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Volume 1, Number 108 October 2018 EDITOR-IN-CHIEF Michael Eury PUBLISHER John Morrow

Comics’ Bronze Age and Beyond!

DESIGNER Rich Fowlks

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COVER ARTIST Eric Shanower (from the collection of John Schwirian; art © Eric Shanower) COVER COLORIST Glenn Whitmore COVER DESIGNER Michael Kronenberg PROOFREADER Rob Smentek

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BACKSEAT DRIVER: Editorial by Michael Eury. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2 OFF MY CHEST: Buried Treasure: Guest editorial by Rob Kelly. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3 One of comics’ most devoted Aquafans appeals to DC Comics FLASHBACK: Bronze Age Aquaman Team-Ups . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4 Does the Sea King play well with others?

GREATEST STORIES NEVER TOLD: The Intended Tale for Aquaman #57. . . . . . . . . . . . . 14 Green Arrow was headed to Aquaman’s mag before its cancellation THE TOY BOX: Bronze Age Aquaman Merchandise . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20 From Aquaman action figures to Underoos, check out these Sea King collectibles BRING ON THE BAD GUYS: Black Manta. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24 A villain history of the Marine Marvel’s malevolent adversary FLASHBACK: Changing Tides: The Post-Crisis Aquaman. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31 You’ve got to hand it to Arthur Curry for keeping his head above these roiling waters FLASHBACK: Aqualad: From Titan to Tempest. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .52 The purple-eyed hero’s murky metamorphosis from sidekick to sorcerer WHAT THE--?!: Seadragon . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 62 This little-known indie superhero comic was more fun than a barrel full of Sea-Monkeys BEYOND CAPES: Atlantis Chronicles . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 66 Peter David and Esteban Maroto revisit their DC fantasy series GREATEST STORIES NEVER TOLD: The Animated Aquaman Movie . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 76 Warner Bros. animator Tim Hauser discusses the Aqua-movie that wasn’t BACK IN PRINT. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 78 Aquaman: A Celebration of 75 Years BACK TALK . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 79 Reader reactions BACK ISSUE™ is published 8 times a year by TwoMorrows Publishing, 10407 Bedfordtown Drive, Raleigh, NC 27614. Michael Eury, Editor-in-Chief. John Morrow, Publisher. Editorial Office: BACK ISSUE, c/o Michael Eury, Editor-in-Chief, 118 Edgewood Avenue NE, Concord, NC 28025. Email: euryman@gmail.com. Eight-issue subscriptions: $76 Economy US, $125 International, $32 Digital. Please send subscription orders and funds to TwoMorrows, NOT to the editorial office. Cover art by and © Eric Shanower. Aquaman TM & © DC Comics.

All Rights Reserved. All characters are © their respective companies. All material © their creators unless otherwise noted. All editorial matter © 2018 Michael Eury and TwoMorrows. Printed in China. FIRST PRINTING.

Aquaman Issue • BACK ISSUE • 1

Aquaman commission by Neal Adams, courtesy of John Schwirian. Aquaman TM & © DC Comics.

SPECIAL THANKS David Michelinie Marc Buxton Dan Mishkin Jim Calafiore Jerome K. Moore Gary Cohn Richard Paolinelli Arthur Curry Martin Pasko Peter David John Schwirian DC Comics Eric Shanower Kevin Dooley Steve Skeates Steve Epting Anthony Snyder Tom Floyd Bryan D. Stroud Grand Comics John Trumbull Database Robert Greenberger John Wells Marv Wolfman Craig Hamilton Dennis Yee Tim Hauser Heritage Comics Auctions Dan Jurgens Rob Kelly Paul Kupperberg Erik Larsen Paul Levitz Esteban Maroto Shaun McLaughlin

There was this high school kid in North Carolina that pestered DC Comics editor Murray Boltinoff about Aquaman. In 1973, Aquaman—a founding member of the Justice League of America, who had, just a few years earlier, been the star of his own animated TV show—was one of the headliners of ABC-TV’s Saturday morning hit Super Friends but had all but vanished from the comics racks. His title had been cancelled for a few years and outside of a handful of token JLA appearances, it looked like DC had forgotten the Sea King.

This teenager had not. When in elementary school, he had watched Aquaman cartoons, read an Aquaman Big Little Book, and was gifted by Santa Claus an Aquaman uniform for his Captain Action figure (and an Aqualad one for Action Boy). And so, like clockwork after the release of every issue of the Batman team-up book The Brave and the Bold, this kid scrawled a longhand appeal or typed (on his mother’s electric Smith-Corona) a plaintive missive to Boltinoff, that comic’s editor, begging for the reappearance of Aquaman as a B&B guest star. Imagine his excitement when one day in his mailbox he discovered a postcard decorated with headshots of DC Comics superheroes and the following message penned by Murray Boltinoff himself (or an assistant): “Aquaman will return with Batman in B&B 114.”

Yes, that teen was me, and while that postcard has been swept away by a tsunami of four lives’ worth of keepsakes flooding my homestead, its message is still crystal clear. This was the first personal contact I, as a young fan, had received from DC Comics, and it had followed Boltinoff’s recent printing of an excerpt of a letter of mine in a “Brave and Bold Mailbag” (in issue #112), the first time my name (although back then it was Mickey Eury) appeared in a DC comic book.

Four short weeks after The Brave and the Bold #114, a three-issue Aquaman backup would begin in issue #435 of the bimonthly anthology Adventure Comics, short stories deliciously drawn by a new artist who would quickly become a fan-favorite: Mike Grell.

One month after Aquaman’s Adventure adventure, the previously delayed Secret Origins #7 arrived, its contents including the origin of the Sea King in a rare reprint of a Golden Age Aqua-tale. Aqua-fans anticipated that DC was testing the waters for the Sea King’s comeback, and they were right. Before long, Adventure’s lead feature, the Spectre, would disappear, and with issue #441, Aquaman would swim onto its cover for the beginning of an on again/off again series of stories that seemed to ebb and flow throughout the Bronze Age of Comics.

The aforementioned Super Friends, through its myriad iterations, may have put Aquaman on the pop-culture sonar again, but it inadvertently drowned his reputation. Super Friends stories would inevitably have to include some ocean- or water-based scene to give Aquaman some screen time. Superswimming and telepathic communication with marine life became a joke to many fans that were seduced

by Superman’s super-ness and wooed by Wonder Woman’s wonderfulness. (Hey, Batman and Robin could only swing on ropes—why weren’t you making fun of them?) Super Friends made Aquaman seem like… well, a fish out of water, a realization that writers of Justice League of America had earlier discovered, hence the infrequency of his appearances in that title.

