OVERVIEW:
Come the Revolution
Aquaman and Mera are racing toward Atlantis to take care of the ursurper Narkran, while in the city, the revolutionaries are getting close to attacking, despite Tula's pleas for patience. The revolutionaries ignore Tula's advice, and start their attack.
Aquaman and Mera find Imp, Aqualad's seahorse, and decide that they must look for him first.
In Atlantis, Tula is captured by Narkran's troops, and accused of helping the rebels. Narkran holds her hostage and demands that the rebels set down their arms, or he'll kill Tula. The leader of the rebels, Mupo, doesn't want innocent blood shed, and orders his troops to lay down their arms, but his second-in-command, Dex, refuses and attacks him. They battle, while Narkran grows increasingly insane and Tula hopes she can break free.
Aquaman and Mera enter a valley that Aquaman recalls was lush and green, but is now barren. He crests a hill and sees Aqualad fighting the Bugala. Aquaman races to help his friend, just as the Bugala catchs and squeezes Aqualad.
In the city, Dex overpowers Mupo, and orders the rebels to advance. Tula breaks free of Narkran's hold, but he slashes at her as she flees. Mupo catches her, and Vulko takes over her care as Mupo confronts Narkran. They battle, and Mupo seems to be winning...
The Adventures of Aquaboy
Aquaman recounts how it used to be difficult for people to believe he was King of the Seven Seas. He rescues an old captain, who has lost his life's savings, a chest of pearls, which sank. The captain, now blind, refuses to believe that Aquaman can help him. Aquaman recognizes the captain as a man he helped many years before, who didn't believe that Aquaman had helped him back then.
Aquaman recalls that it was very difficult in the past to get people to believe in him. He thinks of two specific incidents during which no one believed he was for real. A sudden sea quake breaks up the reef he and the captain are resting on, and Aquaman is injured enough that he needs to call in a whale to save the captain. In the whale's mouth, the captain finally believes Aquaman, and allows him to help find the pearls.
COMMENTS:
A nice cover, with a sinister theme. Aqualad was fighting the Bugala for ... a long time. It was only a matter of time before he collapsed.
Mupo, the leader of the rebels in Atlantis, is so 60's it is scary. I'm sure that with the constant sense of question authority going on at the time that a story like this, set in Atlantis, had to be written. It was very clever of the writers to take Aquaman out of it.
This is the first story in which Tula stands on her own. She isn't exactly Xena, but she does try to convince the rebels to wait, and then breaks away from Narkran on her own. Throughout this story arc, she is Aquaman's presence in the city, instead of simply being Aqualad's girl.
The letter column asks why the letter column was missing in a few issues, in the first letter. The other two letters, long ones, go into detail about specific issues. If you ever chance to pick up some of these old books, definitely read the letter columns.
The reprint of the Adventures story happened because of "personal problems" that made it impossible for Jim Aparo to finish the arc with this issue. This issue and #48 were originally scheduled to be a single 23 page story, according to the letter column in issue #49. One fun thing to do with this issue is to compare Ramona Fradon's art in the back-up story to Jim Aparo's work.
"Come the Revolution" is reprinted in Adventure Comics #498 (Apr 1983). "The Adventures of Aquaboy" is reprinted from Adventure Comics #268.
CONCLUSION:
Rating: 7
No resolution, yet, and leaving us hanging. Good backup story, though it doesn't fit the theme.