Crossover Cover: The Charlemagne Pursuit

Edwin Davis, a deputy national security advisor to the president, asks Stephanie Nelle, Cotton Malone’s former boss, for help, telling her Scot Harvath already turned down the request. Secret Service agent Scot Harvath appears in a series of novels by Brad Thor. Malone was previously mentioned in the Harvath novel The First Commandment. The death of Malone’s father, which occurred in 1971, is said to have been thirty-eight years ago. However, a year of 2009 would place the events of this novel after its year of publication, 2008. Additionally, the dates given fit 2007 rather than 2009. Therefore, I am regarding the references to thirty-eight years having passed as an error, and placing it in 2007, thirty-six years after the death of Malone’s father.

Crossover Cover: Black Swan Green

Jason Taylor’s classmates include Neal Brose and Clive Pike, while Mr. Nixon is his headmaster. Madame Eva van Outryve de Crommelynck tutors Jason in poetry. The Vicar of Saint Gabriel’s’ wife is Gwendolin Bendincks. Neal Brose appears as an adult in Mitchell’s novel Ghostwritten. Clive Pike and Mr. Nixon are from the short story “Acknowledgments,” which features the now-grown Pike trying to get a book published by Timothy Cavendish, another character from Ghostwritten. Mitchell’s story “Muggins Here” is a sequel to “Acknowledgments.” Madame Eva van Outryve de Crommelynck and Gwendolin Bendincks are from Cloud Atlas, which was brought into the CU by Joe Hill's novel NOS4A2.

Crossover Cover: Ghost Walk

Levi Stoltzfus, the ex-Amish magus, battles Nodens of the Thirteen near LeHorn’s Hollow, with help from Maria Nasr and Adam Senft, in a battle that culminates on Halloween night. There are numerous references to the Goat-Man and the forest fire of 2006. Nodens has been known as “Shub-Niggurath,” but this is not its true name; its temples can be found on “the twin moons of distant Yhe and the fungal gardens of Yaksh.” There are references to Nelson LeHorn and Saul O’Connor, and LeHorn’s copy of the Daemonolateria is featured. There is a reference to a group of hunters who died in a mysterious fire near LeHorn’s Hollow. Tony Genova and Vincent Napoli are mentioned. Levi mentions various occult groups, like Black Lodge, the Kwan, and the Starry Wisdom sect. Maria Nasr places a call to retired Detective Hector Ramirez. Adam Senft was incarcerated alongside Karen Moore. A minor character, Cecil Smeltzer, thinks about his late brother Clark and his nephew Barry. Levi mentions Nyarlathotep in a spell, and also refers to the Lost Level. Nodens is not the Celtic deity, nor the Lovecraftian entity, but is instead the greatest of the Thirteen, pre-Universal beings that travel the multiverse destroying entire realities. They are the primary villains of Keene’s Labyrinth saga. The Goat-Man, the fire of 2006, Nelson LeHorn, Saul O’Connor, and Adam Senft are from Keene’s novel Dark Hollow, to which this novel is a semi-sequel. While Nodens is not Shub-Niggurath, it may have disguised itself as that entity at times. Yhe and Yaksh are Cthulhu Mythos locales. The Daemonolateria appears throughout Keene’s works, including Dark Hollow and “Caught in a Mosh.” The deceased hunters are from Keene’s short story “Red Wood.” Tony Genova and Vincent Napoli are mobsters who reappear throughout Keene’s multiverse. The versions mentioned here are native to the CU, but other versions can be seen in Keene’s novels Clickers II, Clickers III, and Clickers vs. Zombies (cowritten with J. F. Gonzalez), and in the short story “The Siqqusim Who Stole Christmas.” Black Lodge is a secret occult organization that also appears throughout Keene’s multiverse, including the short story “The Black Wave,” and in other universes, such as those of Earthworm Gods II: Deluge and Clickers vs. Zombies. The Kwan are from the works of horror author Geoff Cooper; they play a major role in Keene and Cooper’s novel Shades. The Starry Wisdom sect is from H. P. Lovecraft’s story “The Haunter of the Dark.” Detective Ramirez appears in Keene’s novels Terminal and Dark Hollow. Karen Moore and Clark and Barry Smeltzer are from Keene’s novel Ghoul. Nyarlathotep is the crawling chaos of the Cthulhu Mythos. The Lost Level is from Keene’s novel of the same name. A short follow-up story, “The Ghosts of Monsters,” can be found in Keene’s collections Unhappy Endings and Blood on the Page, and takes place about a year later. Keene’s novel Darkness at the Edge of Town takes place in one of his many parallel universes, and shows what happened in a world where Levi died years earlier and was not around to stop Nodens. A follow-up story, “The House of Ushers,” sees Adam Senft traveling to the version of Hell created by horror author Edward Lee in his novel City Infernal and its sequels.