Yet creators like Steve Skeates, Jim Aparo, Paul Levitz, David Michelinie, Don Newton, Neal Pozner, and Craig Hamilton (to name a few), like that kid from North Carolina, never gave up on Aquaman, concocting the Sea King’s sporadically produced Bronze Age stories. For those of you who would like to learn more about those exploits, I direct you to the following back issues of BACK ISSUE, where they have been previously covered: • BI #27 (“Comic Book Royalty”), with a Nick Cardy Aquaman/Mera cover, exploring the Sea King’s stories in the 1970s and 1980s, as well as an Arion, Lord of Atlantis article; • BI #45 (“Odd Couples”), featuring the offbeat Aquaman/Deadman crossover; 2 • BACK ISSUE • Aquaman Issue

by M

ichael Eury

Ye ed’s head laboriously Photoshopped by BI’s long-suffering but greatly appreciated designer, Rich J. Fowlks, onto Lloyd Bridges’ body (and ears) as borrowed from the photo cover of Dell Comics’ Four Color #994 (1959), starring Sea Hunt. With apologies to the late Mr. Bridges (looks like he picked the wrong week to quit snorkeling).

Sea Hunt © United Artists Television.

The Brave and the Bold TM & © DC Comics.

• BI #46 (“Greatest Stories Never Told”), featuring the unrealized sequel to the Craig Hamilton-drawn Aquaman miniseries; and • BI #58 (Justice League in the Bronze Age), including Aquaman’s stint as leader of Justice League Detroit.

And now, this special Aquaman edition of BACK ISSUE picks up where our previous coverage left off, tracking the Sea King through some often-turbulent waters… and drenching you, the reader, with more water puns than you’ll find in any other magazine. Joining us are many of the creators who brought those Aqua-adventures to life.

So, what are you waiting for, landlubber? Suit up and dive in!

by R o b

Kelly

[Editor’s note: Writer/artist/historian Rob Kelly (whose bio is on view with this issue’s Aquaman Merchandise article) loves DC Comics’ SAG (Skeates/Aparo/Giordano) Aquaman, and has something he’d like to get off his chest…]

Extra! Extra! Not long after writing this piece and submitting it to BACK ISSUE, DC announced it will be releasing Aquaman: The Search for Mera Deluxe Edition, a hardcover which will collect Aquaman #40–48, encompassing the complete multi-part storyline. While that still leaves some of the finest SAG stories untouched (“Is California Sinking?,” “The Creature That Devoured Detroit,” among others), it’s great that newer readers will finally have easy access to some of the finest Aquaman adventures ever put to paper. Aquaman: The Search for Mera Deluxe Edition should be available on December 4, 2018.

Aquaman Issue • BACK ISSUE • 3

TM & © DC Comics.

In the days before comic-book specialty shops dotted the suburban landscape, comics fans’ exposure to stories from older books were limited to when publishers reprinted classic material in assorted 100-page giants, treasury editions, devoted reprint titles like Marvel Tales, and digests.

Case in point: When I was checking out the comics selection at the Voorhees News & Tobacco Shop in June 1982 (thanks for the allowance money, Dad), I saw that DC’s venerable Adventure Comics series— which previously had featured a new version of the “Dial H For Hero” characters—was now in a digest format. The front cover looked interesting enough (not a big Legion fan, but Captain Marvel is always cool!), but it was the back cover that sold me: The Spectre! Black Canary! Sandman! And… Aquaman!

Ever since I turned the TV on as a toddler and saw a little show called Super Friends, Aquaman was, and always has been, my favorite character. One look inside the comic (issue #491) showed me that this was an Aquaman adventure I had never read before. The story, “Sorcerers of the Sea,” was by three names I was very familiar with, and a fan of: Steve Skeates (writer), Jim Aparo (artist), and Dick Giordano (editor). The book was immediately added to the pile, even though, at 95 cents, it cost more than most of the other comics I was buying.

I went home that night and read the whole book in one go. As soon as I read the Aquaman story, I loved it immediately, and over the next year I made sure to never miss an issue of Adventure Comics (which wasn’t easy since the digests didn’t show up in all that many newsstands, and sometimes it was a real hunt).

Between issues #491 and 503 (except #500, which was an all-Legion issue), the digests presented a quick-moving, serialized adventure that had Aquaman on a desperate hunt to find a missing (and, unbeknownst to the Sea King, kidnapped) Mera. As he scours the Seven Seas, he battles Black Manta, runs afoul of a gang of surface-world mobsters, meets a world of giants, and visits a surrealistic alternate dimension seemingly not bound by the rules of time and space, all the while fighting off a palace coup back in Atlantis. Skeates’ story delivers high adventure, thrills, complex characterization, and great humor, and it immediately rocketed to the list of some of my favorite Aquaman comics of all time. The artwork is by the legendary Jim Aparo—at the top of his game—and, unlike a lot of other artists whose work suffers when reprinted in digest form, Aparo’s thick ink line and crisp, clear layouts worked just as well at the smaller size.

The only indication of the delights that laid within these issues of Adventure were the tiny slivers of back-cover real estate DC saw fit to give the Sea King alongside a brief headline describing the story.

I had never seen this particular series of stories before, had no idea it existed, and yet here it was tucked away in the back pages of a digest, which never got any advertising love from DC—you just sort of saw these things show up on the newsstand, without fanfare (and once you missed an issue, it was presumably gone forever). Adventure Comics was cancelled a year later with #503, leaving the Aquaman story woefully incomplete. Not too long after, I discovered comics shops and the whole notion of “back issues,” and made an effort to find these older Aquaman comics, dying to see how it all wrapped up. One by one, I found all the issues I needed (out of order, of course), and over the decades when I would go back to re-read old Aquaman comics, I always revisited this series of issues as one complete story. Both Skeates and Aparo would return to the character, but never together, making Aquaman #40–56 a, er, high-water mark in the history of the character.

Time wore on, of course, and older comics started getting reprinted in increasingly deluxe and trade paperback formats. As Aquaman began to get trade collections all to himself, I figured this SAG (Skeates/Aparo/Giordano) run of Aquaman would be at the top of the list, because it was so obviously great. So I waited.

And waited. And waited.

35 years later, I’m still waiting. For some reason, DC Comics has still never seen fit to collect these 16 issues between two covers, even though it would only take one or two books to do it.

When DC gave Aquaman his own Showcase series of phone book-thick B&W trades in the late 2000s, I knew it wouldn’t be long before they got to Aquaman #40–56. Of course—and I think you can see where this is going—DC stopped doing the Showcase: Aquaman series with volume 3, which ends at Aquaman #39! Sufferin’ swordfish!

With the Aquaman movie about to hit theaters, DC is unearthing all the Aquaman comics they can find and reprinting them. As of this writing, the classic SAG run still remains buried treasure, collected only once, incomplete and unceremoniously on grubby, half-sized newsprint. I guess if I want wax nostalgic, I could say it was fitting that some of Aquaman’s best stories appeared in the final year of Adventure Comics, since he had so many good runs in that title—many of which have been reprinted. Hint, hint, DC!

Super Friend or Frenemy?

Aquaman may have gotten along swimmingly with his fellow Super Friends on Saturday morning television, but in the comics, he wasn’t always the most congenial partner. Super Friends bumper cel art

by Alex Toth; courtesy of Heritage Comics Auctions (www.ha.com).

TM

by M i c h a e l

TM & © DC Comics.

