Each day in June you'll get an entry showing you the first appearance of seemingly minor characters, phrases, objects or events that later became notable parts of comic book lore. Not major stuff like "the first appearance of Superman," but rather, "the first time someone said, 'Avengers Assemble!'" or "the first appearance of Batman's giant penny" or "the first appearance of Alfred Pennyworth" or "the first time Spider-Man's face was shown half-Spidey/half-Peter." Stuff like that. Here is an archive of what I've featured so far.

Enjoy!

First "Bwah Ha Ha Ha"

In 1987's Justice League International #8, Blue Beetle, Booster Gold and Black Canary are in Paris setting up their French embassy.

Beetle and Booster are having a drink (by the by, how garish is Beetle's outfit?)...





They get into costume and meet up with Canary, but while she's complaining about the difficulties of the move, Beetle still can't get over the humor of it all...



And that leads to the most famous catch phrase of the Justice League run of Keith Giffen and J.M. DeMatteis, which would be heard many many more times before they left...



For the heck of it, let's see the next page, where the joke continues (and we get to hear Bwah Ha Ha Ha once again already!)...



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First time Psylocke explained to us how her psychic knife is the "focused totality of her telepathic powers"

Amazingly enough, when Psylocke first began using her psychic knife after being put into her new Asian body, she did NOT say "focused totality." Instead, she said...



It was not until 1990's Uncanny X-Men #271, over a dozen issues after her psychic knife started being used, that the familiar phrase made its debut...



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First Appearance of the Beagle Boys

These regular enemies of Scrooge McDuck made a very intriguing first appearance. You see, 1951's "Terror of the Beagle Boys" from Walt Disney's Comics and Stories # 134 was all about how Scrooge was so SCARED of the Beagle Boys that he does all sorts of wild schemes to protect himself. Ultimately these schemes backfire, leading to the following ending, which was the first appearance of the Beagle Boys...



Weird, eh?

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Feel free to send in ideas for future debuts I should feature here to bcronin@comicbookresources.com!