Back Issue #40 Preview by TwoMorrows Publishing

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BLACK CAT • HELLCAT • WILDCAT • JOSIE AND THE PUSSYCATS • VIXEN • TIGER-MAN THUNDERCATS • WHITE TIGER • SONS OF TIGER • PUMAMAN • and bonus beast BADGER!

Volume 1, Number 40 May 2010 Celebrating the Best Comics of the '70s, '80s, and Beyond!

The Retro Comics Experience!

EDITOR Michael Eury PUBLISHER John Morrow DESIGNER Rich J. Fowlks COVER ARTIST Joe Staton

BACK SEAT DRIVER: Editorial by Miss Edgewood . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .2 GREATEST STORIES NEVER TOLD: Foxy Lady: The Vixen . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .3 From cancellation to comebacks, this cat-like crimefighter has legs

COVER COLORIST Freddy Lopez

FLASHBACK: The Domestication of Wildcat . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .9 The Golden Age’s punchiest pugilist refuses to stay down for the count

COVER DESIGNER Michael Kronenberg

BACKSTAGE PASS: ThunderCats . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .19 This ’80s flashback makes grownups purr like happy kiddies

SPECIAL THANKS Walter George Alton Mark Arnold Michael Aushenker Mike Baron Mike W. Barr Bedrock City Comics Alan Brennert Bruce Buchanan Mike Carlin Ernie Colón Gerry Conway DC Comics Tom DeFalco J. M. DeMatteis Kirk Dilbeck Steve Englehart Dick Giordano Grand Comic-Book Database Heritage Comics Auctions James Kingman David Anthony Kraft Selina Kyle Paul Levitz Andy Mangels Bob McLeod Allen Milgrom

Jonathan Miller Mike Nelson Chuck Patton Alan J. Porter Bob Rozakis Roger Salick John Schwirian Jason Shayer Anthony Snyder Roger Stern Jim Sukman John Wells Scott E. Williams Marv Wolfman Tom Ziuko

BEYOND CAPES: Josie and the Pussycats . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .23 Long tails and ears for hats, the breakout beauties from Archie Comics FLASHBACK: Catch a Tiger-Man by the Tale . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .26 The short-lived ’70s Colón/Ditko superhero—plus a different kind of Cougar OFF MY CHEST: Cat of Nine Tales: The Reformation and Conflictions of Selina (Catwoman) Kyle . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .31 So, is she a villainess or a heroine? Jim Kingman has his theories… BRING ON THE BAD GUYS: Never Let the Black Cat Cross Your Path . . . . . . . . . .39 The story of Spider-Man’s slinky sometimes-girlfriend BEYOND CAPES: Everybody Was Kung Fu Fighting . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .48 White Tiger and the Sons of the Tiger brought martial-arts action to Marvel ROUGH STUFF . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .54 Pencil art rarities from Tom Ziuko’s vault FLASHBACK: Beware the Claws of Patsy Walker: The Hellcat Cometh . . . . . . . . . .61 Follow her purrr-gression from teen queen to heroine BACKSTAGE PASS: Each Man is a God: The Inside Story of the Pumaman . . . . . .68 Star Walter George Alton shares behind-the-scenes photos of this cult superhero movie FLASHBACK: Cult of Personalities: The Badger . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .71 This issue’s bonus beast, the Badger was America’s first “deconstructionist” hero BACK TALK . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .78 Reader feedback on “Family” issue #38 BACK ISSUE™ is published 8 times a year by TwoMorrows Publishing, 10407 Bedfordtown Drive, Raleigh, NC 27614. Michael Eury, Editor. John Morrow, Publisher. Editorial Office: BACK ISSUE, c/o Michael Eury, Editor, 118 Edgewood Avenue NE, Concord, NC 28025. E-mail: euryman@gmail.com. Eight-issue subscriptions: $60 Standard US, $85 Canada, $107 Surface International. Please send subscription orders and funds to TwoMorrows, NOT to the editorial office. Cover art by Joe Staton and Freddy Lopez. Catwoman TM & © DC Entertainment. All Rights Reserved. All characters are © their respective companies. All material © their creators unless otherwise noted. All editorial matter © 2010 Michael Eury and TwoMorrows Publishing. BACK ISSUE is a TM of TwoMorrows Publishing. ISSN 1932-6904. Printed in Canada. FIRST PRINTING.

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PROOFREADERS John Morrow and Eric Nolen-Weathington

John Schwirian

Leaping onto the comic-book racks and newsstands in 1978, Vixen quickly joined such luminaries as Firestorm and Steel as the latest sensation in the budding DC Explosion. As DC Comics’ first female African-American hero, Vixen shone as the newest superstar in DC’s Hall of Fame. Um, well, at least, that’s how the story might have been told, had Vixen #1 ever made it into publication. Unfortunately, circumstances arose that prevented the premiere of DC’s newest character, resulting in the cancellation of the series before the artists could even finish drawing the story. In the late 1970s, writer Gerry Conway was on fire, putting out one new title after another. Firestorm, Steel the Indestructible Man, Secret Society of Super-Villains, and more emerged from Conway’s fertile mind. And, according to the house advertisement appearing

in the November 1978 cover-dated offerings from DC Comics, The Vixen was about to strike back with the first issue scheduled to hit the stands on August 8, 1978. Unfortunately, the Vixen was defeated by the greatest DC villain of 1978—the DC Implosion! In the 1970s, Marvel Comics dominated in sales, and DC attempted to regain its former prominence by increasing the number of titles it put out each year. Unfortunately, blizzards in the winters of 1977 and 1978 disrupted the distribution of DC’s books. Sales dropped severely, and DC executives ordered the cancellation of nearly 30 existing and planned titles. Thus, the first Vixen story was banished to the pages of Cancelled Comics Cavalcade (an in-house collection of photocopied art pages from canceled titles distributed to DC employees), never to be seen by the majority of comics readers. Cat People Issue

Cat and Woman Joshua Middleton’s astounding cover art for the 2009 Vixen: Return of the Lion trade paperback. TM & © DC Entertainment.

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THE LADY IS A FOX!

Catty Woman (below) The splash page and (right) cover from the unpublished Vixen #1, as culled from the pages of DC’s Cancelled Comics Cavalcade, courtesy of Bill Alter. Art by Bob Oksner and Vince Colletta. TM & © DC Entertainment.

character who hadn’t been used in almost a decade, and I felt my take on So, who was the mysterious Vixen? the idea was different enough to According to her creator, Gerry make Vixen unique.” Conway, her genesis lay in the fact Yes, Vixen was indeed different that comic books were lacking in a from Animal Man. Where Animal specific area. “I wanted to write a Man gained his powers from black female superhero; other mysterious beings from another than Storm in X-Men, I don’t think planet, Vixen’s powers were granted there were any other notable ones by the Tantu Totem, a mystical artifact in the field at that time,” Conway from her African homeland. “I liked says. Knowing that she would be the idea of tying Vixen’s powers to an African-American woman, her heritage,” Conway clarifies, Conway kicked around several Gerry Conway “making her more than just another ideas for superpowers for his new ‘lucky accident’ kind of hero.” hero. “At the time, there were few With a concept firmly in place, it was time to start African-American female superheroes, so there wasn’t much chance of overlapping powers with fleshing out the details. Meet Marilyn McCabe, famous New York model other characters. Quite a few heroes had ‘animal’ powers—Spider-Man, for example, but I liked the and part owner in a fashion designer firm. In addition idea of a hero who’d have many different abilities to her career, Mari has friends—photographer Willie Lockman, business partner Peg, and publisher/ to draw on.” An African-American female superhero, now that boyfriend Solomon Samules. She’s sitting on top of was new, but animal powers? Didn’t DC already have the world and all is wonderful … that is, until she a hero with animal powers—Buddy Baker, a.k.a. sees a news report about the arrival at the United Animal Man, from Strange Adventures? “I was aware Nations building of President Manitoba of the of Animal Man,” Conway explains, “but that was a African nation of D’Mulla. The sight of this man brings back repressed and traumatic memories of Mari’s childhood. Born in Africa, she was orphaned at the age of eight and then adopted by a couple in the United States. Slowly, the memories return, memories of her father, C’Mellu Dantogi, a leader of his people who preached non-violent protest in their struggle for independence. But a soldier attacked their village, burning their huts and killing the people as he sought out Dantogi. Mari was taken to safety, where her father placed her in the care of Reverend Peak. From her shelter, she watched in horror as the