Aquaman team-ups often pose problems for writers. Most superheroes don’t adapt to his waterworld (and look ridiculous when they try, with their scuba masks or fishbowl headgear), and when the Sea King ventures onto land he’s limited to 60 minutes of action before requiring a dip. Also, the personality for Aquaman that surfaced in the Bronze Age—that of a hard-edged, vengeful monarch—didn’t earn him the DC Comics “Plays Well with Others” Award (outside of his appearances in the kid-friendly Super Friends Saturday morning cartoons and spin-off DC comic).

Still, during our halcyon years of Bronze Age fandom, the ’70s and early ’80s, the Marine Marvel managed to cross paths with several members of the DC Universe. Which team-ups made a splash, and which sank? Let’s find out…

AQUAMAN AND DEADMAN

This one’s a bit of a cheat as a “team-up,” because the King of the Seven Seas and the Hater of the Hook don’t really join forces.

The oddball Aquaman/Deadman crossover of 1970 might better be called a patchwork that morphed into a round robin.

It began with Dick Giordano, the editor (and artist) who jumped from Charlton Comics to DC in the late ’60s, bringing with him Charlton writer Steve Skeates and artist Jim Aparo. Giordano wanted to shake up Aquaman’s book, which had gotten a bit stale despite its beautiful Nick Cardy artwork. So Skeates and Aparo, beginning with 1968’s issue #40, sent the suffering Sea King on a multi-chaptered, sci-fi “Search for Mera” to find his missing wife.

But a year and a half later, the burden of a long-running saga in Aquaman was taking its toll on the creative team (and on some readers unaccustomed to such protracted storytelling) and shorter stories were in order, as the Skeates/Aparo/Giordano (SAG) team agreed during an impromptu 1969 coffee klatch in the offices of National Periodical Publications (that’s DC Comics to you and me).

This matter was forced by Aparo’s slow recovery from an illness, which was adversely affecting his output. “We finally decided to toss Aquaman into another dimension, giving Jim a chance to draw 4 • BACK ISSUE • Aquaman Issue

Eury

all sorts of new, wild, and psychedelic settings and cities,” Skeates wrote in a text piece in Aquaman #52. It was agreed that this would take place in three 16-page chapters to run in Aquaman issues #50 (Mar.–Apr. 1970) through 52 (July–Aug. 1970).

To round out the book, a temporary backup feature was envisioned.

Giordano turned to his pal Neal Adams, the two having worked together when Dick took over as editor of Neal’s Deadman feature (which had recently been cancelled) in Strange Adventures, and asked him to produce some Deadman backups for Aquaman. “I didn’t think a backup was a good idea for Deadman,” Adams told John Schwirian in John’s in-depth article on the Aquaman/Deadman team-up in BACK ISSUE #45. “He’s a lead feature type character, not a backup.”

Adams eventually agreed to produce a Deadman mini-feature for Aquaman that was more than a mere self-contained backup.

What evolved was a parallel storyline that both Steve Skeates and Neal Adams would tell in their respective stories. Skeates wrote his Aquaman stories first, introducing extraterrestrial aggressors that transport the Sea King into a weird world. Adams’ motivation for his contributions, as he revealed in BI #45, was to tell an interwoven ghost story, and the writer/artist riffed off what Skeates had scripted. As the analogous tales progress, Deadman, unknown to Aquaman, thwarts an alien invasion, while the two stories dovetail, reuniting the dimensionhopping Aquaman with his wife, Mera.

AQUABOY AND SUPERBOY

Remember the Aquaboy series from the Silver Age, “The Adventures of Aquaman When He Was a Boy”? Of course you don’t—there was no such thing.

Well, except for that one time…

In late 1970, DC introduced Aquaboy—a teenage Aquaman—in the pages of Superboy #171 (cover-dated Jan. 1971). In “Dark Strangler of the Seas,” the patrolling Superboy—the real Superboy to us BACK ISSUE types, the one who was Superman as a kid—assists a fisherman who’s struggling to reel in an errant catch: a crude oil-saturated human who’s choking to death! Rushing the slippery victim to a nearby detergent

plant, Superboy and factory workers race to scrub the oil off the gasping figure, soon discovering the form of the amazing Aquaboy, the “half-fish, half-boy” who can talk underwater!

Sounds like the kind of outrageous shocker that Bob Haney, the cavalier storymeister notorious for his continuity blindness, might concoct, doesn’t it? Nope, not this time. Bob had nothing to do with this one, although his Brave and the Bold editor and the tacit enabler of that old Haney zaniness, Murray Boltinoff, edited this Superboy tale.

Scribe Frank Robbins was responsible for the Aquaboy story, a continuation of a Silver Age trope of Superboy’s youthful encounters with characters he’d know later in life as Superman.

Aquaman’s Silver Age origin had been revealed some ten years earlier in Showcase #30 (and reprinted in Super DC Giant #S-26, which hit the stands several months after the Aquaboy story)— and even earlier than that in 1959’s Adventure Comics #260 (where his real name of Arthur Curry first appeared)—and it included a flashback to young Arthur learning to telepathically command sea life. But Aquaman’s career as a superhero began as an adult.

Once you get past the head-scratching concept of a previously unrevealed Aquaboy, Robbins’ story is a great deal of fun. Aquaboy’s oleaginous predicament is the result of his running afoul of the corrupt commanders and crew of a Trans-East Oil Company tanker whose toxic spills are endangering marine life. Luckily for the Boy of the Sea, the Boy of Steel proves an ally in Aquaboy’s environmental mission, and saves his bacon a second time after Aquaboy is lured into an explosive trap by a decoy for the Sea Lad’s girlfriend, Marita (a ringer for a young Mera), another previously unrevealed character. The teen titans put the oily oilers behind bars, and Superboy remarks of Aquaboy’s war against water pollution, “This is one battle too big even for us—we’re going to need all the help we can get!” The story’s closing caption contends, “The war against pollution just started in the early days of Superboy’s and Aquaboy’s youth.”

Robbins’ “Dark Strangler of the Seas” is an obvious example of the “relevance” movement of socially conscious stories sweeping DC in the late ’60s and early ’70s. Around the same time this issue was published, other DC superhero books were tackling such torn-from-today’s-headlines subject matter as racism (Lois Lane #106), the population explosion (Green Lantern/Green Arrow #81), world hunger (Justice League of America #86), and campus protests (Teen Titans #31).

Yet when considering Superboy #171’s story setting—the 1950s (approximately 1955, as Superboy stories of this era generally predated the contemporary Superman tales by 15 years)—this attempt at relevance seems shoehorned into modern history.

American oil spills certainly occurred before the ’50s (in 1929, a nine-mile spill choked nine miles of ocean near Ventura County Beach, California, and around 1889, a steamer named The Albatross spotted a slick of unknown origin that stretched from south Los Angeles to northern San Diego County, among others), but it wasn’t until the era in which this tale was penned that they became more commonplace… and more reported, thanks to the prolific emergence of television news throughout the ’60s. When penning this tale Robbins perhaps had in mind the then-recent spill of March 1967, off the coast of Cornwall, England, where nearly 120,000 tons of oil contaminated the sea. “Dark Strangler of the Seas” is such an engaging story, however, beautifully delineated by the penciler Bob Brown/inker Murphy Anderson combo, that it’s easy to ignore its incongruences (as well as its Arab stereotypes) and enjoy the adventure for the lark that it is. (If you don’t want to scour the back-issue bins you can find it reprinted in the 2010 TPB Superboy: The Greatest Team-Up Stories Ever Told.)

