I’ve always had a soft spot for the goofy Doom Patrol series from DC Comics. Originally created by writer Arnold Drake and artist Bruno Premiani, it debuted in My Greatest Adventure #80 in 1963, the same year that Stan and Jack debuted X-Men #1. A lot of fans argue that there are similarities between the Fantastic Four (which debuted before Doom Patrol) and the DP (both teams have four members with the same type of characters: a bitter non-human character, two men - one a scientific genius and the other who can burst into flames/energy - and a woman; in DP the woman – Elasti-Girl - can increase and decrease her size, a power somewhat similar to Mr. Fantastic’s stretchable skin). Others argue that there are similarities between DP and the X-Men (DP debuted three months before X-Men #1). Both teams are led by older guys in wheelchairs who love to boss mutants around, although Professor X clearly has the cooler, higher-tech chair thanks to Mr. Jack Kirby’s design sensibilities. Seriously, if I was a chair-based comic book character, I’d shop at “Chairs by Kirby.”

The original Doom Patrol has that typical 1960s DC Universe appeal and that early run reads like a dinner theater version of X-Men/Fantastic Four with somebody like Sterling Hayden playing Niles Caulder as Monte Wooley. (Forgive the Golden Age of Movies reference point, but I recently saw The Man Who Came To Dinner on Turner Classic Movies, and the first thing I thought of, because I’m a geek, is “That’s Niles.”) While Stan and Jack and company were creating an interconnected universe of recurring villains and cosmic storylines for their DP-similar books with multi-faceted villains like Doctor Doom and Galactus, DC had the Doom Patrol fighting the equivalent of space worms and monsters made from cuts of meat. So it doesn’t really matter if the Doom Patrol looks similar to either the Fantastic Four or the X-Men because it’s not the idea, or the make-up of the team, it’s what you do with them.

DC – because this is what DC does – periodically tries to revive all of their 1960s characters (”Hey look! It’s Blackhawk!”), determined to make them into a long-running title. They do this with the sort of recurring enthusiasm that only children and sports fans have – “just close your eyes and wish real hard and this time, oh this time for sure, the new Metamorpho will make it past 8 or 9 issues!”

Doom Patrol has been revived a bunch of times over the years. Grant Morrison’s run was too weird for me – I didn’t care that he “Morrisoned” the classic team (I’m hardly that kind of worshipful fanboy), but the series didn’t appeal to me. I liked John Byrne’s fairly recent run because I always like to see what Byrne does when he wraps his brain around classic characters. He’s like the new kid in the sandbox with a bunch of cool toys I haven’t seen. Other Doom Patrol revivals and appearances came and went before I even knew they were around.

So I was interested in seeing this latest version of DP, especially because it’s part of DC’s slightly-more-comics-for-lots-more-of-my-money program, allowing them to leapfrog cover prices by $1.00 (to $3.99), while avoiding those pesky intermediary steps of $3.25, $3.50 and $3.75 that only drag out the damage to my wallet. To their credit, they are tossing in some “value-added” features to ease the sting, similar to something they tried when they raised their prices to 25¢ back in the 1970s. Back in those days, the value-added features were reprints of DC’s creaky Golden Age comics. In the case of Doom Patrol #1, DC added a new story, another revival of a classic 1960s DC title, Metal Men.

I understand DC’s desire – which is probably more like a corporate mandate - to keep propping up their old properties, because you never know if Bryan Singer or Christopher Nolan is going to want to make a movie out of them, or Bruce Timm is going to want to make a TV show about them, and that’s the money-making tail that wags the corporate dog. I also get that DC doesn’t have a movie-friendly tentpole property like Marvel’s X-Men (Teen Titans characters are too young; The Justice League characters are too old and the movie rights are probably complicated by separate deals for each, and when you put a bunch of them together, their costumes look silly in live-action).

