Batman Annual #12 – “Slade’s Demon” – Mike Baron/Ross Andru, Pablo Marcos/Denis Rodier
This story is about a murder mystery weekend at the mountaintop estate of Deacon Slade. Deacon built the estate himself, but he was banging the builder’s wife. When the builder found out, he went nuts and slaughtered nine people with an axe before the cops shot him. Apparently, Deacon also pushed the builder’s assistant over a cliff. Rumours also hinted that Deacon was into demonology and was planning some kind of ritual sacrifice. Now Monica Slade is hosting the murder mystery at the house, which is supposedly haunted by some kind of demon. (And Monica herself is having
money troubles, unable to sell the house because her father’s will stipulated it go to the Historical Society.) Bruce Wayne gets an invitation and brings a woman named Ruby Smith as his date, although it doesn’t seem like they’re romantically involved … at least, not yet. After meeting Monica and her friend Jake (who’s some kind of daredevil who does public stunts for attention), Bruce and Ruby are told which roles they’ll play in the upcoming drama. Ruby is the Temptress, a famous actress (and the dress she wears to dinner certainly fits that role), while Bruce (appropriately) will be the 
detective. They meet the other guests at dinner and learn their roles: Randy McEwen (an architect) is the gangster, and Randy’s wife Maureen is his “fancy woman” (which I assume means hooker); Lyle Henderson is the Tycoon and his wife Lil plays his wife, who’s pissed off at all his extramarital affairs; Jake is the Engineer; Victor Pei is the Lawyer; Clarice is the Tennis Pro; Rene Cesar is the Witch Doctor; and Rene’s wife Patricia is a modern urban terrorist. There was apparently a thirteenth guest invited, but they didn’t show up. Monica reminds everyone to stay in character to make things more fun,
especially whoever ends up being the murder victim. Bruce chats with Rene and Patricia, who seems to be taking her role as terrorist very seriously, spouting all the usual rhetoric. The lights go out and Monica goes to get some candles, but a scream brings the others to an unused portion of the house. A broken widow looks down on some rocks, where Monica’s dead body seems to be lying. Nobody’s quite sure if this is part of the game or not, so Bruce changes into Batman while the others are distracted and goes down to check. Monica really is dead and Batman has to hide when Jake comes down. Jake sounds 
genuinely surprised (and broken up) about Monica. But Batman is still suspicious. Jake, Rene, and Patricia were all missing from their seats when the lights went out. Later, Ruby tells Bruce that Deacon Slade fathered a son with the builder’s wife and it’s his ghost haunting the place (because the kid was screwed up somehow and Deacon killed him). A giant attacks Clarice and Bruce changes to Batman again, pretending he took Bruce Wayne to safety. Clarice tells Batman that she thinks Monica and Lyle were banging, since Monica joked about including an ex-lover on the guest list, and Clarice has narrowed it down to Lyle. (It might’ve been interesting if it was one of the
women, but I suppose that was still taboo back then.) Lyle has a gun (with which he tried to shoot the attacker) and refuses to hand it over to Batman. Batman snoops around and finds a photo from years ago of Deacon Slade and his wife. Jake attacks him, revealing that he’s Monica’s son and is trying to repeat the ritual sacrifice. Batman kicks Jake’s ass but gets conked by Rene, who reveals he’s Jake’s father … and Deacon Slade’s son. (Rene’s mom was the builder’s wife.) Rene wants to complete the sacrifice too, by sending the entire house sliding into the gorge with explosive charges. He starts by tossing Batman 
out the window, but he’s caught by the giant … who turns out to be the supposedly dead builder’s assistant, Hamish Stewart. Yeah, this is convoluted as hell. The charges go off and Hamish holds the house up while Batman gets the others out (including Patricia, who apparently really is a terrorist). Rene shoots Jake and falls out the window, leaving Batman to swing clear while urging Hamish to get to safety. But Hamish says his fate is tied to the house and maybe his death will prevent Slade’s demon from getting what it wants. The house falls and what looks like a demon rises above the rubble before fading away. Batman takes off to change back to Bruce, telling Ruby he paid
Batman to take him to safety (by offering to donate money to charity); I’m not sure how good that cover story is, but whatever. As they drive away, Bruce tells Ruby the thirteenth place was meant for Hamish Stewart, who we see watching from a nearby cliff. There’s a back-up story about Jason Todd getting involved with some hooligans in school who break into the computer to change their grades. Json doesn’t want to lose their friendship, so he tricks them into getting themselves caught.