AQUAMAN AND THE CRUSADER

If you’re going to do an eco-friendly Aquaman story, you should set it in contemporary times… and that’s exactly what Aqua-scribe Steve Skeates did with “The Creature That Devoured Detroit!,” his Jim Aparo-illustrated tale that appeared in what turned out to be the final issue (at least for a while) of the Aquaman series, #56 (Mar.–Apr. 1971).

Odd Couplings (top) Panels from the offbeat Aquaman/Deadman crossover. From Aquaman #52. (center) Aquaboy and Superboy tackle water pollution. From Superboy #171. (bottom) The ill-fated “meeting” of the Sea King and one-hit wonder the Crusader. From Aquaman #50.

TM & © DC Comics.

Aquaman Issue • BACK ISSUE • 5

Washed Up Carmine Infantino’s dynamic cover art, ably inked by Murphy Anderson, featuring the unexpected but entertaining pairing of the Teen of Steel and… Aquaboy?

Original cover art to Superboy #171 (Jan. 1971), courtesy of Heritage.

TM & © DC Comics.

As Skeates told Bryan Stroud in the “One-Hit Wonders” article about the Crusader in BACK ISSUE #71, Aquaman #56 followed the writer’s water-pollution tale in Aquaman #49: “Thus I was on the lookout for some way we could get back into the socially conscious scene, and unrestrained algae growth seemed like a good idea.” Here, Skeates cribs from horror movies of the ’50s like The Blob and sics a lethal leviathan of algae on Detroit, Michigan, playfully targeted because it was the hometown of then-up-and-coming comics creators including Jim Starlin, Al Milgrom, Rich Buckler, and Arvell Jones.

The environmental monster was inadvertently caused by a darkness-depriving satellite created by a pal of Aquaman’s, Don Powers, a forensic cop-turned-P.I. with some radical ideas about curbing crime. By bathing Detroit in a week of perpetual sunlight, Powers’ satellite is intended to deny criminals the cloak of darkness—and to illuminate the streets for Don’s alter ego, the costumed hero called the Crusader, who is secretly losing his vision.

A false step from a rooftop causes to Crusader to tumble to his death, shocking observers below—including passerby Aquaman, who discovers his friend’s secret identity as the fallen hero is unmasked. This was the Crusader’s one and only appearance.

6 • BACK ISSUE • Aquaman Issue

In addition to the Crusader, there was another crossover connected to Aquaman #56: Skeates wryly linked it to a Marvel book he was writing, Sub-Mariner #72 (Sept. 1974), published a few years later. DC’s “The Creature That Devoured Detroit!” concludes with Aquaman pressing the “destruct” button on a control panel, causing Don Powers’ satellite to explode, a scene that’s parroted in Sub-Mariner #72’s “From the Void It Came!,” which pits Namor against the muck-monster called Slime-Thing.

Incidentally, this issue was originally intended to be followed by Aquaman #57, featuring a team-up with Green Arrow. This unrealized adventure is the subject of the “Greatest Stories Never Told” feature following this article.

AQUAMAN AND BATMAN

Most BACK ISSUE readers know that The Brave and the Bold was, during the late Silver Age and throughout the Bronze Age, a Batman team-up title. For many years, it was written by the aforementioned Bob Haney. Haney was also the Aquaman scribe during the mid-to-late ’60s, when Aquaman was the “King of the Sea and TV” (as his cover blurbs trumpeted), so if anyone could bring Batman and Aquaman together outside of a Justice League meeting, it was he. But surprisingly, in three Bronze Age B&B appearances with Batman—preceded by a late Silver Age one—Aquaman, guided by Haney’s smoking typewriter, found himself at odds with the Caped Crusader.

Let’s backtrack to the late Silver Age for just a moment to that first pairing, which took place in Brave and Bold #82 (Feb.–Mar. 1969). It’s best known as being one of the legendary B&Bs illustrated by Neal Adams, where the artist was quietly reinventing Batman, post–Adam West and Batusis, through moonlit settings and a more gothic rendition of the Darknight Detective. Here, Aquaman is being manipulated by a villain (becoming “The Sleepwalker from the Sea!”) and on a couple of occasions wallops Batman with his sea depths-charged strength (“…grip like… a… king crab’s… bite!” winces Batman when clutched from behind by a stealthy Sea King, incognito in street clothes). The heroes finally work together by story’s end, but curiously, this was the first traditional B&B team-up whose cover did not link its co-stars’ logos with an “and” (#64’s “Batman versus Eclipso” aside)—their logos simply share space on the cover, and inside on the title page as well. (This is an exceptional story with a surprise or two, which I’ll save for you to discover if you’ve never read it. It’s been frequently reprinted, most recently in the 2017 TPB The Brave and the Bold: The Bronze Age vol. 1.)

After the late-1970 cancellation of Aquaman, during a time when Aquaman comic stories were rare, the Batman/ Aquaman team-up in The Brave and the Bold #114 (Aug.–Sept. 1974) was a breath of fresh air. By this point, the unbeatable combo of writer Bob Haney and artist Jim Aparo was in its B&B prime, but the issue’s “Last Jet to Gotham” again puts the JLAers at each other’s throats, its shocking Aparo cover showing a fanatical Aquaman plucking the deep-sea gear off an unsuspecting, undersea Batman!

The story itself features a Haney hallmark of an attention-grabbing scenario right out of the gate, in this case featuring Batman scurrying to the aid of a jetliner containing 184 passengers that was swallowed up out of the sky by a giant waterspout. Scuba-diving Batman’s effort to enter the submerged plane is stopped by the vise-like grasp of a grim Aquaman, spied by Batman through the murky seas, who (as he did on the cover) yanks off the Caped Crusader’s breathing tube.

There they go again! We soon learn that Aquaman had a reason to sink the plane: it’s carrying a hydrogen bomb that’s intended to level Batman’s home city, and he made the tough decision to endanger the lives of the passengers to spare an entire city’s population. So after their initial scuffle, Batman and Aquaman collectively race against the clock to save both the plane and passengers before their air runs out and Gotham City from an unthinkable fate. As B&B readers would expect, the duo then cooperates to save the day, all in 20 expertly paced, gorgeously rendered pages.

Two years later, Aquaman had returned to a regular berth as the headliner of the bimonthly Adventure Comics, and Haney and Aparo (the latter inking fill-in penciler John Calnan) re-teamed Batman and Aquaman in Brave and Bold #126 (Apr. 1976). A sea-smuggling illegal firearms operation pulls the Gotham Guardian back to the water, where Haney’s rocket-fast pacing embroils the hero (and the reader) in a mission to retrieve an “undersea satellite” whose theft threatens to upend the “Balance of Terror” (what we in the real world call “MAD,” or “Mutually Assured Destruction”) and guarantees the icy détente of the Cold War—a jugularsqueezing setup that evolves in the opening pages!

