Two days ago we posted a brand new Marvel teaser asking “Who Are… The Mystery Men?” Innocent enough at first, until the wheels in the collective cog of the Internet become turning and one lone voice cries out, “Hey! Wait! … you mean, like, Bob Burden’s Mysterymen Of America?”
For those that may have forgotten, Marvel is not the first to put out a comic titled Mystery Men, featuring a group of Mystery Men. There was an old DC property called Mystery Men Comics (featuring the Golden Age Blue Beetle and which, according to Bleeding cool, DC had hoped to resurrect for Flashpoint), there was Bob Burden’s Mysterymen of America, and there was that cherished feature film starring Ben Stiller based off of Bob Burden’s comic. And last night, Dark Horse made a casual gesture in a blogpost reminding people that they are the home of the Mystermen, as they plan to return the strip in the next volume of Dark Horse Presents.
To be honest, this seems to be one of those things where people kind of get all hot and bothered over an admittedly small thing. The Mysterymen comic by Bob Burden is obviously worth remembering, but it’s kind of hard to completely trademark the idea of a group of men who are mysterious. With Marvel planning all sorts of things in this coming year, it’s not exactly unreasonable for them to have a group of Mystery Men of their own, as the individuals in the group are explicitly not going to be the same as DC’s old Mystery Men Comics or Bob Burden’s Mysterymen of America. Either way though, this if nothing else goes to prove comic book fanboys and girl’s dedication to the rather large history of comic books.
(via source)