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John Wells

On a cool fall day in 1941, a stranger came upon a little boy crying on the sidewalk. It seems a bully swiped his comic book just as he’d been reading about the Golden Age Green Lantern. When the man confessed bewilderment at the name, the youngster explained that this was a man who put on a mask and costume and went out to fight bad guys. The stranger let that settle in for a moment, specifically the detail that GL’s get-up prevented him from being recognized. Whipping out a dollar bill (a veritable fortune in an era still recovering from the Great Depression), the man told the thunderstruck kid to buy himself a pile of comic books and walked off into the night. Ted Grant had believed all hope was lost that night, but a little boy inspired him toward a path that would change his life in ways he could never imagine. Ted had aspired to a career in public service since his youth, with an eye toward eventually becoming a doctor. Determined that his son not be a studious weakling as he had been, Henry Grant encouraged the boy’s participation in sports from an early age, and in college Ted found a particular proclivity for boxing. But times were tough and Henry’s death left Ted with no more financing for his education. Dropping out of school, the young man came under the wing of heavyweight champ “Socker” Smith and ended up with a boxing career of his own. The friendship ended in tragedy when Smith and Grant’s managers engineered a match between the two and then tried to fix the bout by placing a drugged needle in Ted’s glove that would knock out Socker. Instead, Smith died and his friend stood accused of murder. Fearing that Grant might accuse them, the managers ran the police car carrying the boxer into a gorge, but their target miraculously survived.

THE COMING OF WILDCAT

Taking his cue from Green Lantern, the fugitive boxer donned a black costume complete with a cat-head mask including floppy ears, a faux gray whiskered lip, and jowls hanging off each side of his jaw. Declaring himself Wildcat, this two-fisted mystery-man beat confessions out of the two managers in short order before surrendering to the police as Ted Grant. Created by writer Bill Finger (best known for co-creating Batman) and artist Irwin Hasen, Wildcat was the closing feature in Sensation Comics #1 (Jan. 1942), an issue most famously known for its introduction of the ongoing Wonder Woman series. If Wildcat resented being overshadowed by the Amazing Amazon, he never acknowledged it. Instead, Ted Grant persevered, becoming world heavyweight champion in #2 and finding love with Joan Fortune. Issue #4 introduced comic relief in the form of gangly, would-be detective (and later Ted’s manager) Hiram “Stretch” Skinner and, more enduringly, a means of transportation for the feline crimebuster. With handlebars jazzed up to resemble

Purr Box Detail from the Jim Aparo-drawn cover of The Brave and the Bold #118 (Apr. 1975), the Batman/Wildcat/Joker team-up. TM & © DC Entertainment.

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its rider’s mask, the Cat-O-Cycle became Wildcat’s ride of choice for the rest of the decade and far beyond. “Having gotten to know Irwin Hasen in the years since,” former DC Comics president Paul Levitz observes, “I realized that the original Wildcat stories probably had some of the first realistic ‘fight’ art— Irwin having been a sports cartoonist specializing in boxing before he came to comics.” By the time Wildcat solved “the mystery of Cell 17” in Sensation #90 (June 1949) and his original publication history ended, Wildcat had been fighting crime for seven years. He’d racked up a few recurring foes like the Yellow Wasp (#20, 25, 66) and a woman in a black-striped, yellow-fur costume known as the Huntress (#68–69, 71, 73, 75, 76). And he was even a member of the famed team of superheroes called the Justice Society of America for two issues (All Star Comics #24 and 27).

THE SILVER AGE WILDCAT

TM & © DC Entertainment.

Although Wildcat’s JSA connection had been more by accident than design—the consequence of a merger of DC Comics with sister publisher All-American— it was still enough to place him among the select group

of 1940s heroes that DC began reviving in the 1960s. In 1961, writer Gardner Fox conspired with editor Julius Schwartz to unite the modern incarnation of the Flash with the Golden Age version who ran around 20 years early. The story—which revealed that the earlier Flash and his JSA cohorts existed on a parallel world later dubbed Earth-Two—was a huge success, inspiring multiple sequels, a full-fledged JSA revival via annual summertime team-ups with the Justice League of America, and finally an effort to launch spin-off series featuring the older, wiser Society heroes in pairs such as Starman and Black Canary in The Brave and the Bold (B&B) #61–62. Fox and artist Murphy Anderson’s B&B #62 (Oct.–Nov. 1965) was notable for its revival of a certain Feline Fury in a guest-appearance. From Ted Grant’s perspective, it wasn’t a particularly proud moment. Retired both as undefeated heavyweight champion and a superhero, he was allowed a brief moment to shine but mostly sat out the issue as a hostage of the Huntress and missed out on her defeat altogether. This was a visually mellower Wildcat, reflecting the version of the character as he’d appeared in 1949 rather than Irwin Hasen’s original design. His costume was now blue with black highlights, the claws had disappeared from his boots, the jowls had vanished from his mask, and the ears on his hood were stiff points that resembled nothing so much as Batman’s cowl. It was fitting, then, that Wildcat was tapped to appear in the 1966 and 1967 Justice Society team-ups in Justice League of America #46–47 and 55–56 that were published at the height of the media frenzy involving the white-hot Batman TV show. Fan-turned-pro writer Mike Friedrich tapped into a gray-at-the-temples Ted Grant’s insecurities in The Spectre #3 (Mar.–Apr. 1968), devoting fully half of the ghostly title character’s comic book to Wildcat’s growing frustration over the effect that age and retirement had taken on his fighting prowess. The capper was an attack by a cosmically empowered minor crook who found that he could literally control the hero’s every move and subjected him to a humiliating defeat before a crowd at a boxing match. The Spectre stepped in to defeat the “mystic mastermind,” but Ted was left feeling like a has-been. Losing the ability to fight effectively had, from the Ghostly Guardian’s perspective, created a void in both Grant’s and Wildcat’s lives. Hoping to stem his teammate’s depression, the Spectre suggested Ted become a mentor. Opening Grant’s Gym in his hometown of Knickerbocker City, Ted began instructing kids in self-defense and boxing, slowly regaining his old confidence and enthusiasm in the process. While reader reaction to the youthful Friedrich’s story was mixed, the dynamic neo-realism of Neal Adams’ art was greeted with wild acclaim. The story reverted back to Wildcat’s original costume design with greater balance of black and blue and a more rounded mask that returned its jowls and droopy ears.

Groomed for a Comeback Neal Adams’ photorealistic art helped bring Wildcat to life in the pages of The Spectre #3 (Mar.–Apr. 1968). TM & © DC Entertainment.

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For people of a certain age, the sight of a stylized silhouette of a black panther’s head against a red circle brings with it an almost uncontrollable urge to utter one of the most memorable battle cries, pulled from memories of 1980s cartoon watching. “Thunder … Thunder … ThunderCats HO!!”

