B&B 2-in-1 Round 1: The Green Goliath vs. The Emerald Gladiator

Before Marvel Two-in-One, Ben Grimm tried out his unique brand of team-up goodness in Marvel Feature, which canceled itself in 1973 to make way for the new title. Meanwhile, in the previous decade, The Brave & the Bold had started publishing team-ups, but wouldn't settle on Batman as the regular character for a while yet. He appeared in it intermittently from 1965 to 1967 before becoming its star. Here then is the first round of an epic team-up battle that will shake the foundations of my blog...

In the orange corner... weighing in at 19 pages and starring both the Thing and the Hulk, written by Len Wein and drawn by Jim Starlin and Joe Sinnott, Marvel Feature #11, Cry: Monster!

And in the black corner... weighing in at 25 pages and starring Batman and Green Lantern, written by Bob Haney and drawn by Ramona Fradon and Charles Paris, Brave and the Bold #59, The Tick-Tock Traps of the Time Commander!

Let the battle begin! DING DING DING!

The Stars
The Thing is normal self, right from the first page damaging some of Mr. Fantastic's instruments because he can't stand the disappointment of them NOT being able to change him back into Ben Grimm. Without trying it first, mind you. Pure, violent emo. Running off, he gets teleported by the bad guys to an empty frontier town there to fight the Hulk and maybe disarm a bomb that will blow up the whole world. He puts up a good fight, especially since his strength is being specially boosted from afar. When he finds out, despite the fact that the Hulk would have creamed him and he wouldn't have been able to get to the bomb, he hands the culprit a sermon about fairness. Extra points for calling an astral projection an astral injection. And despite his tough guy exterior, he's still a little girl inside as expressed in this pose:
+8 points

As for the Batman of 1965, I'm afraid he's not as driven as he once was or later will be. The story starts with him being bored and missing Dick (Robin, that is).
It is later revealed that he hasn't put on his Batman uniform in days! You know Bruce, sometimes you need to be proactive. You can't just wait for the bat signal to light up before going down that fireman's pole. More points off for thinking a lecture is an "antidote for 20th century boredom". Later, the Time Commander tricks him, finds out his identity, knocks him out and takes his place. Not a stellar performance for the Dark Knight. Note however the use of the Whirly-Bat, a one-man helicopter that manages to never rip Batman's cape to shreds by accident.
Only redeems our brave, bold star a little: +2 bat-points

The Guests
Over in the Thing's corner, we have the Hulk. Seems a natural to guest with the Thing, monster vs. monster and all that. Unfortunately, the Savage Hulk is a pretty one-dimensional character, especially if you're not gonna use Bruce Banner to counter-balance him. Hulk smash! Hulk not like rocky orange man! Hulk not like being teleported to frontier town to fight! Hulk smash puny big brained villains! And so on. +3 points

And in Batman's corner, the much more interesting Green Lantern. More interesting, but not necessarily more competent than Batman in this tale. For example, when he gets knocked out of the sky by the Time Commander at one point, he must "will a way" to save himself. Here's what he does:
Fun and clever, but this is a guy who can FLY. Slowing yourself down is patently ridiculous. Still, it's not the only interesting use of the power ring. He also uses it to give Batman a full body massage. I can just imagine those relaxing nights at JLA HQ...
Invigorating! Actually, he's giving his powers to the disguised Time Commander there. Oops! The ring is also used to put himself and Batman in telepathic contact even in different time zones, to boost sound with a green stethoscope, and later to brainwash both the Commander and himself as to the identity of Batman!
Wow. Just goes to show that Identity Crisis had a precedent. I bet Hal just flashed some light on his head there and made like he erased his own memory. Jerk. Still, it pays to have versatile powers in a story like this. +7 bat-points