Crossover of the Week

April 1987

A FISTFUL OF JUDEXES

Reporter Mattie Storin interviews Michel Kerjean, leader of the Judex Society, a security business dedicated to battling crime and corruption on the Channel Island of Jersey. The Society is named after a masked crime-fighter in Paris, before the War. Detective Sergeant Jim Bergerac of the Bureau de Etrangers intervenes when a group of Judexes at Diamante Lil’s café become rowdy. An older detective named Teddy Verano helps him deal with the Judexes. On returning to the Bureau, Jim is greeted by his secretary, Peggy, who tells him Chief Inspector Barney Crozier wants to see him. Jim asks his former father-in-law Charlie Hungerford what the Law and Order committee plans to do about the Judex Society. The real Judex tells Jim Kerjean created the Society to discredit the vigilante, who he blames for the death of his grandfather, a criminal named Morales. Kerjean is backed by BlackSpear Holdings. Jim mentions his relationship with Susan.

Short story by Nigel Malcolm in Tales of the Shadowmen Volume 11: Force Majeure, Jean-Marc and Randy Lofficier, eds., Black Coat Press, 2014. Mattie Storin is from Michael Dobbs’ novel House of Cards, which features the appointment of a fictional Prime Minister of Great Britain, Francis Urquhart. Therefore, the Mattie Storin in Malcolm’s story must be the CU counterpart of the character seen in Dobbs’ book, which takes place in an AU. Michel Kerjean is the grandson of Robert Morales (née Kerjean) and his lover Diana Monti, who died in battle with the title character of Louis Feuillade’s 1916 film serial Judex. Detective Sergeant Jim Bergerac, Diamante Lil, Peggy Masters, Chief Inspector Barney Crozier, Charlie Hungerford, and Susan Young are from the British police drama Bergerac. Teddy Verano is a private eye featured in books by Maurice Limat. BlackSpear Holdings is the name by which Paul Féval’s criminal society the Black Coats is known in the 20th and 21st century, as seen in fiction by Jean-Marc Lofficier.

Crossover Cover: Devil Take the Hindmost

In the city of Denbrook, former journalist Damon St. Cloud seeks to avenge his family’s murder. Along the way, he encounters Matthew Corrigan, Detective Christos, Frederick “the Whale” Whalen, Charybdis and Scylla, and Toulon. Kenneth Ottman and Laloosh are also mentioned. The city of Denbrook, created by Mike McGee, was the setting of nine serialized stories by various authors on the website Frontier Publishing. The first section of the book, “Club Red,” originally appeared on the website in 2004. Matthew Corrigan and Detective Christos are from Michael Franzoni’s Denbrook story “Missing Persons.” Frederick “the Whale” Whalen is from Derrick Ferguson’s novel Dillon and the Voice of Odin. Since Dillon is in the CU, so are the various inhabitants of Denbrook. Charybdis and Scylla, Toulon, and Laloosh are from Ferguson’s as-yet-unpublished Denbrook novel Diamondback: It Seemed Like a Good Idea at the Time. Kenneth Ottman is from Tom Lynch’s Denbrook story “Pentagram Whispers.”

Crossover Covers: Teen Titans - Ghost

The Mystery, Inc. gang meet the version of the DC comics superteam the Teen Titans seen in the cartoon Teen Titans Go!, initially investigating a seeming haunting at Titans Tower, then helping the Titans get rid of Raven’s uncle Myron the Mildly Irritating. Per Win's rules about generally not including superhero teams in the CU, I'm treating this story as an AU.