Batman’s investigation draws him into a reunion with the oceans’ observer and protector, Aquaman, who informs the Caped Crusader that this sophisticated satellite in question was of Atlantean design. In a rare Haney-scripted nod to DC continuity (at least under the editorship of Murray Boltinoff), the embittered Sea King wants no part of Batman’s mission, having recently being deposed of his kingly crown of Atlantis in his Adventure series—and to top it off, while affecting his best Namor impression, Aquaman snarls, “As for the air-breathers, let them destroy each other! I care not!”

Batman persuades Aquaman to help by convincing him that a nuclear attack on the surface world would equally threaten the undersea one, and the two work well together in the remainder of this shocker. Believe it or not, the Nazis are the perpetrators of this attempted disruption of the balance of power between the superpowers (that’s not a spoiler, by the way—the issue’s cover shows Batman tangling with sinister scuba divers whose diving suits sport swastika shoulder patches), and our heroes successfully save the day, giving the brass at the Pentagon a reason to sleep easy (at least until the next threat to the “Balance of Terror” comes along).

It’s writer David Michelinie who next unites the Darknight Detective and the Sea King some two years later, which Kobra himself plans to create a this time not in B&B but in Aquaman’s “deadly cloud of chemicals” that will own revived mag. Aquaman #61 exterminate the entire population of (Apr.–May 1978), penciled by Don Portugal, to send a message to the Newton and inked by Bob McLeod, world’s powers that he is a force to be continues a plotline started in the previous reckoned with. Of this story’s origin, issue when the Marine Marvel briefly writer David Michelinie reveals to BACK encountered the undersea machinations ISSUE, “I had always wanted to write of would-be world dominator Kobra, Batman, but was never offered an david michelinie the slithery, pontificating DC despot opportunity at one of the character’s who was in vogue during the ’70s. own series. So when a friend who By issue #61 Aquaman is playing against Bronze Age edited a comics news magazine in England sent me type, forsaking his vengeful attitude for the role of a newspaper clipping he thought might fit in with Super Friend by involving his JLA teammates Batman Aquaman, I saw my chance. The incredibly dangerous (who’s aware of Kobra’s menace) and Green Lantern and clandestine practice of burning chlorinated hydro(a surprise cameo not advertised on the issue’s Aparo carbons at sea seemed to offer a threat that a dark cover) in a great consultation scene from the Justice do-gooder like Batman couldn’t possibly resist. So I came League satellite (which you hardcore DC fans know up with a plot that put Aquaman and Batman on the orbits 22,300 miles above the Earth). same trail and that became issue #61.”

Kobra’s minions have hijacked a ship’s cargo of Batman and Aquaman’s teamwork—and in this “extremely poisonous chlorinated hydrocarbons,” from instance, more importantly, their combat prowess—

Bat-Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea Batman’s four Aquaman team-ups in The Brave and the Bold often placed the heroes in conflict. Cover art

by Neal Adams (#82) and Jim Aparo (#114, 126, and 142).

TM & © DC Comics.

Aquaman Issue • BACK ISSUE • 7

JLA Fight Club Fellas, fellas… break it up! Aquaman/ Batman scuffles from B&B (top) #82, (center) #114, and (bottom) #142.

TM & © DC Comics.

ultimately topple Kobra’s plans. They release some dignitaries he’s held hostage, leading to a concluding battle between the snaky scoundrel and the orange-andgreen clad star of this comic book. Aquaman gives Kobra a good tongue-lashing (Michelinie pens the delicious Aqua-dialogue “You’ve been blinded by the conviction that everyone but you is an idiot!”), but on the final page Kobra manages to slink away to freedom… earning Aquaman an admonishment from Batman. The roiled waters between our heroes that was occasionally seen in Haney’s B&Bs returns as an indifferent Sea King turns his back on the Gotham Guardian, remarking (in a great

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recap of his book’s recent storylines), “With my son dead and my wife vanished, getting flak for saving lives is something I don’t need!” as he dives into the ocean which provides him solace.

“Looking back, the story seems to be very much of its time, almost quaint,” Michelinie reminisces.

“The harshest thing Batman says is ‘Blast!’ And these days I’d never have a hero refer to an egomaniacal despot as a ‘raving banana cake’!”

He also praises the story’s artist: “Many people consider Jim Aparo to be the ultimate Aquaman artist, but I was always happy to work with Don Newton; good drawing, good storytelling.”

The great Batman/Aquaman divide returns to writer Bob Haney’s court when the heroes co-appear in The Brave and the Bold #142 (July–Aug. 1978). Atop artist Jim Aparo’s cover, which portrays yet another underwater battle between Batman and Aquaman, the “and” connecting each hero’s logo is crossed out, substituted by a “vs.”—this time, they’re really going at it! And if that weren’t enough, when the reader opens the cover to the splash page, this Haney/Aparo shocker shows Aquaman commanding Mera to harpoon Batman!

Suffering seahorses!!

The action commences at Cape Fear (whose lighthouse, in the DC Universe, looks nothing like our Earth’s, so says this North Carolinian), where the determined Darknight Detective has pursued a fleeing Gotham pusher named “Augie,” demanding he give up the name of his drug syndicate supplier. Piecing together clues, Batman discovers that the narcotics kingpin’s name is in the logbook of a sunken ship, and B&B’s readers once again witness Scuba-Batman undertaking a deep-sea mission.

Finding the wreckage, Batman’s salvage efforts are stymied, first by rogue sea creatures (being telepathically controlled by an off-panel Sea King), then by an attack from dastardly divers in the employ of the drug cartel.

Aquaman soon appears to help fend off the assailants (with Batman thinking, “I guess he’s trying to square things for letting Kobra get away the last time we worked together!” plus a footnote citing Aquaman #61, a continuity addition mandated not by Haney but by new B&B editor Paul Levitz, who was also the Aquaman editor at the time)… then the Sea King turns against the Caped Crusader, head-locking him and snarling a warning: “Stay away from the wreck!” Aquaman commands Mera to entrap Batman in a hard-water bubble and send him away. But the intrepid Batman soon frees himself and, with the indefatigable determination you’d expect from the Masked Manhunter, returns to the ship for the logbook. Aquaman arrives to stop him, and the two fight, with Batman besting the Sea King once the scuffle shifts to land.

As the dazed Aquaman shakes off Batman’s punch, the Caped Crusader reads the logbook and uncovers the reason for the Sea King’s bizarre behavior: Aquaman feared the log of the sunken ship’s final voyage contained incriminating evidence that would ruin the reputation of the lighthouse’s keeper—Aquaman’s father—but it did not. “I couldn’t bear to have his memory dirtied…” admits Aquaman as he shakes hands with his JLA teammate—and the story concludes with Batman’s shock over the discovery of the druglord’s name, which a cliffhanger blurb enticing readers to return next issue “to unravel the drug riddle!” (Incidentally, at the time Brave and Bold was undergoing changes, with editor Levitz policing a stricter adherence to DC continuity, which scribe Haney had routinely ignored for sometimes preposterous—but always entertaining— plots. Haney would soon be phased out as B&B writer… but that, my friends, is another story.)

