You’d think after two years and 700-plus posts we’d do a better job of following through on our plans for The Fortress.

We wanted to write a review of Final Crisis, but after clicking through the old Google Reader it seems that bloggers with much higher readerships have already covered just about everything necessary about that particular effort.

The only original thought we can add is that Morrison and Jones would have a heckuva New Gods story on their hands if they could only leave out such unpleasantness as The Monitors and Martian Manhunter’s sudden induction to the Job Squad.

(Seriously … J’onn’s supposed death scene was nearly identical to Bendis and Yu’s infamous beat-down of Tigra, right down to the point where the hero was incapacitated to sate some forgotten loser’s thirst for vengeance and establish the credentials of a new, emerging villain - Libra in this case, instead of The Hood.)

We also planned to run an adventure of the Golden Age Quicksilver (known better to modern readers as Max Mercury) drawn by the great Nick Cardy, but noticed at the last minute that said story included a so-called bit of humor that your admittedly PC host felt uncomfortable featuring in the Fortress.

As any Golden Age fan will say, appreciation of such stories often involves an understanding of the time they were produced and its targeted audience.

It’s no secret that popular culture wasn’t as racially sensitive in the 1940s as it is in the 21st century - although stuff like The Love Guru makes us wonder if such assumptions are necessarily true - but even the most broad-minded rationalization can’t excuse the vulgarity of the racial caricatures presented in many early comic books.

Which is essentially a long-winded way of saying that we won’t post the Quicksilver story anytime soon. But, hey, every closed door leads to a new path … and all that rot. So we’re happy to instead present Jack Cole’s Midnight, a quasi-parody of The Spirit who fought crime with the aid of an eccentric scientist and a talking chimpanzee.

Awesome, eh?

We have one more entry in our seemingly endless series of Batman’s Greatest Hits in store, but after that The Keeper plans to take a few days off for rest ‘n’ relaxation.

Since the momentary fame caused by links from Journalista and I Can Has Cheeseburger seems to have petered out, your humble host is confident his absence won’t bring about the Internet’s downfall.

EDIT: Oops! Looks like we forgot to specify the Midnight story is taken from Quality’s Smash Comics #28. Sorry about that!