Crossover Cover: The Shadow Calling Nick Carter

In one of the stories in this issue, Nick Carter teams up with the Shadow and Margo Lane to battle a criminal mastermind called Vox.

Crossover Cover: Summer Knight

Queen Mab inherits the debt Harry Dresden previously owed to the Winter Fae. Harry twice views Queen Titania with his Wizard’s Sight. Queen Mab and Queen Titania are from William Shakespeare’s plays Romeo and Juliet and A Midsummer Night’s Dream, respectively, and become recurring characters in the Dresden Files series with this novel.

Crossover Cover: The House of Wax

Teenage amateur sleuth Kindaichi Hajime, grandson of detective Kindaichi Kosuke, works alongside another teen detective, Edward Columbo, the nephew of a noted Los Angeles homicide detective. Kindaichi Kosuke appeared in a series of novels by Seishi Yokozimo. Edward Columbo is meant to be the nephew of Lt. Columbo from the television series Columbo; since the Lieutenant is in the CU, so are the Kindaichis.

Day of the Hunter

In a 2002 storyline in the Tarzan comic strip written by Alex Simmons, the jungle lord encountered Simmons' character Arron Day, aka BlackJack, an African-American mercenary active in the 1930s and '40s, via time travel. The official BlackJack website provides links to the individual chapters on the GoComics site.

Crossover of the Week

March 1920

THE JADE SUIT OF DEATH

Charles St. Cyprian and his assistant Ebe Gallowglass battle the Order of the Cosmic Ram, which has unleashed the demon Baphomet and the ancient Chinese sage and werewolf Zhang Su. St. Cyprian uses a “devil-box” formerly used by Carnacki to subdue the Hairy Hands of Dartmoor. Soho’s dockworkers are a mixture of races, including Chinese, Lascar, English and Tcho-Tcho. St. Cyprian and Gallowglass dwell at No. 427, Cheyne Walk. Carnacki, St. Cyprian’s predecessor as Royal Occultist, was once the apprentice to Edwin Drood, his own predecessor. Picking up a letter, Gallowglass asks St. Cyprian, “What’s a Janus House and why doesn’t it have a postmark?” St. Cyprian replies, “The Sergeant has other means of posting letters than Royal Mail.” St. Cyprian and Gallowglass answer a summons from William Melion, who was once a member of the Kensington Clique, a group of occultists that also included John Silence, Saxon Amadeus Dorr, Sar Dubnotal, and Flaxman Low. In Limehouse, St. Cyprian and Gallowglass meet with Lady Molly Robertson-Kirk, formerly of Scotland Yard. St. Cyprian tells Robertson-Kirk he was sorry to hear about Hubert, and she mentions Inspector Meisures. Amelia Glossop is a member of the Order. Melion thinks of previous Royal Occultists, such as Drood and his shimmering crystal egg, and Beamish and his hunt for the worms in the earth. Philip Wendy-Smythe claims to know the hidden mysteries of Lemuria and ancient Khem, the Aklo, and how to make the Voorish Sign. St. Cyprian asks if he knows the Hloh Gestures. Wendy-Smythe, who falsely believes one of his personal curios is the idol of Chaugnar Faugn, invokes the myriad and malevolent moons of Munnapor and the roving rings of Raggadorr when he and St. Cyprian are attacked by an animated statue. Wendy-Smythe tells his servant to retrieve the cursed scepter of Ibn-Schacabao, but the butler gives notice, saying he’ll be in residence at the Junior Ganymede Club. St. Cyprian’s unidentified enemy is a magus in the truest sense of the word, on a level with Oliver Haddo or one of that lot. St. Cyprian uses the powder of Ibn Ghazi to expose an invisible menace. St. Cyprian tells Gallowglass to get the arbutus, which is on the third shelf, left of the statue with the head of an ibis; Gallowglass mistakes a falcon figurine for the ibis. Saxon Amadeus Dorr smokes cigarettes made from the poppies of Leng. The sorcerers of Averoigne are mentioned, as is the Westenra Fund. Melion’s servant Ghale brews his tea from the blossoms of the mariphasa, a flower known to grow only in the higher altitudes of Tibet. Sadie Fleece refers to the Starry Wisdom. St. Cyprian uses the sign of Koth, which guards the Black Tower and seals the vaults of Pnath, to bind Zhang Su. Saxon Dorr tells Melion about a Polish nobleman who shares his affliction of lycanthropy, and has lived for centuries.