Wonder Woman Annual #1 – “Amazons” – George Perez/Brian Bolland, Chris Marrinan, Arthur Adams, John Bolton, Jose Luis Garcia-Lopez, Curt Swan, Ross Andru/Mark Farmer, Will blyberg, Bob McLeod
This is a series of stories about Diana taking Julia and Vanessa Kapatelis to Themiscyra as the first outsiders allowed to visit there. Naturally, Julia and her daughter are overwhelmed by the beauty of the place and the majesty of the Amazons. Hippolyte is quite impressed that Julia can speak Ancient Greek so well, and Julia notices an Amazon staring at her and thinks the Amazon looks vaguely familiar. I
thought maybe she had the hots for Julia, but it’ll turn out to be something else. Later, some Amazons are doing a bit of cliff-diving and Diana talks Vanessa into trying it. Despite her initial fear, she ends up enjoying it. Before Diana dives, another Amazon (Euboea) tells a story of how Diana didn’t like swimming as a child, preferring to fly, which was something unique to her. But Euboea tricked her into diving into the water by pretending to drown and Diana met the Nereids, who gave her an appreciation for the sea. That afternoon, Diana and her mother watch Julia and Vanessa ride a horse and Hippolyte 
tells Diana the story of meeting Hypsipyle many years ago. Hypsipyle was Queen of Lemnos, an island of women who had gotten rid of all their men because they neglected or mistreated them. But when Jason and the Argonauts landed there, they ended up banging the women of Lemnos, many of whom got pregnant … including Hypsipyle, who bore two children by Jason. But the Argonauts took off to continue their voyage and the women of Lemnos wasted all the male children and exiled Hypsipyle and her daughter Phthia. Years later, one of the Argonauts found Hypsipyle and told her she had to return to Lemnos to find a great truth. Hippolyte’s sister
Antiope agreed to escort her there and Hippolyte later found out that (after fighting off a harpy) they found everyone on Lemnos was dead. In the absence of any outside enemy, the women of Lemnos had turned on each other, proving to Hippolyte that violence and hatred aren’t the province of men alone. The next day, Diana and Philippus tell Vanessa the story of Egeria, the first Captain of the Guards, who gave her life to block the evil coming from the doorway to the netherworld that the Amazons accidentally opened. Diana closed that doorway (in issue 14), but Egeria and many other Amazons were 
honoured for their sacrifices with statues in the Temple of Hades. Meanwhile in the library, Julia tells Mnemosyne about her life and meets Pythia, the Amazon who was staring at her the day before. Turns out Julia almost drowned while on a boat trip as a small child, but was rescued and brought to Themiscyra where she met Pythia. She was sent back with the Amazons’ blessing—and the inspiration to strive for peace and knowledge. That explains the vision Julia had when touching Harmonia’s amulet in issue 3; it was Pythia’s face she saw. That night, Hippolyte asks about Steve Trevor and Diana tells
a story about Steve testing a new jet fighter. Some spies sabotaged it (the same ones who caused Steve’s jet to malfunction over Themiscyra) and Wonder Woman had to save him from crashing, while Etta rounded up the saboteurs. Vanessa takes a group photo of everyone and Diana takes them home the next day, after some bittersweet farewells. There’s a back-up story about the reading of Myndi Mayer’s will and we learn some more about her background. Her mother had dementia and Myndi had to look after her when her sister decided she’d had enough. Myndi’s brother is gay and she always supported 
him, unlike the rest of the family. In the will, Myndi asks Diana to scatter her ashes, which Diana thinks might be too personal a thing, since she never got to know Myndi that well. But she ends up carrying out Myndi’s last wish.