THUNDERCATS, THE TV SERIES

ThunderCats featured a band of humanoid feline warriors fighting for survival on an new planet, the not-soimaginatively named Third Earth, following the destruction of their home planet, Thundera. The series mixed many aspects of science fiction and fantasy along with some familiar comic-book and mythology tropes, and this mix of influences undoubtedly helped its popularity. The level of animation was considered high quality for the time (although it doesn’t really stand up to a repeat viewing 20-plus years later), with the opening sequence and its memorable theme song being a particular standout. Central to the series’ ongoing themes was the struggles of the youngest surviving ThunderCat, Lion-O, to come to terms with his role and responsibility as the group’s hereditary leader, an Arthurian parallel that added yet another layer to what on the surface appeared to be simple kids’ cartoons. The series was created by a prolific inventor named Ted Wolf, in his only screenwriting credit, who saw it as a morality play with human characters in strange feline bodies. After Wolf’s pitch was picked up, the concept was passed to veteran comics and animation writer Leonard Starr to develop for TV production. The series, produced by the Rankin/Bass animation studios, debuted with an hour-long special in January 1985 and was followed by a regular series starting in the following September, and would eventually run for a total of 130 episodes over four seasons as well as a TV movie, until being canceled in 1990. ThunderCats is unusual for animated shows of that period in that it actually had a defined end to the series that brought the whole story arc full circle. Most people’s memories of the series tend to revolve around the 65-episode first season (subsequent seasons were short by comparison with “only” 20 episodes each), which featured the core cast of Lion-O; the fleet Cheetara; the strongman Panthero; the master of camouflage Tygra; the acrobatic twins WilyKat and WilyKit; the obligatory 1980s cartoon comic-relief character, the annoying Snarf; and the equally required ghostly mentor, Jaga. This band of warrior felines battled both their traditional enemies, the Mutants of Plundar, and Third Earth’s resident bad guy, the mummified sorcerer Mumm-Ra. The first season, as well as having the most episodes, was the only season to feature any real sense of continuity with an ongoing arc rather than just a sequence of self-contained single-episode adventures. Key to all these adventures was Lion-O’s magic sword (more Arthurian overtones), the “Sword of Omens,” which as well as giving the bearer the ability to glimpse the short-term future, or “the power of sight beyond sight” as the series termed it, also, in a not-so-subtle Freudian undertone, grew at times of danger and projected a searchlight beam topped by the sigil mentioned at the opening of this article. It was a device designed to alert or summon the heroes in a Gotham–like rallying beacon.

Alan J. Porter

Lion-O Says, “ThunderCats HO!” Detail from the cover of Marvel/Star Comics’ ThunderCats #1 (Dec. 1985). Art by Jim Mooney and Brett Breeding. Special thanks to Andy Mangels for this article’s images. © 1985 Lorimar Telepictures/Marvel Comics Group.

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THUNDERCATS, THE COMICS SERIES

The series’ debut on TV was accompanied by a ThunderCats comic-book series from Marvel under its Star Comics imprint. The Star Comics line was Marvel’s attempt at winning back the elusive young readership by publishing titles that were primarily adaptations of children’s animated TV series or tie-ins to popular toy lines. The line was overseen by Tom DeFalco (who would also script a few of the ThunderCats stories), and over the course of its four-year existence published 33 different titles ranging from ALF to Wally the Wizard by way of Care Bears and Star Wars: Ewoks. One-time Star Comics and ThunderCats editor Mike Carlin recalls, “I’m sure a Star Comic of one or another series is a lot of folks’ first comic, but the line probably didn’t alter the general comics readership that much, or it might have been around for longer than four years. Those first-timers would probably have read another comic eventually. The original stuff didn’t really click big, and much of the licensed stuff (like ThunderCats) was limited to the life of the source material. “Unfortunately, readers and retailers complain that there aren’t enough comics for younger readers, but whenever Marvel or DC produces titles with that audience in mind the sales figures simply don’t compare with the sales on the ‘real’ comics. I suspect kids always want what their older siblings and friends are getting and deem the kids stuff for babies. Perhaps if Transformers or G. I. Joe was a part of the Star Comics line at the time they all would have faired better, or maybe the Transformers and G. I. Joe would’ve also suffered from the same ‘Baby Comics syndrome.’” The first issue of Stars Comics’ ThunderCats title was cover-dated Dec. 1985, and was a direct adaptation of the TV show pilot episode. However, it would appear that the comics series had already been in development for a while. In the letters page, in response to a complaint from a young fan that the early issues were inconsistent with the show, then-editor Mike Carlin mentions that several stories had been written and drawn before the show aired, and were based on concept drawings rather than the on-screen designs. Talking about the ThunderCats in a recent interview with the author, Carlin expands on his letters column note: “On books like this, the editorial team and writers and artists usually work from a series bible. But even the most detailed bible is merely a starting point. Shows veer from their own blueprints, and by the time ‘licensees’ hear of changes it’s usually too late to match exactly! We were probably six months ahead from writing stories to on-sale dates … so we were lucky to even have a videotape (and luckier for the writers and artists to even have VCRs to play them on that early in the game!) before watching episodes on the air.” The comics series followed the general feel of the TV show’s first season, and was perhaps the most “adult” of the Star Comics line, being closer in tone to Marvel’s traditional superhero titles. The ThunderCats book is often referred to as the best quality book of the Star line in terms of both storytelling and art. “Our desire was to emulate the TV series,” explains Carlin, “which wasn’t quite as heavy as a regular Marvel Comic but it was definitely serious and with more at stake than whether or not Planet Terry had birthday cake or whatever they were up to there. The He-Man [and the Masters of the Universe Star] series was more heroicadventure as well, but with clear comic relief coming from the cartoons’ established ‘lighter characters.’”

Three Times as Ugly (left) Giant-size Mumm-Ra attacks the crusading clowder on the cover to ThunderCats #6 (Oct. 1986). (above) Page 6 of #issue 1, scripted by David Michelinie with art by Mooney and Breeding. © 1985 and 1986 Lorimar Telepictures/Marvel Comics Group.

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Mark Arnold

Josie started out as an answer to the already-popular Archie series. The character of Josie was created by Dan DeCarlo, who christened the character after his wife, ® Josie DeCarlo, who claimed the inspiration for the fictional Josie: “We went on a Caribbean cruise, and I had a [cat] costume for the cruise, and that’s the way it started.” Josie’s initial adventures were fairly straightforward. It was not until Josie donned cat ears and formed a musical trio with her friends Valerie and Melody that they became the iconic Josie and the Pussycats. Josie as a character premiered in Archie’s Pals ’n’ Gals #23 (Dec.1962), but nothing on the cover indicated this debut and it was just a standard backup story. Josie as a comic book debuted shortly thereafter, coverdated Feb. 1963, but the character was created as far back as 1958. DeCarlo spent several years trying to sell Josie as a syndicated newspaper comic strip, but having no success, he ultimately sold it to Archie. In Dan DeCarlo’s final interview with R. J. Carter, from late 2001, DeCarlo explained the origins of the other characters: “I submitted the Josie strip to [newspaper] publishers and [they] sent it back and said, ‘It’s not what we’re looking for, Dan, but keep up the good work,’ or words of that kind. “Then is when I decided to take it to Archie to see if they could do it as a comic book. I showed it to Richard Goldwater, and he showed it to his father, and a day or two later I got the okay to do it as a comic book. “When they agreed to make it a comic book— because I only had six dailies, and there was just Josie, Melody, and Pepper, the three girls. Then I submitted a model sheet, and I designed all the other characters. I designed Albert; I designed the big, hulking guy (not Alan M.—he came later). “I designed all the characters, anyway, and Frank Doyle was doing all the writing. I didn’t have any more input on what direction they were going to go with Josie.” The success of the group did a few things. First, the title of the Josie comic book changed from She’s Josie to Josie and the Pussycats beginning with the 45th issue. Second, it prompted Archie Comics to create bands for their other titles josie de carlo including the Bingoes for That Wilkin Boy, the Madhouse Glads for Archie’s Madhouse (which was also renamed Madhouse Glads), and, of course, the Archies. [Editor’s note: For more on the Archies, see Mark

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Thrilling Adventure Stories (Feb. 1975), like many an Atlas/Seaboard series, only lasted two issues. But the first issue introduced us to a character which, if you’ve seen him, for better or for worse (mostly worse), you will never forget him: a ludicrous, slapdash-dressed crimefighter called Tiger-Man. Tiger-Man’s saving grace? Half the time, he was drawn by Ernie Colón; the other half, Steve Ditko.