Novel by Josh Reynolds, Emby Press, 2014. Thomas Carnacki and No. 427, Cheyne Walk are from William Hope Hodgson’s Carnacki the Ghost-Finder. The Tcho-Tcho people are from August Derleth’s contributions to the Cthulhu Mythos created by H. P. Lovecraft. Edwin Drood is the title character of Charles Dickens’ unfinished novel The Mystery of Edwin Drood. The Sergeant is Sergeant Roman Janus, the “Spirit-Breaker,” an occult detective created by Jim Beard. John Silence is the protagonist of an eponymous collection by Algernon Blackwood. The Sâr Dubnotal appeared in a French pulp series by an anonymous author. Flaxman Low is from Ghosts; Being the Experiences of Flaxman Low by “E. and H. Heron” (Hesketh V. Prichard and Kate O’Brien Ryall Prichard). Lady Molly Robertson-Kirk, Hubert de Mazareen, and Inspector Meisures are from Baroness Orczy’s collection Lady Molly of Scotland Yard. Amelia Glossop is presumably a member of the Glossop family from P. G. Wodehouse’s Jeeves books. The Junior Ganymede Club is a club for gentlemen’s gentlemen of which Jeeves is a member. The shimmering crystal egg is from H. G. Wells’ “The Crystal Egg.” Worms in the Earth are from Robert E. Howard’s Bran Mak Morn story “Worms of the Earth.” Khem and the Starry Wisdom are from H. P. Lovecraft’s story “The Haunter of the Dark.” The Aklo language is from Arthur Machen’s “The White People,” and was also used by Lovecraft in “The Dunwich Horror” and “The Haunter of the Dark.” The Voorish Sign and the powder of Ibn Ghazi are also from “The Dunwich Horror.” The Plateau of Leng is featured in Lovecraft’s Cthulhu Mythos stories. The Sign of Koth and the Vale of Pnath are from Lovecraft’s Dream Cycle. The Hloh Gestures are from Margery Lawrence’s stories about occult detective Miles Pennoyer. Chaugnar Faugn is from Frank Belknap Long’s novel The Horror from the Hills. Munnapor (or Munnopor) and Raggadorr are mystic entities from the stories of Marvel Comics’ Sorcerer Supreme, Doctor Strange. Ibn-Schacabao is from Lovecraft’s story “The Festival.” Oliver Haddo is from W. Somerset Maugham’s novel The Magician. The falcon figurine is the titular statue from Dashiell Hammett’s The Maltese Falcon. Averoigne is a province of France that is the site of many supernatural events in Clark Ashton Smith’s works. The Westenra fund is named after Lucy Westenra from Bram Stoker’s Dracula. Mariphasa is from the 1935 horror film Werewolf of London. The Polish nobleman is Waldemar Daninsky, a werewolf played by Paul Naschy in a long-running series of Spanish horror films.

Crossover Cover: Vionna and the Vampires

Private eyes Vionna Valis and Mary Kelly (a victim of Jack the Ripper who was resurrected by the vigilante known as the Black Centipede) join forces with the ghost of Sherlock Holmes to battle the Lord of the Vampires, Professor James Moriarty. Moriarty formerly served the previous Lord, Count Dracula, before betraying and killing him. One of Moriarty’s vampire henchmen is a Chinese man who claims to have once been played by Boris Karloff, implicitly Fu Manchu. Holmes and Moriarty’s fates in this story are irreconcilable with their established history in the CU. Combined with the revelation that Moriarty is really Holmes’ oldest brother Sherrinford, this book, as well as the Black Centipede novels by Miller, must take place in an AU.

