With so many big names and big events plastered across the shelves of your LCS, sometimes great comics get left behind - buried in longboxes until someone comes along to find these Hidden Gems.

Collects Tales of the Unexpected #1-8 (backup story)
Written by Brian Azzarello
Art by Cliff Chiang
Published by DC Comics (2007)

A few years back DC Comics took its whole line of mainstream books into a time travel, one year into the future present post-Infinite Crisis. With all titles jumping into the unknown future, the plan was to cover the “missing” year in a weekly series of 52 issues told in real time and titled - shockingly - 52. Trusted with that mission were four of DC’s top scribes, so-called architects of the new DCU: Geoff Johns (Green Lantern), Grant Morrison (Batman and Robin), Mark Waid (Amazing Spider-Man) and Greg Rucka (Action Comics) - with aide from Keith Giffen (Doom Patrol) on plotting and layouts. With the foursome now ruling the DCU and its fate, there’s a chance some characters don’t fit in and that would have to face with their tragic ending. One of those characters is Dr. Terry “Dr. 13″ Thirteen.

Being the world’s famous paranormal investigator and the most skeptical man in the business, it makes him very unique. Living with his only daughter Traci (later known as Traci 13 with her mystic powers) in a big mansion, Dr. 13 is called to investigate a plane crash site where the survivors fed on each other. From then on he encounters Lord Andrew Bennett (”I… Vampire”, as he likes to shout for the world to know), Genius Jones, French-speaking Anthro (you know, that cave guy from Morrison’s Final Crisis), Infectious Lass, the Nazi-founded Primate Patrol, the undead Captain Fear and the Haunted Tank. In other words - characters with canceled books and non-continuity. With the mysterious Architects planning to revamp the DCU, Dr. 13 despite his disbelief, leads the merry group of nobodies on a quest to prevent that from happening. The Architects faces are never seen, but at one point it is obvious they’re Johns, Waid, Rucka and Morrison. Does this team have any chance against the four most powerful beings in the universe? Why should you even care? The answer to the first question is clear by the end, where you’ll also have fondness for the characters enough to want to see their story continues. Sadly, besides Traci and Anthro none of these was used by any DC creator ever since.

What I love in this story is the use of inner jokes directed at mainstream comic book fans. At one point, a character is hit by a metro train. Easily recognizable amongst the train passengers are James Howlett/Logan, Clark Kent, Matt Murdock and Peter Parker. What’s more poetic than a D-lister run down by a bunch of A-listers, as the industry or continuity move too fast for him to catch on? Another thing I liked was when the doctor and some of his pals meet the Architects for the first time in human form. To separate them from each other, Chiang hides them behind masks of Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman and Flash. Now you do the math and match the Architect to the character he’s been either writing recently or had a lengthy run with in the past. I’ve mentioned it recently, but my favorite part of the book is when Bennett transforms General Julius of the Primate Patrol (he started as a villain and later joined the team after losing all of his people apes) into a vampire. If you don’t see the awesomeness in this, you must lack a heart, a brain or both. And there’s also this nice X-Men pose-style shot. Cliff Chiang - best move from editorial to creativity or what?

I’m not a huge fan of Azzarello (Joker), but Doctor 13: Architecture & Morality made me like his writing a bit. To that point, I disliked Lex Luthor: Man of Steel, was interested in Startling Stories: Banner but never bought it or just recognized him as “that guy from Kingdom Come“. So yeah, kudos to Azzarello for finally writing something I actually like.

The book gets 4 out of 5 on a scale of literal dimes for your thoughts.

To contact Tomer Soiker: tsoiker@panelsonpages.com