Superboy #167

Superboy #167 (On Sale: May 21, 1970) has a cover by Neal Adams featuring Superbaby. It also features the ever popular crowd running towards you that Neal was so known for.

We begin with "The Day Superboy Blew Up the World!" by Frank Robbins, Bob Brown and Murphy Anderson. It is Superboy's birthday (the day the Kents found his rocket) and Jonathan Kent wonders why Superboy is moping around. He reveals that he a nuclear-powered alien space probe heading towards Earth and intercepted messages from the craft indicating it plans on landing on Earth, which might cause it to explode. Superboy is unable to penetrate the craft's force-field.

Jonathan Kent tells him the story of how, as Superbaby, he once tried to blow up the Earth with his super-breath as if he were blowing up a balloon globe. His super-breath caused volcanic eruptions, oil gushers, and other catastrophic results, but Martha Kent lured him back with the smell of a tasty stack of homecooked pancakes.

After hearing the story, Superboy gets the idea of fashioning a phony "Earth" globe of magnetic iron, which pulls the space probe away from Earth and lets it harmlessly destroy the iron globe. The most interesting thing about this story is the credits which state that Mike Esposito was the inker, but you would have to be blind to believe that.

We end with "The Super-Mammoth Mystery" also by by Frank Robbins, Bob Brown and Murphy Anderson. When the Dale Brothers Circus comes to Smallville with their star attraction, Trixie the world's largest elephant, Superboy has to check it out. When Superboy flies by, Trixie goes wild, but Superboy is able to bring her under control using the smell of peanuts. The circus gives Superboy free circus tickets for his good deed. After Superboy flies off, Kuku the clown and Nardu, the ringmaster, comment on how well Trixie did, even fooling Superboy.

When Superboy takes Lana Lang to the circus, Kuku distracts him while Nardu causes the circus tent to collapse. While Superboy helps the people trapped inside, Trixie gets loose again and attacks an armored car on the highway. When the car goes missing, Superboy joins the search. He finds Trixie and flies her back to the circus, which then leaves town. Once out of town, the circus stops and Nardo and Kuku open up the side of Trixie, who is a robot and inside of her is the missing armored car. When they open it up to get the loot they find Superboy waiting for them. Superboy figured out Trixie was not real when she did not eat any peanuts and the circus had no bales of hay for her to eat either.

Edited by Murray Boltinoff.