Crossover Cover: Suspect

L.A. cop Scott James joins the Metro K-9 Unit and is paired with a former bomb-sniffing dog named Maggie, who like himself suffers from post-traumatic stress disorder. Together, they investigate the death of Scott’s partner. John Chen appears. Chen also appears in Crais’ Elvis Cole novels, as well as the Joe Pike series and the non-series novel Demolition Angel. Scott and Maggie later teamed up with Cole and Pike in The Promise.

Crossover Cover: Interdimensional Women's Prison Breakout

Bomb Queen and two other supervillainesses break out of the otherdimensional prison known as the White Ward and enter Cassie Hack’s world to cause havoc. Cassie teams up with Samhain to bring them to justice. Hoodoo Hex is seen among the inmates of the Ward. This story is a sequel to the one-shot Bomb Queen vs. Hack/Slash, which had Cassie and Vlad traveling to Bomb Queen's alternate universe to battle her. Hoodoo Hex is from Tim Seeley’s web comic Colt Noble and the Megalords.

Crossover Cover: Monster Hunter Alpha

Earl Harbinger, head of Monster Hunter International and a century-old werewolf, battles agents of the Old Ones and a new breed of lycanthrope in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula. The Deep Ones are discussed, and it is mentioned every nation with a Navy has programs to eradicate them. These references further solidify the presence of Monster Hunter International in the CU.

Crossover Cover: The Hot Rock

John Dortmunder attempts to break fellow professional thief (and occasional actor) Alan Greenwood out of prison. Greenwood plans to change his name to Alan Grofield after the escape. A professional thief named Alan Grofield appears in Westlake’s Parker novels, written under the pen name “Richard Stark,” and is also the protagonist of four other novels written under the Stark pseudonym. Can the two Alan Grofields be the same person? Another Dortmunder novel, Nobody’s Perfect, claims Greenwood became a successful television actor under his original name. This seems exceedingly unlikely, since Greenwood would be wanted by the police for his prison escape. Since both the Parker and Dortmunder series have links to the CU, it is more likely the reference in Nobody’s Perfect is a distortion, and the two Grofields are indeed one and the same.

Crossover Cover: The Living Goddess

This collection of stories features the Grey Monk, a deeply religious vigilante. In the story "The Living Goddess," the Monk battles Thuggee seeking a chest that has passed through many hands before coming to his own city. The history of the chest is shown through a series of flashbacks. One is set in Victorian London, and involves a Great Detective who is friends with a doctor (whose new bride has family in America), knows Baritsu, and is pursuing a Professor. Another takes place in New York City in 1939, and shows a vigilante who also has a guise as man about town Michael Shaw gunning down Thuggee and Nazis seeking the chest at a museum. The Great Detective is clearly Sherlock Holmes, though the 1892 date for the flashback must be incorrect, as that would place it during Holmes’ Great Hiatus. 1886 is more likely, since William S. Baring-Gould’s biography Sherlock Holmes of Baker Street states Dr. Watson married an American woman in that year. The vigilante in New York City in 1939 is Michael Shaw, aka the Nightmare, who has appeared in other stories by French.

Crossover of the Week

June 1945

CHANCE OF A GHOST

George Chance’s (aka the Green Ghost) friend Ned Standish, of the Kingsport Standishes, a summa cum laude graduate of Miskatonic University, has been accused of murder. Although Chance calls Standish “Commissioner,” he is actually an Assistant Police Commissioner for one of New York City’s boroughs, as are Weston, Kirkpatrick, Woods, Foster, Quistrom, Gordon, Warner, Hombert, and others. Chance refers to other vigilantes active at the time he began his career, such as the Black Bat, Captain Midnight, the Phantom Detective, the Domino Lady, and Ki-Gor. Chance’s wartime missions began with liberating Professor Horatio Smith, who was something of a modern-day Scarlet Pimpernel, from a supposedly unescapable German prison camp. Subsequent missions for the OSS included a strange encounter with a hideously wriggling whitish worm at an abandoned chateau in Northern France and one with a revolting frog-mouthed, tentacle-lipped creature that accosted him in the sewers of Paris. Standish went over the file on flapper girl Toby Basinger’s case with D.A. Skinner. A lookalike for Standish murdered Basinger, who killed an ex-girlfriend of Chance’s, nightclub singer Angel de la Ruse. Chance’s aide Joe Harper smokes Red Apple Cigarettes.