AQUAMAN AND WONDER WOMAN

“The Twelve Labors of Wonder Woman” was DC’s 1974– 1975 follow-up to the Amazon Princess’ stint as the powerless “Diana Prince, the New Wonder Woman,” à la Emma Peel of The Avengers fame. Herein, the Amazon Princess undertakes a dozen Herculean missions—each secretly observed by a voyeuristic JLAer—to prove her worthiness to rejoin the Justice League of America. (Then-new Wonder Woman editor Julius Schwartz incorporated the JLA appearances to elicit reader enthusiasm, but some fans have labeled this storyline as sexist, contending that a returning male JLA member would have been welcomed back without such ordeals.)

The heroine’s fourth mission, shown in Wonder Woman #215 (Dec. 1974–Jan. 1975), guest-stars Aquaman in writer Cary Bates’ “Amazon Attack Against Atlantis,” illustrated

by John Rosenberger and Vinnie Colletta. Aquaman quietly watches Wonder Woman save New York Harbor from an unnatural waterspout thanks to a few handy rope tricks with her magic lasso, then dons street clothes to “blend in with the millions of other New Yorkers” as he tails her.

The disguised Sea King witnesses Wonder Woman, in her Diana Prince guise, ward off an attack of strangely mutated dogs, then spies her as Wonder Woman stopping an oil geyser that supernaturally sprouts from a park fountain.

(In an ingenious bit by Bates, a writer not associated with the Sea King, the disguised Aquaman, near death from lack of water, revives himself by splashing cola over his body, proving true Coca-Cola’s ad campaign, “The pause that refreshes.”)

Aquaman is suspicious of an unseen manipulator behind these bizarre challenges to the Amazon Princess, and by page 15 the conflict promised by the story title emerges, as the Amazons of Paradise Island declare war on the domed undersea city of Atlantis. Aquaman and Wonder Woman team up in the last two pages of the tale to thwart this culture clash from happening, overcoming the mysterious perpetrator of the story’s malevolence: Mars, god of war, whose identity was teased through most of the story but announced with great fanfare on the comic’s Bob Oksnerdrawn cover.

Guest-starring Batman (top) Aqua-scribe David Michelinie had the Marine Marvel and Darknight Detective work together in Aquaman #61, (bottom) delightfully delineated by Don Newton and inker Bob McLeod.

TM & © DC Comics.

AQUAMAN AND CAPTAIN COMET (guest-starring THE ATOM)

Super-Team Family #13 (Oct.–Nov. 1977), co-starring Aquaman and DC’s first mutant hero, Captain Comet, is the third chapter of a four-part storyline written by Gerry Conway spotlighting the Atom and—unbeknownst to the scribe at the time—laying the groundwork for DC’s bestselling (and controversial) Identity Crisis event which would be published decades later.

“The Atom didn’t have his own title or series, and that made him available,” Conway explained in BACK ISSUE #66’s Super-Team Family (STF) article. “One of the downsides to a team-up book is that it can’t really have an effect on the characters in their own titles, so the notion I had was, let this have an effect on a peripheral character, one who isn’t the main character in each story, but is central to the story.”

The plot involves the abducted Jean Loring—the love of Ray (Atom) Palmer’s life—and the Tiny Titan’s search for her, which leads him through other realms in team-ups with the Flash and Supergirl, then Green Lantern and Hawkman, in the previous two STFs (the four-partner would conclude in #14 with a Wonder Woman/Atom team-up).

By Chapter Three in issue #13, titled “Ragnarok Night,” the storyline—and Jean herself—teeters into madness as we discover that Loring, who had earlier suffered a nervous breakdown, is experiencing a psychotic seizure, her insanity manifesting itself as environmental catastrophes that are jeopardizing the planet. Captain Comet, the house hero Aquaman Issue • BACK ISSUE • 9

TM & © DC Comics.

of Conway’s criminal-crammed Secret Society of Super-Villains (SSOSV) title, enters the stage when he rushes Kid Flash—currently guest-starring in SSOSV— to the Justice League satellite for medical attention.

There, Captain Comet crosses paths with the Atom, who’s frantic over Jean’s plight. JLAer Aquaman becomes involved with the saga as he valiantly spares New York Harbor from a tidal wave by telepathically commanding whales and octopi to fashion a giant dam out of debris (this is a dynamite showcase for the Sea King, illustrated with gusto by Arvell Jones and Romeo Tanghal).

From there, the three headliners battle parallel crises involving the machinations of a cataclysmic villain named Wind Pirate (not exactly one of DC’s A-list baddies—or C-list, for that matter) and their connections to Jean’s abnormal mental state. Aquaman, Atom, and Captain Comet cross paths and link telepathically as they scurry to save the both Jean Loring and the world, but being part of a larger ongoing storyline, Super-Team Family #13 feels less like a team-up and more like a crossover event.

AQUAMAN AND SUPERMAN

After longtime Superman editor Mort Weisinger retired in 1970, the first thing Julius Schwartz did when he took over World’s Finest Comics was to demote Batman to occasional co-star status and essentially transform the title into Superman’s version of The Brave and the Bold. After team-ups with the Flash, Robin, Green Lantern, and a returning Batman, it was Aquaman’s turn to pair off with Superman, the result being World’s Finest #203 (June 1971) and its story, “Who’s Minding the Earth?”

Schwartz tapped Aquaman scribe Steve Skeates to pen the tale, which saw print a mere three months after Aquaman #56, the aforementioned last issue of the series, an appreciated gesture for the Sea King’s fans still aching from the sting of cancellation. Skeates ably follows the “How to Write a Successful Team-Up” playbook by crafting a tale that gives equal weight to both co-stars, drawn here by World’s Finest’s regular art team of Dick Dillin and Joe Giella.

It begins with Aquaman’s discovery of the ruins of an abandoned oceanography lab on an island, where he stumbles across a group of bizarre dolphin-men.

The Marine Marvel makes the mistake of chuckling at

With Friends Like These… (left) Aquaman stands up for Diana Wonder Woman #215. A Bates/Rosenberger/Colletta collaboration. (right) Aquaman was among the many superheroes appearing in Gerry Conway’s Super-Team Family #13. Cover by Al Milgrom and Jack Abel.

TM & © DC Comics.

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their awkwardness, and they in kind incapacitate him by emitting a high-pitched buzzing from their group mind. Meanwhile, in Metropolis, Clark Kent chances across a clumsy figure, his features obstructed by a fedora and trench coat, who’s accosting pedestrians while demanding an audience with the Man of Steel: “Where is Superman? He is the only one who can help me!” The stranger’s behavior abruptly changes as he stands his ground, radiating the same audio frequency that befell Aquaman in the opening scene, leaving the people on the street temporarily blind—including Superman, but not before he witnesses, through blurry vision, the enigmatic figure splitting into two!