ENTER THE TIGER-MAN

Written by Jonah Hex co-creator John Albano and drawn by Colón, “Tiger-Man and the Flesh Peddlers,” as you can guess from the story’s title, is a couple of notches grittier, grimier, less inhibited than the forthcoming Comic Code–approved standard comic-book spin-off advertised at tale’s end. In this magazine format, Tiger-Man stalks the underworld with eye-gouging, throat-slashing ferocity. “The violence was a reader-grabber, as most pop violence is––movies or TV or whatever,” says Colón, who also penciled Tiger-Man #1 (in which he and writer Gabriel Levy were uncredited). “Personally, I liked working on [Atlas Comics’] The Grim Ghost better. It seemed a little more brainy, more thoughtful.” Colón turned in an uncluttered, well-told inaugural story with his sketchy characters bursting out of the confines of their panels: the black boot legs of a dead prostitute, the legs of a lifeless thug drained of life by the Tiger-Man, listlessly hanging out of the panels. A thug gets punched out so hard by the wildcat superhero, he flies back beyond the panel’s borders. Within the magazine, “Flesh Peddlers” appeared in good company, published in an issue which contained the Nazi camp breakout piece “Escape from Nine by One” by Russ Heath, the Frank Thornedrawn “Lawrence of Arabia,” and Jack Sparling’s “Kromag the Killer.” (The mag also included an article hyping Warner Bros.’ then-upcoming Doc Savage movie.) Not an origin story, “Flesh Peddlers” finds Tiger-Man on the trail of the prostitution ring overlord Hecht, the fat cat behind a rash of killings, including Tiger-Man’s sister. Tiger-Man brutally wrings information out of Hecht’s thugs to get to the crimelord himself. Once at Hecht’s mansion, he violently dispatches the mansion’s security guards. The superhero evades explosions with the alacrity of a cheetah and the fury of “a frenzied demon” (Hecht’s words). When Tiger-Man finally reaches him within his estate, Hecht backs up in fear and falls into a pool of piranha. Concludes Tiger-Man: “It’s strange how the forces that govern men’s destinies. On your end, Mr. Hecht, you fed off the flesh of others and now … those tiny cannibals can feed off your flesh.” Revenge exacted with EC Comics-worthy irony. End of story.

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Michael Aushenker

EARNING HIS STRIPES

After a grotesquely violent debut in the magazine Thrilling Adventure, Tiger-Man #1 (Apr. 1975) arrived, in standard color comic-book format. In Tiger-Man #1, Dr. Lancaster Hill (partially named after actor Burt Lancaster) isolates the tiger chromosome while encamped at an African village. In an effort not to lose a life (or his medical license) with his experiment, Hill injects himself … with obvious results. Soon, he can kill a tiger with his bare hands, and an African chief (alternately referred to as Chief “Junka” and “Jnuka”) gives Hill a costume fashioned from the very beast Hill had snuffed. Clearly, Chief Junka or Jnuka never majored in fashion design, and the piss-poor outfit–– a tiger mask-and-unitard combo (anticipating the movie Flashdance, he appears to wear tiger-striped leg-warmers)––is the hardest element of Tiger-Man to overcome. Even in the superhero genre, where suspension of disbelief is routine, Tiger-Man is a hard pill to swallow, looking as downright dopey as his name. And so, dressed like a cast member of the Broadway musical Cats, Dr. Hill experiences his first test as a newly minted crimefighter when a pair of rodeo cowboy scum (!!) slays his sister, Anna Hill. With his garbage costume and his tiger-scent powers, he tracks the killers down and lays some feline smackdown on ’em. Tiger-Man #1, as rendered by Colón in an impressionistic realism that combined early-Moon Knight Bill Sienkiewicz with Spectacular Spider-Man-era Sal Buscema, rises above what would otherwise be a rote revenge tale (with its garden-variety origin) and transcends most of the snoozy books released by Atlas.

ONE COOL CAT: STEVE DITKO

For many, the Tiger-Man journey truly begins with issue #2 (June 1975) and ends with #3 (Sept. 1975), a pair of issues scripted by Gerry Conway that is worth discussing for two reasons only: “Steve” and “Ditko.”

Does Whatever a Tiger Can

As Ditko comes aboard with Tiger-Man #2, the series abandons Colón’s semi-realism, and Ditko’s inimitable style, with its surreal edge, takes over. Whereas Colón’s Tiger-Man looks like a man with a mask, Ditko’s appears organic and anthropomorphic. Many of #2’s pages conform to that meticulous Ditko grid, as the master artist tells his story cleanly and intensely, panel by panel, the action almost animated. Issue #2, “Stalker in a Concrete Jungle,” pits Tiger-Man against his first supervillain. As Ditko presumably designed Blue Leopard, the antagonist’s costume looks better than the series’ protagonist, although it’s a throwback to the camp era of Batman. In “Stalker,” what starts out as a crook ring bust-up leads to Professor Anderson Hobart, who supplied the criminals with high-tech suits of armor. Suddenly, the Blue Leopard materializes to assault Tiger-Man. He has arrived all the way from Africa to seek vengeance against Dr. Hill for crimes related to his visit in issue #1 on behalf of Na’ Bantu, witch doctor of the village in Zambia. According to Blue Leopard, more than Cat People Issue

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Jim Kingman

1) CATWOMAN’S A VILLAINESS, SHE CAN’T GET NO REFORMATION

“I don’t want to sound egotistical, Robin—but I’ve come to the conclusion that Catwoman is in love with me!” – Batman, the World’s Greatest Detective “Of course she is! Everybody knows that—but you!” – Robin, no slouch at deducing the obvious, either

The above revelatory exchange between two renowned crimefighters in Batman #197 (Dec. 1967) focused on but one of the emotional conflicts, spanning over 20 years, between Selina (Catwoman) Kyle and the man/men of her affections, Bruce (Batman) Wayne. Theirs was a romance compounded by contradictions and connections, mysteries and secrets, commitments and betrayals, tension and tragedy, and punctuated by doses of madness, magic, and science fiction to often resolve matters or muck up their relationship even further. After Catwoman’s male-bashing, mensmashing escapade in Batman #210 (Mar. 1969), wherein she donned a new, hip-for-then blue bodysuit costume complete with bouncy cat tail and a shorter hair style, Selina decided to stay clear of Batman and pursued criminal activity outside of Gotham City. As chronicled by writer Denny O’ Neil, she crossed paths with Black Canary (Adventure Comics #418–419, Apr.–May 1972) and Diana Prince, Wonder Woman (Wonder Woman #201–202, July–Aug. and Sept.–Oct. 1972) before returning to Gotham, disguised as a tiger trainer to infiltrate a circus she felt was abusing a tiger (Batman #256, May–June 1974). While she encountered Batman during this exploit, the Caped Crusader was investigating a murder and not seeking her. When the murder was solved and the tiger freed from captivity, Selina’s personality, for the first time in years, had been given some depth. Batman pointed out to Robin that Selina caused “evil,” even when she didn’t intend to. Selina had always been an adventuress and a thrillseeker and had chosen villainy as the best route to pursue those desires. She was equal parts compulsive and independent, stubborn and devoted only to herself, but she also had,

Can Catwoman Change Her Stripes? A gorgeous 1989 specialty piece by the legendary Gray Morrow (for more of the late Mr. Morrow, join us in two issues for our Vigilante article). Special thanks to Heritage Comics Auctions (www.ha.com) for the art. TM & © DC Entertainment.

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Friskies Irv Novick’s original cover art for Batman #324 (Mar. 1969, courtesy of Heritage) was rejected for Neal Adams’ revision of the same pose (inset). TM & © DC Entertainment.

as revealed in this story, her sentimental, caring side. She was arguably the most human of all of Batman’s Rogues’ Gallery. In Batman #266 (Aug. 1975), also written by O’Neil, Catwoman donned her classic cat-eared cowl, purple dress, and green cape and continued her villainous ways, although it was becoming clear with each successive exploit during the 1970s that her reputation was fading. Supporting roles in The Joker #9 (Sept.–Oct. 1976) and Robin’s first full-length “novel” (Batman Family #8, Nov.–Dec. 1976) were confirmation of this, and when she stepped completely out of character and became a killer in Bob Haney and Jim Aparo’s notorious The Brave and the Bold #131 (Dec. 1976), also going so far as plotting to kill Batman, it was apparent her popular glow had severely dimmed. Even a thirst for attention and brief change of identity in Batman #291 (Sept. 1977) didn’t help matters. What saved Selina Kyle, and possibly led to her reformation, was a violent encounter with a woman not of her Earth, hence the science-fiction element.