Short story by George Chance, edited by Win Scott Eckert in Legends of New Pulp Fiction, Ron Fortier, ed., Airship 27 Productions, 2015. The Green Ghost (aka the Ghost) appeared in the pulp magazine The Ghost, Super-Detective (later retitled The Ghost Detective, and then The Green Ghost Detective). Kingsport, Massachusetts and Miskatonic University are from H. P. Lovecraft’s Cthulhu Mythos tales. Commissioner Weston appears in the tales of a vigilante who can cloud men’s minds. Commissioner Stanley Kirkpatrick is from the Spider stories. Commissioner Woods is from the Green Lama’s pulp exploits. Commissioner Charlie Foster is from the Secret Agent X tales. Commissioner Arthur J. Quistrom is from Leslie Charteris’ novel The Saint in New York. Commissioner Gordon operated as a whispering vigilante in pulp novels by Laurence Donovan. Commissioner Jerome Warner is from the Black Bat stories. Commissioner Hombert and D.A. Skinner are from Rex Stout’s Nero Wolfe novels. Captain Midnight is from the radio series of the same name. The Phantom Detective appeared in pulp stories by Robert Wallace. The Domino Lady is a pulp heroine created by Lars Anderson. Ki-Gor is a jungle hero who appeared in pulp tales by John Peter Drummond. Professor Horatio Smith is from the movie Pimpernel Smith. The Scarlet Pimpernel is from Baroness Orczy’s novels, of course. The seemingly unescapable prison camp is Loki from Farmer’s authorized Doc Savage novel Escape from Loki, which is also the source of the whitish worm, which Doc encountered in Baron de Musard’s chateau during World War I. The frog-mouthed, tentacle-lipped creature is Dewer, who encountered occult detective Jules de Grandin in Seabury Quinn’s story “The Bride of Dewer.” Toby Basinger and Angel de la Ruse are from Howard Hopkins’ Green Ghost story “Ghost of a Chance,” although Basinger’s name is Eckert’s invention. Red Apple Cigarettes appear in a number of films, including Pulp Fiction, Four Rooms, and Romy and Michele’s High School Reunion, as well as a number of other works by Eckert.

Crossover Movie Poster: Captain America: The First Avenger

The Red Skull, on seeing the Tesseract, this universe’s version of the Cosmic Cube, remarks, "And the Führer digs for trinkets in the desert." This line is a reference to Raiders of the Lost Ark, confirming the Marvel Cinematic Universe as an alternate reality to the CU, as is the main Marvel Universe.

Crossover Cover: Lynch

Johnny Pearl, an ex-Confederate farmer, is lynched by members of the U.S. Cavalry, who also murder his pregnant Indian wife. Pearl is restored to life by Dr. Anton Mirablis and given the name of “Lynch.” Mirablis is nearly 100-years-old and studied medicine in the 1790s with Frankenstein. Mirablis has some of Frankenstein’s notebooks. According to Mirablis, he and Frankenstein were working to create life together, until they went their separate ways when they disagreed on the method. Frankenstein was interested in electricity, but Mirablis was interested in creating a serum. Eventually, Mirablis combined both methods. Rick Lai writes, “Mirablis claims that Mary Shelley altered events for her classic novel. He says that Frankenstein’s real name was Viktor von Frankenstein, and that the two of them studied at the University of Vienna (rather than Ingolstadt). Mirablis also claims that both Frankenstein and the Monster perished differently than in the novel. Mirablis is an untrustworthy person, and could be lying for his own reasons.” An ad for "Dr. Mirablis's Amazing Electric Truss" appears in a penny dreadful called Pickman's Illustrated Serials in Collins' story "Hell Come Sundown." Rick Lai referenced this story by identifying Count Corbucci's American dime novel publisher as Pickman and Sons in his story "The Last Vendetta."