The Man of Steel soon regains his vision and pursues his dual prey over the ocean, as they are rapidly “swimming like guided missiles!”

He’s led to the island where Aquaman lay unconscious, and after plunging the ailing Sea King into therapeutic waters, the two Justice Leaguers are greeted by the figure that was searching for Superman on the Metropolis city street. It’s a benevolent dolphin-man, who tells the heroes his origin: he was a mutated dolphin rejected by his own kind who was adopted and raised by oceanographers. Ridiculed by humans because of inelegance, the creature, longing for companionship, discovered its innate ability to reproduce itself asexually. This started a chain reaction of replications, the end result being an army of dolphin-men lacking their host’s compassion for humankind, hellbent on recreating Earth into a waterworld. Together, Superman and Aquaman narrowly defeat their foes, with Skeates’ script deftly allowing the two heroes equal time and importance.

World’s Finest’s “Brave and Bold” format was short-lived, with Batman returning as Superman’s permanent co-star for the duration of the book’s run. However, a wave of Supermania surrounding the impending premiere of Superman: The Movie led DC Comics in April 1978 to launch DC Comics Presents, a new title that teamed Superman with a different co-star.

Issue #5 (Jan. 1979) reunited Superman and Aquaman in “The War of the Undersea Cities!” by Len Wein (plot), Paul Levitz (dialogue), and Murphy Anderson (pencils and inks).

Clark Kent’s former love, mermaid Lori Lemaris, hooks Superman into the middle of a conflict between her undersea city of Tritonis and Aquaman’s realm of Poseidonis, the “twin cities [that] have lived together in peace since Atlantis was an island continent—back before recorded history!” Readers discover that this civil war was orchestrated by an aquatic interloper whose identity I would otherwise conceal for the benefit of those who have not yet discovered this story, but its splashy Ross Andru/Dick Giordano makes no secret of the fact that Aquaman’s half-brother, Ocean Master, is the story’s villain, clouding the Atlanteans’ minds with a giant telepathic jellyfish-like monster that even gives the Man of Steel a tough time. Superman’s clearheadedness peers through the murkiness of Ocean Master’s machinations, however, and helps the twin cities resolve their conflicts.

Three and a half years later, Superman and Aquaman pair off again in DC Comics Presents #48 (Aug. 1982) in a tale titled “Eight Arms of Conquest!,” written by Dan Mishkin and Gary Cohn, serviceably illustrated

by Irv Novick and Frank McLaughlin. It begins with Aquaman’s encounter with an octopus that refuses to obey his telepathic commands… and if that wasn’t enough to throw the Sea King for a loop, he’s soon attacked by several metamorphosed octopi. Temporarily under their psychic thrall, Aquaman barges into S.T.A.R. Labs, coming into conflict with the visiting Superman—and in a scene worthy of a Haney/Aparo Batman/ Aquaman B&B, the Sea King uses his depths-enhanced super-strength to wallop the Man of Steel until breaking free of the control of the octopi. Once Aquaman warns Superman that his brief mental link with the octopi informed him that “They’re out to conquer the world!,” the two Justice Leaguers race into undersea action.

What follows is a quickly paced, lively adventure where Superman and Aquaman effectively combine forces in their struggle. The Sea King’s telepathic control of marine life is put to the ultimate test as his telepathy goes up against that of his eight-armed enemies’ as both forces command sea creatures in combat. Whereas many of Superman’s DCCP teammates often take a backseat to the infinitely powerful Metropolis Marvel, Mishkin and Cohn cleverly fashion the ultimate “team-up” between the two co-stars, as Aquaman temporarily takes telepathic control of the body and abilities of Superman once Big Blue is disabled by the octopi. I’ll leave it to you readers to discover the secret of these eight-armed terrors’ powers by reading the story yourself.

The Marine and Metropolis Marvels Meet (top) Neal Adams’ cover art on the Superman/ Aquaman outing in World’s Finest #203 (June 1971). (bottom left) A sibling rivalry complicates the heroes’ next team-up, in DC Comics Presents #5 (Jan. 1979).

Cover by Ross Andru and Dick Giordano. (bottom right) A nasty entanglement in DCCP #48 (Aug. 1982).

Cover by Gil Kane and Frank Giacoia.

TM & © DC Comics.

Aquaman Issue • BACK ISSUE • 11

Of Course, You Know This Means War (left) Atlantis’ underwater cities tussled in DC Comics Presents #5, with Superman drawn into the fray. By Wein/Levitz/ Anderson. (right) Looks like these two rock ’em-sock ’em heroes borrowed a page from the Bob Haney B&B playbook for this scene from DCCP #48. By Mishkin/Cohn/ Novick/McLaughlin.

TM & © DC Comics.

Looking back on this tale, co-writer Gary Cohn remarks, “I recall almost nothing about the few times I worked on the [Aquaman] character… except, of course, that I turned down the Atlantis Chronicles series when it was offered to me because I didn’t like the material or the character. Apparently it was the first big hit written by Peter David; so much for my ability to recognize an opportunity.”

Cohn’s writing partner, Dan Mishkin, has a vivid personal memory connected to DCCP #48: “Yikes!

My (and Gary’s) very first Superman story! My most vivid memory is having to call Julie Schwartz from a pay phone in the hospital where my first child had just been born (a couple of weeks early) to tell him that the script was going to be late.”

AQUAMAN AND THE LITTLE MERMAID

A DC/Disney crossover? Of course not! This Little Mermaid, created by DC’s human encyclopedia E. Nelson Bridwell, abetted by fan Nick Pascale, was, like Aquaman, a half-breed—but in her case, the product of a Poseidonis/Tritonis union, a personal merger between Atlantis’ two twin cities.

Before we discuss the Little Mermaid’s team-up with Aquaman, let’s turn to DC historian extraordinaire (and frequent BI contributor) John Wells, for a refresher about Atlantis’ twin cities, since this is the second time they’ve been mentioned in this article: “The contrasting Atlantean cities were first discussed in 1960’s Adventure Comics #280, but they weren’t actually named until the Lori Lemaris story in 1977’s Action Comics #475. Tritonis was also identified by name a few months later in DC Special Series #5, and

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the full origin of the two cities was detailed by E. Nelson Bridwell in Super Friends #9 one month after that. Nelson, I’m sure, was responsible for naming the two cities, although he was drawing on fantasy lore.

Poseidonis was first referred to in a 1912 short story

by Algernon Blackwood. Meanwhile, Tritonis was the name of a mythical water nymph.”