2) WHAT MAY HAVE CAUSED SELINA’S REFORMATION

It was revealed in the classic origin of the Huntress, “From Each Ending … a Beginning” by writer Paul Levitz and artists Joe Staton and Bob Layton and published in DC Super-Stars #17 (Nov.–Dec. 1977), that the Catwoman of Earth-Two, a parallel world where DC’s Golden Age superheroes and villains resided, married Bruce (Batman) Wayne, and they had a daughter together, Helena, who would years later become the Huntress. Months later, in The Batman Family #17’s “Horoscopes of Crime” (Apr.–May 1978), written by Bob Rozakis and illustrated by Don Heck and Bob Wiacek, the Huntress visited Earth-One and encountered Catwoman. The results of this face-off, I’m positing, would be huge, and affect Selina’s life for years to come, although she would never speak of it out loud or think it for the reader’s benefit in any thought balloon. During her brutal catfight with Selina, the Huntress couldn’t help but feel she was battling her own mother. Overcoming her hesitation, she delivered to Catwoman a knockout punch. As Selina collapsed to the ground, the Huntress said, “Maybe someday you’ll reform like my mother did—but until then, you’re just another criminal!” What if Selina heard this statement before she fell into unconsciousness, and later did some detective work, obviously inspired by the Batman, and eventually learned that on a parallel Earth, her counterpart had given up crime, married Batman, and had with him a daughter! Wouldn’t that be motivation enough for her to reform? Of course, because in her next appearance, Detective Comics #479 (Sept.–Oct. 1978), she had reformed!

27 Lives Between Them Detail from the back cover of Who’s Who in the DC Universe #4 (June 1985), depicting the Catwomen of Earths-One and Two, as well as Cat-Man. Art by George Pérez. TM & © DC Entertainment.

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Jason Shayer

There are villains that you love to hate, villains that are plot-device punching bags, and villains you truly sympathize with. Felicia Hardy, the Black Cat, is one of the latter. Classifying her as a villain is a bit of a misnomer, though. While she’s broken the law as a cat burglar, Felicia is more of a self-absorbed rogue than your typical Spider-Man villain. Throughout the Spider-Man titles of the 1980s, the Black Cat’s life became intertwined with Spider-Man’s. As with all good characters, she was defined by her weaknesses and flaws and how she dealt with them. Her all-too-human side was no better portrayed through her efforts to cope with a variety of psychological issues. To properly understand who the Black Cat is, let’s start at the beginning and explore the forces that shaped her.

ORIGIN

The Black Cat pounced on to the scene in the pages of The Amazing Spider-Man #194 (July 1979). Classic 1970s artist Dave Cockrum provided the initial design for the Black Cat, bringing her to life in a voluptuous, fur-lined, skin-tight costume and collar. While Felicia Hardy’s costumed feline persona might remind you of DC’s notable cat burglar, Catwoman, Felicia is her own woman. While they share some obvious characteristics, such as being thieves and deriving pleasure from playing cat-andmouse games with superheroes, the Catwoman actually wasn’t the inspiration for the Black Cat. “Oddly, I hadn’t even thought of Catwoman,” creator Marv Wolfman admits. “If I had, I wouldn’t have done it. I was watching a Tex Avery cartoon called ‘Bad Luck Blackie’ [about a cat] that caused bad luck to a pursuing dog and thought that would make for a great villainess for Spider-Woman, which was where I was going to use her.” “We did a cover (Spider-Woman #9, Dec. 1978), but before I wrote the story I decided to quit the book so I moved [Black Cat] over to Spider-Man. I made her more of an action character, where the Spider-Woman character was designed to be a mystery villainess, very 1940s in design and very noir in approach. You can see the original Spider-Woman cover in the letters column of the first Black Cat story [Amazing Spider-Man #194].”

Pounced and Bounced Keith Pollard and Bob McLeod’s cover to Amazing Spider-Man #194 (July 1979), premiering the Black Cat, was scrapped for the version in the inset, by Al Milgrom. © 2010 Marvel Characters, Inc.

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PARENTAL LOSS

Amazing Spider-Man #195 (Aug. 1979) provides us with some insight into what molded Felicia’s Black Cat persona. Felicia grew up believing that her father, Walter Hardy, a world-famous cat burglar, had died in a plane crash. Parental loss can leave a child, such as Felicia, with lingering doubts about their own self-worth. Children can cope with the loss of a parent by idealizing that person. From Fathers and Adolescents: Developmental and Clinical Perspectives, “The centrality of the father figure and a continuous need for the idealized father is evident even in cases where the father is not necessarily positive (…) even in cases where the father was absent or abusive, children exerted enormous efforts to preserve the ideal image. The negative image of the father may even be reconstructed into a positive and idealized figure.” In Felicia’s case, she over-identified with her absent father. She developed an idealized fantasy life and drove herself to emulate that fictional lifestyle. This coping mechanism allowed her to deal with this emotionally traumatic event. She learned everything she could about her father and was particularly interested in his criminal exploits. She used these elements to build her idealized fantasy. Later, Felicia learned that her mother had lied to her about her father’s death. Walter Hardy was in fact still alive, but in jail. She took a bold step, making her debut as the costumed Black Cat to break him out. An important facet of her idealized view of her father was how it altered her morality. Despite his criminal tendencies, in her eyes he could do no wrong and she applied that perspective to her own criminal actions.

She wasn’t afraid to cross the line into unlawful territory, and proved to be resourceful, recruiting a criminal crew to assist her in the jail break. However, things aren’t always as they seem. Her father’s jailbreak wasn’t motivated by any criminal intent or desire, but rather by love. It was only when she heard Walter was dying that she selflessly decided to break him out. She’s emotionally deeper than her flashy exterior might convey, and that’s what keeps the reader and Spider-Man so interested in her. What Felicia didn’t know was that her father was the one who wanted her to believe he had died in a plane crash. Walter didn’t want Felicia tainted by his lifestyle. Unfortunately, his efforts resulted in the exact opposite. Still deluded, she told her father that “you would have been proud of the way I trained (...) I perfected your every move. Learned your every trick.” Dr. Ayala M. Pines, in her book Romantic Jealousy: Understanding and Conquering the Shadow of Love, tells us an “internalized romantic image” is developed “very early in life, based on powerful experiences we had during childhood. Our parents and other adults involved in raising us influence the development of our romantic image in two ways: the way they express, or don’t express, love toward us; and the way they express, or don’t express, love toward each other.” Felicia’s carefree and thrill-seeking rogue persona is an internalized romantic image of her father. Her attraction to a masked adventurer, like Spider-Man, follows that romantic image. Similarly, you don’t have to look far down her relationship list to see that pattern: the Foreigner, Thomas Fireheart (the Puma), and even the heroic jock, Flash Thompson.

OBSESSIVE-COMPULSIVE?

The Black Cat returned almost a year later, in Amazing Spider-Man #204 (May 1980), when her criminal exploits once again caught Spider-Man’s attention. Her interest in Spider-Man escalated and bordered on obsessive-compulsive as she stole a variety of loveinspired object d’art to add to her Spider-Man collection. In the following issue, when cornered by Spider-Man in her hideout, Felicia proudly displayed a shrine devoted to him. Spider-Man was caught off guard by her obsession. Looking at this development, it isn’t hard to conceive that her emotional balance was shattered by the death of her father. Her mother didn’t approve of her following in her father’s footsteps, so there was no doubt Felicia was carrying around a lot of emotional baggage. A reasonable way to deal with such stressors was to turn towards the only other person she looked up to. “I like the men in my life to be a little mysterious!” Felicia remarked about SpiderMan in Amazing Spider-Man #194. How can you get more mysterious than a masked superhero? With her father dead, Spider-Man became a substitute father figure and new role model in the fictitious world she chose to wrap around herself. However, on another level, you can put together a theory that she was merely feigning her emotional issues to try and get out of having been caught. Former Spider-Man writer Roger Stern fills us in: “The Black Cat had already been shown to be clever and conniving, right up until the end of Amazing Spider-Man #205. That’s the issue where Spider-Man cornered Felicia in her lair, and discovered that she had a whole wall of photos devoted to him. He jumped to the conclusion that she had a psychotic obsession with him.