Crossover Cover: Hack/Slash/Eva: Monster's Ball

Cassie Hack and Vlad team up with Eva, Daughter of the Dragon, and the vigilantes known as the Ghosts of Old Detroit to rescue Eva’s companion Michael from Doctor Praetorius and Mary Shelley Lovecraft. A Gill-Man can be seen among the slashers whose corpses have been collected by Praetorius and Lovecraft. Eva is allegedly the daughter of Dracula, though more likely “Dracula” is a “soul-clone” of the original Vlad Tepes. Similarly, although Michael is identified as Victor Frankenstein’s monster, the significant difference in personality between the original monster and Michael suggests the latter was actually created by another member of the Frankenstein family. Dr. Praetorius (or Pretorius) is from the film Bride of Frankenstein. It is unknown whether this Gill-Man is the same one that appears in The Creature from the Black Lagoon and its sequels.

Crossover Cover: Melmoth Reconciled

The immortal wanderer John Melmoth makes a deal with an embezzling cashier, who takes on Melmoth’s curse and all the power that goes with it. Melmoth dies in peace. The cashier works for the banker Baron Nucingen, and observes Nucingen’s wife flirting with the unscrupulous Rastignac. Also appearing are prostitutes Aquilina and Euphrasie and devious money lender Charles Claparon. This crossover connects Charles Robert Maturin’s Melmoth the Wanderer to Balzac’s La Comédie Humaine cycle of novels. Madame Nucingen and Rastignac began their affair in Balzac’s Père Goriot. Aquilina and Euphrasie first appeared in The Magic Skin, while Charles Claparon went on to appear in César Birotteau.

Crossover Cover: A (Super) Friend in Need

Scooby and the gang help the Super Friends and Supergirl deal with a seeming haunting at the Hall of Justice, which turns out to actually be the work of the Legion of Doom. Since superhero teams are generally not included in the CU, this must be an AU.

Crossover Cover: Sharpe's Tiger

Private Richard Sharpe infiltrates the army of Tippoo Sultan. One of the jewels the Sultan wears is a dagger with a large yellow-white diamond. The French colonel that advises the Sultan says the diamond is called the Moonstone, and supposedly brings misfortune to anyone who steals it. Sharpe does just that. The appearance of the Moonstone (from Wilkie Collins’ novel of the same name) reinforces Sharpe’s presence in the CU.

Crossover of the Week

2012

THE RESURRECTION OF ABNER KADAVER

A woman claiming to work for the Emilio Lizardo Crematorium appears at the State Prison to collect Abner Kadaver’s body. Dick Tracy and his wife Tess take some time off to go fishing. A boat with the name “Swee’pea” on it is seen. Tess is offered a cup of coffee by a woman named Olive, who says Dick is out fishing with Olive’s own husband at the dock. We see Dick with a man with a large forearm that has a tattoo of an anchor on it, who is holding a can of spinach. Olive and Tess discuss what first attracted them to their respective husbands, namely their chins. As they return home, the Tracys’ son Joe refers to both Olive’s husband and Dick being ex-Navy. Dick smokes a corn cob pipe and says, “I yam what I yam!” Dick’s granddaughter Honeymoon tells him she is going to a Hong Kong Cavaliers concert on Sunday night, and she hopes to get an autograph from Perfect Tommy.

Dick Tracy strip by Mike Curtis and Joe Staton, October 22, 2013–January 4, 2014. The crematorium, mentioned in the October 22 strip, is named after Dr. Emilio Lizardo from the film The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the Eighth Dimension. The couple who are also vacationing is Popeye and Oliver Oyl from E. C. Segar’s classic comic strip Thimble Theatre. Swee’pea is the name of Popeye’s adopted son. The boat appears in the October 27, 2013 strip, and Popeye and Olive first show up on October 28. The leader of the Hong Kong Cavaliers, who were mentioned in the strip on November 7, 2013, is Buckaroo Banzai himself. Perfect Tommy is the Cavaliers’ rhythm guitarist, and also designed the suspension system on Buckaroo’s Jet Car.