The Villains
Fantastic Four villain Kurrgo the Master of Planet X teams up with Hulk villain the Leader for a double whammy of villainy. Kurrgo is a lame-ass alien with a giant brain who's only other appearance to date was FF #7, so we get to spend a couple pages recapping that story, with editor Roy Thomas explicitly not blaming us for the remembering him. As for the Leader, he's a gamma-irradiated baddie with a giant brain (see? a natural team) who is so well-known, his editor's note reads: "As seen in about a billion old issues of the Hulk." Oh, and he can't move.
They're having a friendly and ultra-polite contest of champions between our two heroes. The winner gets to use both monsters as their pawns. Yeah, like they could ever force these guys to work for them. Points off for their harebrained scheme, but they do get points for having gone to the Dr. Doom Academy of Speechifying: "You, Leader, by right of priority, naturally chose the Hulk... while I, convinced his intelligence and years of battle savvy make him an equally dangerous threat, chose the bludgeoning Thing!" That's some prose there, Kurrgo. The Leader is a little too honorable, riling the Thing up with the false threat of the Ultrex bomb, which only helps Kurrgo, while Kurrgo himself is boosting the Thing's strength. At least there's one cheater in the bunch. +6 points

The Time Commander makes his debut in the Brave&Bold story and I'm thinking Haney couldn't decide what kind of time-related villain he wanted him to be. He can control time, send people and things to the past or future, etc. à la Time Trapper. He uses clock motif weapons (as seen in the Whirly-Bat pic above) à la Chronos. He also has time-related manias, such as compulsively setting every clock to a certain time, à la Calendar Man. With all that power, he could rule the world, but his real goal, once the heroes are out of the way, is to get his prison sentence reversed. Aim low, that's what I always say. Speaking of taking the heroes out, he performs pretty well here, tricking both Bruce Wayne and Hal Jordan and knocking them out a couple of times each. Unfortunately, he stupidly sends GL one day in the past as a means of separating the him from Batman. Ok... and what's stopping GL from stopping you from even starting your crime spree a day early? +5 bat-points

Odds vs. Ends
I've got problems with both stories' artwork. To me, Joe Sinnott is THE Ben Grimm inker. When I think of how those rocks should look, it's always Sinnott. Unfortunately, Jim Starlin doesn't work for me. His handle on anatomy, posing and consistency is fuzzy at best. The Hulk spends half his time with an enlarged cranium, and then there are fight scenes like this:
How are the shadows supposed to work here? Is Ben's foot pressed up against a wall? -1 point

Fradon's work on B&B isn't much better. In fact, it's worse. It's all incredibly limp and low-energy, with bare backgrounds and stiff poses. And there's the matter of this fat little Batman running away:
-3 bat-points

Other stuff from Cry: Monster:
A totally unnecessary 1-page recap of the Fantastic Four's origin, especially since the splash page refers to it as well. -2 points
The credits start with: "Beginning a new kind of Marvel madness!" +1 point

Other stuff from Tick-Tock:
Carol Ferris telling GL: "I'm a beauty, too, Hal Jordan... but then, I'm just your flesh-and-blood boss! Here, this telegram came while you were making love to my tin rival." You can cut the sexual tension with a knife! That is pretty damn raunchy for 1965. +2 bat-points
Green Lantern appearently wears a watch. It looks really stupid when he wears it over his glove. -1 bat-point
The Time Commander developped his mastery of time while in prison, where they gave him a fully stocked lab. When will the comics penal system learn?!? -2 bat-points
There's a funky robot guarding his cell though! +1 bat-point
The resolution makes no sense whatsoever. GL is in the past, in a perfect position to set up the Time Commander's fall, but he sends Batman - 1 day in the future - some telepathic advice to set an air raid siren to a frequency that will shatter the Commander's hourglass weapon... I'm lost. -3 bat-points

Farewells and Scoring
The Comic Treadmill has well documented the B&B tradition known as the Friendly Farewell. At the end of every story, the two stars should wave each other goodbye, share a laugh and generally make like they' ve bonded. And they're being judged on the quality of their farewell.
More stiff posing, but a reminded that these guys are teammates and friends for life. It's so very perfect that this month, Brave & the Bold was relaunched with Batman and GL starring together. +2 bat-points

With the Thing's team-ups, however, there's a whole other thing going on: The UNfriendly Farewell. Yes, Ben just can't catch a break. But I'm judging him on just how crappy he's treated by his guest-star.
Abandoned in the desert, 50 miles from civilization, and a promise that these guys don't ever want to see each other again. Nice! +3 points

Calculating those points... At 18 to 8, Green Lantern gets mulched by the Hulk. After Round 1, Batman is covered in the thin green gruel that is his guest-star, and the Thing stands as the champ... until next time, at least.