Super Friends #9 (Dec. 1977), by Bridwell and artists Ramona Fradon and Bob Smith, is the concluding chapter of a three-issue arc in the series transitioning the book from its original junior Super Friends, Wendy and Marvin (and Wonderdog), to the new junior Super Friends, Wonder Twins Zan and Jayna (and space monkey Gleek). The storyline began in issue #7 when the Wonder Twins arrived on Earth from Exxor to warn the Justice League that Grax—the blue-hued, multi-armed mastermind from Superman’s Silver Age rogues’ gallery who boasted that he was brainier than Brainiac—had secreted a dozen bombs on Earth. Through this three-parter Bridwell introduces not only the Wonder Twins to DC Comics but also a legion of international superheroes (soon to be known as the Global Guardians), who team up with various Justice Leaguers in their missions to discover and dispose of Grax’s bombs… …which brings us back to Super Friends #9. The pairing of Aquaman and the Little Mermaid—whose real name is Ulla Paske, from Denmark—only lasts a few quick pages, but in true Bridwell style they’re packed with DC lore (in this case, regarding Atlantis), including the intimation that Aquaman already knows Ulla and that the Little Mermaid can stay underwater for no more than 30 hours.

By Land, Sea, or Ariel (top) Aquaman summons Global Guardian the Little Mermaid in Super Friends #9—and writer Bridwell fills in the reader on this new character’s background. Art by Fradon and Smith. (bottom) Ray (Atom) Palmer provides an assist to the incapacitated Sea King in Action #530 (Apr. 1982). By Rozakis/Saviuk/Chiaramonte.

TM & © DC Comics.

AQUAMAN AND THE ATOM, AQUAMAN AND AIR WAVE

In the early 1980s, Aquaman eight-page short stories could be found as an “Action Plus” backup in the pages of Superman’s Action Comics. There, the Sea King would rotate the backup spot with the Atom and occasionally Air Wave (the teenage, legacy version of the Golden Age hero, whose story was told a mere two issues ago in this magazine), in stories written by Bob Rozakis and penciled by Alex Saviuk. But on a few occasions, Aquaman teamed up with his fellow Action Plus-mates.

Discounting their JLA camaraderie, the team of Aquaman and the Atom had a history that predated this article’s Super-Team Family #13. In 1967, the pair combined forces to tackle Galg the Destroyer in Brave and Bold #73, the last B&B issue to feature a non-Batman team-up. The science-fiction milieu of Aquaman’s undersea kingdom, which was often rife with horrific creatures, and the similar otherworldly realms of the Atom’s subatomic explorations combined nicely.

And so Rozakis reunites the Justice Leaguers in Action #521’s (July 1981) short story which begins with Aquaman attempting to communicate with, not simply command, sea life. Puzzled by the appearance of a shrinking amoebalike creature, he uses his JLA communicator to summon the accommodating Atom, who doesn’t shrink from duty but shrinks into it. The two share very few panels in this eight-pager, but a telepathic link forged between Aquaman and the imperiled Atom, who’s trapped in subatomica, is the extent of their actual “team-up.” (This issue of Action is better known for its lead story, the introduction of the Vixen, in a crossover with Superman. Vixen was originally slated to get her own title in the late ’70s, but it fell prey to the infamous DC Implosion.)

Air Wave dominates the Action Plus tale in Action #527 (Jan. 1982) as he’s zapped by a teleportation beam and transported to a strange water planet. He returns to Earth with a small alien octopus in tow and enlists his cousin, Hal Jordan—Green Lantern—to connect him with an expert on aquatic realms, our own Sea King. Air Wave (along with GL) and Aquaman meet briefly before the Marine Marvel is transported by Air Wave and GL to the waterworld, shifting our focus to an Aquaman serial.

The next few issues feature Aquaman’s involvement on the alien world of Vortuma as he assists the alien octopi called the Hexapuses in a conflict with the four-armed invaders known as the Land-Masters. A weakened Sea King returns to Earth, where Ray Palmer and his now-wife Jean are mixing business with pleasure, deep-sea fishing while Ray stands ready to provide an Atom-sized assist if needed—and it is, as he saves Aquaman on page 7 of the eightpager. The Action Plus baton is now passed to the Tiny Titan, as this story picks up in the next issue with his solo adventure.

TEAM-UP TALK

Deadman, Crusader, Batman, Wonder Woman, Captain Comet, Atom, Superman (and Superboy), Little Mermaid, and Air Wave… who was the best Bronze Age teammate for Aquaman?

While I fondly remember the Aquaman/Batman tales thanks to my undying affection for the Bob Haney/Jim Aparo partnership on The Brave and the Bold, my vote for the best Aquaman team-up partner of the Bronze Age goes to Superman (including the Superboy tale). Superman’s connection, through Lori Lemaris, to Atlantis gives him familiarity with Aquaman’s turf, and his superpowers allow him to adapt to undersea life without donning ridiculous scuba-gear (really, Batman, do you need to wear your scalloped bat-cape in the ocean?). But it’s the caliber of the Aquaman/Superman stories chronicled above that earn my vote. Without any fish-out-of-water (sorry, another sea pun) contrivances or sensational but unlikely plots demanding our attention, Aquaman and Superman complement each other, without the Big Red S upstaging the King of the Seven Seas. If you’re an Aquaman fan and haven’t read those stories, seek them out.

Aquaman Issue • BACK ISSUE • 13

Sadly, the celebrated Skeates/Aparo/Giordano (SAG) run on Aquaman came to an end after 17 issues with #56 (Mar.–Apr. 1971). DC Comics publisher Carmine Infantino decided to pull the plug on the book after editor Dick Giordano resigned to go into business with Neal Adams [at Continuity Studios—ed.]. Giordano proposed continuing Aquaman as a freelance editor, but Infantino felt business would get too complicated and opted to cancel the fan-favorite instead. Thus, the decade-old series ended on a cliffhanger, with our hero trapped in a room with armed guards preparing to open fire as they break down the door.

Flash back to the year 2000, when I noticed a text box at the end of the letters column in 1970’s Aquaman #55: “Next issue, Aquaman battles ‘The Creature That Devoured Detroit’… and the following issue, as Aquaman is headed towards New York… he meets and teams up with (Are you ready?) Green Arrow.”

Fortunately, Aquaman writer Steve Skeates had joined our Internet Aquaman fan chat-line, so I asked him about the unfulfilled tease.

“Yep,” Skeates replied, “a team-up with Green Arrow was definitely in the works for Aquaman #57 of that particular run—in fact, it was gonna be a three- or four-issue deal! Jim [Aparo] had even sneakily given readers a hint of what was to come—check out the fourth panel on page 4 of ‘The Computer Trap’ in issue #55! I had written the first issue of that arc, which began with Aquaman, severely wounded, stumbling out of the Powers Lab, trying to make it back to the sea, but passing out before he could get very far. Jim was in the midst of drawing that ish when word came down that the book had been cancelled.”

Later that same year, Skeates published a more detailed explanation in Comic Book Marketplace #83 (Nov. 2000). The article, titled “Aquaman & Green Arrow – The Lost Episode,” explained how Aquaman dramatically emerged from the Powers Lab building (leaving the details of his battle up to the readers’ imaginations), only to stagger down the street, bleeding from multiple gunshot wounds. As the Sea King attempts to reach a waterway, his injuries continue to drain his strength. “Marvel no longer, then,” Skeates explained, “over this hero’s fortitude, for, as he wobbles around a corner, into an alleyway, all that has occurred to him this day at last takes its toll and he tumbles, prone, into heavy-breathing unconsciousness. