who survived his bisection in BB #1 and is now, uh, two worms), and two new guys: Baron Brain and Dr. Nirvana, Mighty Man's archenemy. The art here is really emphasizing the Sivana angle for not just Binana and Nirvana, but also Cortex

So this is taking place on Earth A, with Binana still able to travel between the worlds at his leisure. Although I guess this takes place before the Criss-Cross Crisis storyline. Of course, I have to wonder why he would bother at all if their plan couldn't affect Thunder Girl. Anyway, the Wicked Worms ask if this is about some stock market scam, and while cursing himself for missing that obvious idea, Binana says he's after more than money -- he wants to take the strongest, nastiest creatures from the future and use them to crush their heroic foils. And for starters, Officer Dragon looks like just the type. Looks like, of course.

To that end, Knight Watchman baddie Grandfather Clock has devised, uh, something like a time machine, sort of. See, this is why they need a big monster for the mission; the only thing Grandfather Clock could find that could produce the energy to break the time barrier was a uranium bomb, albeit one that can explode again and again. With the remote control, the Society of Evil Minds can send him to any time they like. 

As it turns out, Dragon is fighting Mighty Man because MM is possessed by the Wicked Worm (who is actually thousands of worms at  this point), and the Wicked Worm deliberately lured Dragon to a certain location to get him to jump on the time bomb.

Yeesh, is Dragon hairy. You know he's not a reptile? Erik Larsen told me on twitter so you know it's true. anyway, 1963 Mighty Man shows up to blow the SoEM's good time, and Dragon drops a bomb on them when they order him to do their dirty work: Mighty Man is a good friend of his, he's a police officer, and they're all under arrest. These guys are so racist, just because he's green he's the bad guy. He also explains why he was fighting Mighty Man in the future, because of course that came up.

In a panic, Binana splits for Earth B, while Grandfather Clock hits the remote to send Dragon back to his own time. The remote is broken in the explosion, meaning his time jumps are random from here on. Oh, man, this is the best Quantum Leap/Savage Dragon crossover since that fanfic I wrote.

Dragon arrives, seemingly, just a few years later, where the time bomb explosion chips away part of the "Coolidge Dam", a possible disaster that is naturally responded to by the Round Table of America.

Some items of note: Hummingbird, Mr. Martian, and Mike Merlin all put in their first appearances in this story. Hummingbird is sort of Hawkman and kind of the Atom; Mike Merlin is Snapper Carr with a bit of Zatanna (and after a magic sex change, full Zatanna as Ms. Merlin); and Mr. Martian is, duh, the Martian Manhunter. Anyway, the RTA fixes the dam up like new, and I discover that I hate Mike Merlin. Seriously, Snapper Carr is awesome, this guy is insufferable, even with amazing magic powers.

Dragon is saved by the Atomic Sub, and attacks Mr. Martian as soon as he comes to. The RTA has Mr. Martian's back, but Dragon mentions a Martian invasion in 1996, which I guess is a reference to the movie Mars Attacks! and the comics Image published that tied into it. It turns out htis is '65, so shortly before the Atomic Sub's death, by the way. Dragon tells his story, and the Knight Watchman picks up on Grandfather Clock's involvement immediately, but the bomb goes off seconds later.

Dragon lands in a Golden Age Dr. Weird story, where his explosion causes a house fire. Weird saves the people trapped inside, and goes to fight Dragon, but ends up hearing the guy out.

Dragon explains his predicament, and Weird can mystically tell he's being for real. Luckily, time travel is something he's familiar with; he was a scientist from the future who came back to the past and was killed, and whose spirit can't move on because he hasn't been born yet and thus shouldn't exist. Weird tries to set the time bomb to send Dragon to talk to his mentor, but when it blows, he ends up a little too far in the future.

Dragon pops in just as tryouts start, but Pantheon founders Jupiter Boy, Gravity Girl, and Clone Boy think he's one of the hopefuls and don't realize he needs help. Clone Boy's initially kind of interested in the explosive powers of this "Bomb Boy", but they don't allow people without inborn powers, and he's way too old anyway. 

Next it's 1962, at Midway City's football stadium, where the Midway Monsters are playing the Empire City Titans for the championship. Among the spectators: Reid and Jerry Randall, the Knight Watchman and Kid Galahad. A game winning field goal is shot out of the air by Grandfather Clock, who runs off with the championship trophy and prize money.

The Knight Watchman and Kid Galahad foil him, blah blah, and Dragon bursts into the picture. He yells at Grandfather Clock, who has no idea who he is or what he's talking about since this is before the Society of Evil Minds meeting. The 'misunderstanding' worsens until it's boom-boom time once more.

Yeah, it's the future. Er, the old future, at least; sometime in the 80s. An Ultiman robot brings Dragon to meet an aged, retired, powerless Chris Kelly. The robots do all the work these days, dispatched by Chris from his Command Center to deal with crises. Oh, and he's married and has a kid, and his wife is totally not Lori Lake. Is that why he moved out of the Secret Citadel, because his family couldn't live in a volcano? I just hope he still has his trophies. Anyway, Dragon asks if he can help him out, but Chris says he already has; Dragon made a jump to the 70s and there was some business with Venus that ended with the RTA getting him back to his own time. And, you know, kaboom, he's gone.

Now he's in a Brave and the Bold story. Or, uh, "Free and the Brave"; obviously the 70s, but not quite when the RTA has figured out how to help him. And this story is obviously to be continued in a later issue, as we're running out of pages pretty quick. You know, I once had a conversation on deviantArt with artist Shawn van Briesen about his work on this story, and in particular the Aparo aping.

The Knight Watchman and Dr. Weird are going to break into Grandfather Clock's place to find a remote for the time bomb. When they get there they find nothing... except for two Grandfather Clocks! He's since perfected the time bomb travel thing, you see, and even has the remotes. Both are immobilized by shock and considering how old and fat they are, probably also having heart attacks.

Weird uses one of the remotes to send the traveling Clock back whenever he came from, and tries to do the same to Dragon, who realizes this can't be the end because he hasn't met Venus yet. Throughout this whole story, Dragon's been a real cut-up, commenting sardonically about everything that happens as if he's resigned to the fate of Sam Beckett-but-not-really. This one ends with a classic: "THE END? Only time will tell!"