The Zoo Crew Was Beaten to the Punch By the Just'a Lotta Animals

Welcome to Comic Book Legends Revealed! This is the seven hundred and ninety-second installment where we examine three comic book legends and determine whether they are true or false.

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COMIC LEGEND:

Just'a Lotta Animals was invented after Captain Carrot and the Zoo Crew.

STATUS:

False

The excellent comic book series, Captain Carrot and His Amazing Zoo Crew got its start in a preview feature in New Teen Titans #16 (echoing how New Teen Titans, itself, ALSO debuted in a preview feature in DC Comics Presents #26) by Roy Thomas, Scott Shaw! and Bob Smith (Gerry Conway co-created the series with Thomas and Shaw!). In that story, Superman sees that the people on Earth are starting to act like animals. Superman detects an energy beam being transmitted from Pluto. There is also a strange barrier around Earth that not even the Man of Steel can penetrate. Superman comes up with an ingenious solution to his dilemma. He noticed that a meteor was able to pass through the barrier unimpeded, so Superman simply grabs the meteor and then throws it up towards the barrier and he then grabs a hold of it, using the momentum of the meteor to drag him past the barrier. His clever plan works, but then Superman is suddenly transported, along with the meteor (which shatters) into a whole dimension with a world called Earth-C (C for Cartoon, I assume).

Superman and the meteor pieces land on Earth-C. Earth-C is filled with anthropomorphic animals. What we would term "Funny animals" (when Superman uses that phrase, though, it's deemed offensive). The pieces are each imbued with some of Superman's super-abilities and so when animals encounter them, they gain superpowers.

Superman lands with one piece near a comic book creator named Roger Rabbit who is working on the latest issue of the superhero team, Just'a Lotta Animals. Superman gets into his Clark Kent outfit but he is shocked when Roger is shocked to discover, well, a giant pink monster in his home!

As you can see, Just'a Lotta Animals was introduced very early into the world of Captain Carrot and the Zoo Crew, but only as a fictional comic book series.

It turns out that Starro the Conqueror has launched an attack from the Plutos of both universes. Here, the animals are all turned into their "normal" animal versions (so a duck flying a plane suddenly starts quacking and stuff like that). Superman teams up with the animals who have gained superpowers (including Roger, who didn't get his meteor to affect him directly, so he instead has to eat carrots grown in the garden where the meteor piece landed to transform into Captain Carrot) to defeat Starro.

This leads directly into the first issue of their ongoing series...

The Zoo Crew is made up of Captain Carrot, Pig-Iron, Fastback, Rubberduck, Yankee Poodle, American Eagle and Alley-Kat-Abra.

They proceeded to have a series of adventures for the next year or so until Captain Carrot and His Amazing Zoo Crew #14 came out, which was done by Scott Shaw!, E. Nelson Bridwell, Al Gordon and Carol Lay. It played on an amusing aspect of DC continuity where the heroes of the DC Universe often found themselves meeting the comic book writers and artists who created their comic books. And so, in this issue, Roger Rabbit comes face to face with the Just'a Lotta Animals!

Not only did Captain Carrot get to meet the main members of the Just'a Lotta Animals, but he then was taken to their satellite where he got to meet the entire roster (the whole issue is a very clever takeoff by Shaw! on the classic Justice League of America/Justice Society of America adventures, with the heroes teaming up and splitting into groups for the issue).

Here, then, is the entire lineup for the Just'a Lotta Animals...

Super-Squirrel, Wonder Wabbit, The Batmouse, Wonder Wabbit, Green Lambkin, The Crash, Aquaduck, The Green Sparrow, The Stacked Canary, Hawkmoose, The Martian Anteater, The Item, The Elong-Gator, Firestork, Zap-Panda and The Rat Tornado.

Okay, so this seems like a normal enough situation, right? Thomas, Shaw! and Conway invented Captain Carrot and the Zoo Crew and they had Captain Carrot's secret identity be a comic book creator who works on Just'a Lotta Animals and then they brought the fictional characters into the series.

However, it was actually almost the other way around. You see, when Shaw! and Thomas first pitched DC Comics on the funny animal concept, their idea was Super Squirrel and the Just'a Lotta Animals! However, Dick Giordano decided that this could be a problem, as one of the attractive aspects of this Captain Carrot idea (which I will get to in a future legend) is that it would be easy to turn into a cartoon series.

The problem there, though, is what if DC had licensed, say, Superman to one studio and Wonder Woman to another and the lincensors took issue with DC having a funny animal version of Wonder Woman sold to ANOTHER studio. So Giordano told them to come up with original characters and Captain Carrot and the Zoo Crew was the result. Shaw! talked about it on his old website here.

Obviously, the characters were then introduced as an in-joke that eventually became part of the book. Too funny.

Thanks a lot to Scott Shaw! for the fascinating piece of comic book history!