In the recently published Marvel Knights Spider-Man miniseries by Matt Kindt and Marco Rudy, the story makes an interesting observation about why Sandman has long been one of Spideys creepier villains because Spider-Man can never tell which part of the Sandman's amorphous anatomy is hitting him. Fortunately for Spidey in this panel, it is clearly Sandmans fist punching him. Unfortunately for Spidey, that fist seems to be penetrating a very uncomfortable part of hisanatomy. This visual brings a whole new level of horror to there being sand in someones crack.
3. Jokers Boners
In what may very well the most famous Golden Age Batman comic after Detective Comics #27 and Batman #1, 1951s Batman #66 features such a gratuitous use of the word boner, one has to wonder if the books creators knew this was something everybody was going to continue to snicker at more than 60 years later. In this comic, the Joker commits a mistake, dubbed a boner by Gotham's press. For the rest of the issue, both Joker and Batman keep talking about each others boners. The comic ends with Batman apprehending the Joker after the Clown Prince of Crime commits another boner naturally.
2. The Red, Wank and Blue Avenger
This panel may be the most amazing use of comic book sound effects in the mediums history. Of the dozens of potential sound effects that could have been used to depict Captain Americas shield hitting the Controller clank, clank, bang, whack, thwack, pow, kapow the creators settled on wank, a phrase that is more associated with masturbation. The fact that this totally random wank sound effect is preceded by a character saying I command you to the comics creators had to know what they were doing here, right?
1. Robin What Have I Done To You?
The most unintentionally funny comic book panel goes to this Silver Age masterpiece for all the levels of wrong it represents. For starters, the villains choice of the word touched is a surefire way to introduce an out-of-context gag. Then, as the Atom, Flash and Green Lantern think in horror about their respective significant others who they have touched in some way, Batmans mind leaps immediately to his male sidekick Robin. For the kicker, Batmans horrified Robin what have I done to you, invites the mind to go to do some hilariously dark places.
Mark is a professional writer living in Brooklyn and is the founder of the Chasing Amazing Blog, which documents his quest to collect every issue of Amazing Spider-Man, and the Superior Spider-Talk podcast. He also pens the "Gimmick or Good?" column at Comics Should Be Good blog.