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“When three are called and stand as one … as one they’ll fight, their will be done … for each is born anew, the Tiger’s Son.” – Sons of the Tiger oath The Sons of the Tiger first appeared in The Deadly Hands of Kung Fu #1 (Apr. 1974). Deadly Hands was a black-and-white anthology magazine that attempted to capitalize on the kung-fu craze of the early 1970s, most notably captured in the song “Kung Fu Fighting.” The first issue, edited by Don McGregor, included the origin story of Shang-Chi, Master of Kung Fu, by Steve Englehart and Jim Starlin, a non-fiction feature on kung-fu film legend Bruce Lee, and even an amazing Bruce Lee cover by Neal Adams. Also featured in this first issue was a story about a three-man martial-arts team called the Sons of the Tiger. This feature was written by Gerry Conway, who at the time was in the middle of his instantly classic Amazing Spider-Man run, and drawn by Dick Giordano, who already had achieved fame as an editor at Charlton and DC and as an artist on Batman. Giordano explains how he received the assignment: “Someone from Marvel called and asked if I would be interested in doing the assignment. I don’t recall who called but it was most likely Gerry or Roy Thomas. I said I was interested and that I liked working on Gerry’s scripts. The script arrived by mail at my studio.” While Giordano created the look of the characters, he says that he and Conway didn’t do much back-andforth collaboration in creating the Sons of the Tiger. “We didn’t come up with the characters,” says Giordano. “Gerry did. We actually did very little work together on Sons of the Tiger. I lived and worked in Connecticut and Gerry in New York. The characters were fully realized in Gerry’s script, and I created the visuals for them. Artists and writers seldom get together and hash out concepts or characters together. “I liked Gerry, still do when we meet. I will always accept assignments, sight unseen, when written by writers that I have enjoyed working with in the past.”

Barroom Brawl White Tiger shows ’em who’s the top cat in this dynamite painted cover by Earl Norem from the black-and-white Marvel magazine Deadly Hands of Kung Fu #27 (Aug. 1976). Special thanks to Heritage Comics Auctions (www.ha.com) for the original art scan. © 2010 Marvel Characters, Inc.

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Bruce Buchanan

Working in a black-and-white magazine format presented its share of challenges and opportunities, as Giordano explains: “The page size is different—bigger—allowing for more room to spread out a drawing, and because there is no color, it is necessary for the artist to do additional rendering either by adding tonal values or rendering more heavily in ink. I chose the tone route because I had done some Dracula pages for Marvel in tone and enjoyed the experience. Other than that, the storytelling problems are about the same, as is the drawing skill set you bring to the table.” Giordano adds, “A side benefit of the B&W format magazines is that your work is reproduced bigger, looks better, and often is more dramatic, but this is just a show-off benefit!” The Sons of the Tiger returned to the pages of Deadly Hands in issue #3 (Aug. 1974), again with a story from Conway and Giordano. Conway worked with Don Perlin in the subsequent issue for a story entitled “Night of the Death-Dream.” The Sons of the Tiger got their first cover story in issue #6 (Nov. 1974), in a tale called “The Way of the Jackal” by Denny O’Neil (under the pseudonym of Jim Dennis) and a young, then-largely unknown artist named George Pérez. Marv Wolfman, the editor of the book, would later pair with Pérez on their now-legendary New Teen Titans run. Even at the time of “Sons of the Tiger,” Wolfman knew Pérez was something special, as he told BACK ISSUE back in this magazine’s first-ever issue: “You can teach perspective, you can teach anatomy, you can teach all that stuff, and a good artist is going to learn that fairly quickly, once they get a steady diet of work,” Wolfman said. “But, boy, there are people who have been in the business 30 years who still don’t know how to tell a story, and George had that from Day One.” In all, the Sons of the Tiger appeared in of 21 the 33 issues of The Deadly Hands of Kung Fu. Many of these stories were written by workhorse Marvel writer Bill Mantlo, who often teamed with Pérez.

Eyes of the Tiger

MY THREE SONS

The Sons of the Tiger are Abe Brown, Bob Diamond, and Lin Sun. The three martial artists studied at the Tiger Dojo in San Francisco under Master Kee. One day, they return to the dojo to find that the place has been ransacked and Master Kee mortally wounded. Master Kee tells his disciples to open a box containing a set of jade tiger amulets—a tiger’s head and two tiger claws. These amulets give the three men increased power and martial-arts skill when they join hands and speak the above incantation. The three then set out to avenge their master and defeat the Silent Ones, an evil underground sect that murdered Master Kee. The Silent Ones are a mystical race of beings bent on world domination. All was going well for the Sons of the Tiger—until a woman came between then. The beautiful and dangerous Lotus Shinchuko showed up out of nowhere in Deadly Hands #8 (Jan. 1975) to help the boys in a fight with the Silent Ones. She explains she had escaped from the Silent Ones, but it turns out she really was still under their mental control and turns against the Sons of the Tiger. However, once the Sons remove the mind-control device from her neck, she truly joins the team and helps them destroy the Silent Ones once and for all. Along the way, Lotus and Bob Diamond become lovers. Cat People Issue

(left) Early George Pérez art on a Sons of the Tiger pinup. (above) Artist Dick Giordano’s textured art enlivened this Sons page from the black-and-white Deadly Hands of Kung Fu #1 (Apr. 1974). © 2010 Marvel Characters, Inc.

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With this issue’s “Rough Stuff” we celebrate our furry, feline friends—both two- and four-legged. Didja ever notice that most characters associated with cats are usually of the villainous sort? Oh, sure, you’ll have the the occasional Felix the Cat or Wildcat, but for the most part, if there’s a cat involved, there’s sure to be trouble ahead. Take this nasty fellow, for instance—Mr. Jinks. He’s the bane of Pixie and Dixie’s existence, but not exactly the brightest bulb in the box. Here we have some preliminary pencil art for a Hanna-Barbera VHS collection of episodes by the wonderfully talented Len Smith.

To m Z i u k o

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This is a great example of the awesome cover pencils of the King, from later in his career—Jack Kirby’s take on Tigra, the Were-Woman [in Marvel Chillers #7, Oct. 1976], locked in battle with one of the Fantastic Four’s deadliest enemies, the Super-Skrull. TM & © 2010 Marvel Characters, Inc.

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“It’s not the sight they expect to see! The rumpled girl in the borrowed costume is gone! Crouched in her place, claws gleaming in the feeble lamplight, is a far more impressive form … a far more sinister form. Even Iron Man catches his breath.” With the preceding words from The Avengers #144 (Feb. 1977), Captain America, Iron Man, and the readership of The Avengers were introduced to the Hellcat, Marvel Comics’ latest attempt to create a strong, independent female character who reflected the attitudes of and toward women in the 1970s.