The Doom Patrol is nothing if not movie-friendly. The characters in action are all visually appealing. Seriously, how cool would it be to see Robotman, Negative Man and Elastic-Girl/Woman steeped in Michael Bay-style action with a temperamental Jon Voight rolling through in his CG wheelchair?

Usually these revivals follow a familiar pattern: toss in some new elements and new characters, sort of explain what’s been happening to everybody since their last cancellation, introduce just enough old-school DC continuity to keep the 40-year-old fanboys from over-snarking on the message boards, and introduce a menace who doesn’t really come into play until the second issue.

So with all of that, two questions need to be answered: Is the new Doom Patrol any good, and is it worth its half-of-a-discount-movie-ticket price?

This newest Doom Patrol incarnation is written by Keith Giffen, who for my $3.99 is probably one of the top five guys I’d want to come in and revive a dusty franchise. He sees things slightly askew, keeps things modern while avoiding reverential nostalgia, and he has a working knowledge of the DCU that he likes to twist and turn. Plus, his dialogue is snappy, like the best TV dialogue. He handles exposition through dialogue better than pretty much anyone. The excellent interior art is by Matthew Clark and Livesay. The first issue, which has been out for a bit (the second’s due soon), finds the team in the middle of a covert operation gone bad, a team member dies, another disappears, the team regroups with some quiet character-based reflective moments (that includes an appearance from Rocky Davis, one of the Challengers of the Unknown, which gets sarcastically name-checked) and the real menace is introduced on the last page to let you know that things will really start to pop next issue, and we can assume that the villain from the covert operation will be showing up again as will the vanished DP teammate.

Doom Patrol #1 is a really well done comic. Old-school DP fans should like it a lot, although there is a shocking bit of violence at the beginning which might not favor the graphically squeamish. If you’re new to the game and you never heard of these guys before, there’s nothing here that’ll test your continuity skills and send you off to Wikipedia or wish you could text Mark Waid. It’s a fast-paced, well-drawn story that’s clearly told with great dialogue. Giffen excels with Robotman and Larry Trainor (Negative Man).

But for all of its bells and whistles and aggressive pricing, this is really just a good, solid DC comic book, the kind of thing that DC has turned out regularly at 15¢, 25¢, 35¢, 50¢, 75¢, $1.00, $1.25, $1.50, $1.75, $2.00, $2.25, $2.50, $2.75, and $2.99 a copy.

As for the Metal Men back-up feature, someone could write a college thesis on Doc Magnus and his neuroses. Here’s a guy who created a bunch of robots, one of whom is a beautiful babe who just wants to have sex with him. So what does he do? He treats her like a jerk – and not in a Tom Leykis way where he’s trying to make her want him more, but in a way that clearly says, “stay away, robot honey.” That’s a guy with some serious emotional baggage right there, behaving in the exact opposite way the fanboy demographic would if their bedroom was full of happy smiling robot hottie.

This newest MM revival in the back of Doom Patrol #1 (it’s the added value of the value-added package) is clearly Giffen, and his old DCU/JLI buddies J.M DeMatteis and Kevin Maguire, having some fun, starting at the credits and moving through to the end. Giffen and DeMatteis are in sitcom mode here and I mean that in the best way. In addition to the robots’ struggle with this issue’s villain (which recalls some of the goofy villains of the 1960s MM run by Robert Kanigher, Ross Andru and Mike Esposito), and the introduction of a new team member (Copper), Doc Magnus has to contend with a contentious Homeowners Association that doesn’t like robots in their neighborhood. It’s a good take on the characters and it crackles. There’s a lot going on in the 9 pages, and it’s really funny. Plus, it’s always a good idea to have Kevin Maguire draw something. More please.

So to answer my own two questions: The new Doom Patrol looks like a success. I’m definitely following it for a few issues (I’ll spring for 5 issues and $20) to see where they go and what they do, and I like the Metal Men back-up feature and hope it continues. But at the $3.99 price point, there are a couple of other comics that won’t get a look from me because my salary isn’t as value-added as DC’s new comics.

[Artwork: Cover to Doom Patrol #1]