TEEN QUEEN TIPTOES INTO THE MARVEL UNIVERSE

Jonathan Miller

It was not the sight anyone had “expected to see.” Author Steve Englehart had taken 1940s teen-romance queen Patsy Walker and had her step into the role of the Cat, an ill-fated character that had debuted in her own title in 1974, which was subsequently canceled after only four issues. Despite having starred in her own title and numerous others for more than 20 years (see inset), Patsy Walker was probably unfamiliar to readers of superhero comics, coming from the world of romance (read: girls’) comics, and never theretofore had the two met. She was an unlikely candidate to become an action hero, but in two concurrent plotlines that had Marvel’s prestigious superteam meet the company’s greatest Western stars in addition to the former queen of its romance line, Englehart blurred the distinctions between genres and expanded the bounds of the Marvel Universe. Patsy and her best friend and erstwhile co-star Hedy Wolfe— Veronica to her Betty—made a cameo appearance as spectators at the wedding of Reed Richards to Sue Storm in 1963’s Fantastic Four Annual #3, establishing that they were part of the same continuity as the immensely popular line of superhero titles that ushered in the extinction of the genre the girls belonged to. Such a nod to the other types of entertainment the company produced was a knowing wink reminding readers that, whatever the style or subject matter, comic books were all essentially just lighthearted entertainment, not to be taken too seriously, and that regardless of one’s respective preference for talking animals, teen angst, or fantastic adventures, it did not exclude the enjoyment of the rest. Englehart took the idea one step further when he added Patsy to the supporting cast of Amazing Adventures with issue #13 (July 1972), in which the Beast, formerly of the X-Men, was appearing in an

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Here Comes Hellcat! (right) Writer Steve Englehart used the Beast’s feature in Amazing Adventures (panel here from #15) to inch Patsy Walker into the mainstream. (below) Hellcat’s big debut. © 2010 Marvel Characters, Inc.

ongoing feature. Questioned in connection with this article, the veteran author recalls that the girls’ walk-on in Fantastic Four “struck my fan’s eye by including her in the Marvel Universe (MU). So when I got my chance to do strange things in comics, I thought it would be cool to bring her in as a real character, with things to do. Part of my ‘training’ as a Marvel writer was writing romance stories and Westerns, but Patsy was defunct as a comic by the time I got there so I never wrote anything about her previous to ‘The Beast.’ Still, as a fan, I had collected everything Marvel, including Patsy Walker and Patsy and Hedy—toward the end of their runs, they had moved into a running soap opera, which I enjoyed—so I knew them as characters, and enjoyed exploring Patsy in the MU.” Although the Beast already had a love interest in his lab assistant, Linda Donaldson (who was, unfortunately, an operative of the Secret Empire), Patsy served as a feminine presence, a damsel in distress, albeit an intrepid one—equal parts Nancy Drew and Katy Keene. Patsy, now married to her former high-school sweetheart, Col. Buzz Baxter, also provided intrigue and melodrama, elements associated with romance comics, but truthfully an intrinsic part of the appeal of superhero titles, ever since the Marvel Age began with Fantastic Four #1. Things like Reed and Sue’s relationship problems, Spider-Man’s girl troubles, and Thor’s angst over his mortal love interest and conflicts with his father were what defined Marvel Comics and redefined the medium. Patsy’s inclusion in the world of superheroes demonstrated that the distinctions between the two genres were not so sharply defined after all.

FROM AMAZING ADVENTURES TO THE AVENGERS

When “The Beast” was replaced with another feature in Amazing Adventures, Englehart incorporated him into The Avengers, and Patsy soon followed. The one loose end from the earlier series Englehart seemed intent on tying up was a pact the two had formed after Patsy had discovered that the Beast’s other identity was Hank McCoy. The story in The Avengers revealed that Patsy had elicited a promise from the Beast in return for keeping his secret from her husband and his employers, the shady Brand Corporation: she had demanded that the Beast help her become a superheroine and he reluctantly had agreed to, despite having no practical way to accomplish such a feat. Englehart relates that he initially had no plans to turn Patsy into a superheroine, but that “my characters tend to write themselves, and pretty soon I knew she would want in on this game for real.” In The Avengers, the other heroes are somewhat bemused by Patsy, particularly after her enthusiasm gets the better of her and she attempts to aid them against their opponents, the Squadron Supreme, with disastrous results. When they later happen upon the Cat’s costume in the Brand Corporation’s facility, however, even the reluctant Captain America is persuaded by her girlish exuberance and naked idealism to allow Patsy to don it. As Patsy says in The Avengers #144 (Feb. 1977): “I’ve waited all my life for this moment! You couldn’t stop me with a team of wild horses!” In a sequence that relates Patsy’s history as a way of explaining her motivation, Englehart effectively married the disparate worlds of romance and superhero comics. Camp elements like a caption that attributes the design of Patsy’s wardrobe in one panel to a reader, referencing a popular gimmick in girls’ comics that

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In 1980, a brand new hero burst onto the scene. He had amazing powers, which he inherited from his ancestors, who, in turn, received them from the gods. He was also new to his role as a hero and inexperienced, resulting in as many mistakes as successes. No, this wasn’t some lost Stan Lee creation, descended from the mold of Spider-Man, nor was it television’s Greatest American Hero. It was the Pumaman, star of his own 1980 feature film. In this article, we’ll go behind the scenes of this minor camp classic via a brand new interview with the film’s star, Walter George Alton. We’ll investigate the stories behind the film’s production and most memorable moments, including the unforgettable flying scenes and the Pumaman’s unique costume, and even take a look at how the Pumaman has returned to the public consciousness. This is the inside story of The Pumaman.

BIRTH OF THE PUMAMAN

If you’ve never heard of the Pumaman, you probably shouldn’t be too surprised. After all, the Pumaman has only appeared once, in the eponymous 1980 film The Pumaman, starring relative newcomer Walter George Alton and cinematic luminary Donald Pleasence. The film began production in 1979 in Italy, where it is known as L’uomo puma, under the direction of Alberto De Martino. Influenced by Erich von Daniken’s 1968 book Chariot of the Gods and almost certainly inspired by the success of 1978’s Superman: The Movie, De Martino set out to write a screenplay about a superhero who was granted his powers by an ancient alien race that had once posed as South American gods. According to the film’s introduction, “An ancient Aztec legend tells of a god who descended from the stars at the dawn of time and became the father of the first Pumaman.” Seemingly divine powers were then passed down through the generations from father to son, giving rise to the film’s rather nifty mantra, “Each man is a god. Each man is free.” In De Martino’s story, palentologist Tony Farms, the modern Pumaman, has no knowledge of his celestial lineage. Thus, when the evil Kobras attempts to use a golden mask, left behind by those same aliens, to take over the world, Tony finds himself in over his head, desperately trying to master his newfound powers in time to defeat the madman. While the story had the promise of a genuine superheroic epic in the mighty Marvel mold, a muddled script and low budget unfortunately got in the way of the film’s heady ideas about gods, aliens, and men, and even undermined the possibilities of the unsure, rookie-superhero plot that, for decades, had worked so well in the pages of The Amazing Spider-Man—and which, shortly thereafter, would also prove a rousing success on the small screen with The Greatest American Hero. Still, seen as a camp superhero adventure, more in the vein of Adam West than Christopher Reeve, The Pumaman is actually pretty entertaining. The film’s star, Walter George Alton, puts it nicely, saying, “In a way, the movie was kind of a camp movie, not really a spoof, but a fun, crazy movie about an Italian superhero guy.”

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Eric Houston

Scott E. Williams

The 1980s—a decade of buzzwords and catchphrases. Movies gave us the “mockumentary,” a type of comedy in which part of the joke was pretending that what we were seeing was real. TV gave us “dramedy,” a type of show that fell between drama and comedy without fitting nicely into either niche. For comics in the 1980s, the word was “deconstruction.” French writer Jacques Derrida apparently coined the word in the 1960s, using it to describe a difficult-to-define system of exhaustively examining a writing, in order to determine its various meanings. For Derrida, deconstruction was a means to an end— the end being showing that nothing had absolute meaning. In comics, the word came to represent an approach that would examine what motivates heroes and how their antics would play out on a world more realistic than the one Silver Age heroes had occupied. Two seminal works of the 1980s—Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons’ Watchmen and Frank Miller’s Batman: The Dark Knight Returns—would come to embody this approach. However, in Wisconsin, one American hero had beaten them to the punch. Moore’s Marvelman explored the real-world effect of a Superman–like character in a non-super world, starting in 1982, in Britain’s Warrior comics anthology. The character did not appear stateside until 1985, as Miracleman, published by Eclipse Comics. By the time Miracleman had debuted in the USA, the Badger had been kicking butts and deconstructing the superhero for two years.

“HE’D HAVE TO BE CRAZY”

Initially published by Capital Comics, The Badger (inset) was a follow-up to Nexus, Capital’s science-fiction book about a man with vast powers who must use those powers to execute mass-murderers, regardless of mitigating circumstances. The ensuing examinations of complex moral choices and the consequences thereof rendered Nexus a successful and critically acclaimed comic. In 1983, Nexus co-creator (with artist extraordinaire Steve Rude) Mike Baron had an idea for a new book, one that would ask, “What would motivate a man to put on a colorful costume and fight crime?” Baron’s answer inspired The Badger, a book that would enjoy a 70-issue run, an oversized graphic novel, a four-issue miniseries, and a 1991 one-shot. “All the elements that made The Badger came together from a lot of different angles,” Baron says. “The first was that very question—why would someone

Crazy Cat Detail from Steve Rude’s cover art to The Badger #32 (Feb. 1988). Unless otherwise noted, Badger scans in this article are courtesy of Jim Sukman. Badger TM & © Mike Baron.

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BADGER’S CELEBRITY FRIENDS The Badger suffered not only from multiple-personality disorder, but also hallucinations. Specifically, he saw the ghosts of dead celebrities. Sometimes, these spirits offered helpful advice, and sometimes, they just seemingly wanted to chat. Other characters seemed oddly reminiscent of real-world newsmakers. Still others might only have existed in popular myths (aside from The Badger). Some of the luminaries who visited with Badger: Warren Oates. The star of Bring Me the Head of Alfredo Garcia was Badger’s most frequent ghostly visitor, starting in The Badger #9 (Jan. 1986). In that issue, Oates helps Badger locate a pair of runaway panthers running loose in a mall. Badger is trying to rescue the animals but gets distracted in a pet shop by fish. As Badger screams, “You fish are stupid, you know that? Stupid!” at the fish, Oates advises Badger to stop that and head over to Radio Shack. There, Badger manages to rescue one of the panthers, the other one having been shot by police. John Wayne. When Badger decides in The Badger #14 (June 1986) to seek vengeance for a snake, against a San Francisco chef making snake-bile cognac, the Duke smacks some sense into Badger, pointing out that Chef Herbert Ng is more honorable than the serpent Badger purports to represent. A very Hulk Hogan–like pro wrestler named Killdozer battled Badger in The Badger #25 (July 1987). Oates and W. C. Fields show up in The Badger #29’s (Nov. 1987) multidimensional romp.

Badger battles furriers and the Dire Wolf (from the Grateful Dead song of the same name) in The Badger #36 (June 1988). When a beer-shilling pit bull (think Spuds McKenzie) is framed for murder in The Badger #39 (Sept. 1988), Badger must clear his name. Paul Bunyan. Bunyan and Badger combined forces in The Badger #42 (Dec. 1988), to track down an arsonist setting forest fires, although sparks flew between Babe the Blue Ox and Lamont, Badger’s ninja-trained buffalo. Badger takes on a Ted Turner-ish media tycoon named Morris Meyer, who is intent on colorizing every classic movie he can get his hands on, in The Badger #55 (Jan. 1990). Ham’s rivalry with mogul Donald Trump appears periodically through the book’s last years. Daisy’s completion and publication of her book on the Badger earns her in The Badger #69 (Mar. 1991) a slot on a late-night talk show that might give déjà vu to 1980s viewers of the Arsenio Hall Show. When a TV-studio stylist gives our hero a swanky new ’do, he immediately phases into Max Swell, a more cultured, more effete personality. During Daisy’s interview, Max pats the leg of the next guest, and compliments him his “lovely coat.” Unfortunately, the next guest is a loud, foul-mouthed comedian named Sam (as in Kennison) in a bandana and trenchcoat. Sam lays a homophobic diatribe, only to drive Max offstage (or at least off-panel). Within seconds, Badger is flying into Sam’s teeth, feet-first, with a trademark salutation: “Greetings, from the land of beatings!”

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do this? The immediate answer was, ‘Well, he’d have to be crazy.’” With that, Baron knew he had his hook, as well as a way to mix in a character whose conception predated even Badger himself. When Baron and artist Jeff Butler had begun planning a new book, the first thing that they envisioned was a character who became a straight man (when needed) for Badger, but also a character with his own rich mythology. Ham the Weather Wizard was born. “Jeff didn’t want to do superheroes, so instead, we came up with an idea for a series about a fifth-century Druid wizard in modern times,” Baron says. “We put together six pages on him and gave them to Capital. Capital said no.” However, Butler insisted that the pages not go to waste, and the creators instead made them into a prologue in the first issue of The Badger. As the series opens, Ham himself is squaring off against a coalition of rival sorcerers, who zap him into a coma that would last until the 1980s. Ham ended up in a Wisconsin mental hospital. While case worker Daisy Fields thought he was a vegetable, the physically inactive Ham was actually communicating mentally with a man in the adjoining room. Ham’s neighbor was Norbert Sykes, a Vietnam veteran and former prisoner of war, who was suffering from multiple-personality disorder. One of Sykes’ personalities was the Badger, a self-styled defender of

Badger’s Crusade Norbert Sykes’ first dialogue, from The Badger #1 (Sept. 1983). Script by Mike Baron and art by Jeff Butler. Badger TM & © Mike Baron.

human dignity. Sykes had been committed to the hospital after an altercation in which the Badger had hospitalized four teenagers. But this was no ordinary superhero, and the evils he battled more greatly resembled things one could read about in a newspaper than in the pages of a superhero comic. The teens’ sin? In the first words the Badger/Sykes utters out loud in the comic, “Those boys were catching ducks with pieces of bread wadded up on fish hooks, hauling them to shore and stomping them to death.”

REAL-WORLD “EVILS”

As the series progressed, Badger periodically took on evils ranging from mundane-yet-annoying to truly awful. When publisher First Comics picked up the series with Badger #5 (May 1985), Baron (and new artist Bill Reinhold) offered a series recap, opening with the Badger’s campaign against evils great and small. One of that issue’s opening panels depicts Badger delivering a high kick to a man in a grocery store, while yelling, “Next time, fill out the godd*mned check before you get in line!” Baron says he enjoyed having a costumed hero who could pummel those with whose evils readers could identify. After all, most of us have never had to endure an invasion of shapeshifting aliens or a reservoir poisoned by a clown-faced psycho. By contrast, who hasn’t wanted to knock out the inconsiderate people smoking in non-smoking sections, people in theaters who talk during movies, or litterbugs? Every time the Badger bloodied one of these offenders’ noses, Baron was inviting readers a type of vicarious catharsis. “[Badger] started out by beating up my list of personal bitches about society,” Baron says. “What I quickly came to realize was that these complaints were almost universal. I think a lot of people got a kick out of seeing Badger combat everyday rudeness.”

And kicks were in great supply within the pages of The Badger, as Baron’s crazed hero was a martial-arts master. Proficient in countless disciplines, including shorin ryu (a Japanese martial art that focuses on fluid movement and flexibility), Badger had fights that looked like actual fights. While most superheroes battle in a series of actions that look like action poses, the portrayal of combat in the pages of The Badger always flowed from panel to panel in a way that conveyed how such battles would actually unfold. The unique approach deconstructed the action sequences that had been the lifeblood of many superhero titles. Baron, himself a second-degree black belt, says the realistic fights were important to his vision of the series. “It was something I was always striving for,” he says. “One of the things I wanted for The Badger was to show martial arts correctly within the pages of a comic, where the reader could actually see that we were not faking the techniques. I worked long and hard to choreograph those fights, because they had to be real.”

Cleaning Up the Streets (left) A montage from Badger #5 (May 1985), the first issue published by First Comics. (right) A 1984 Badger sketch by Bill Reinhold. Badger TM & © Mike Baron.

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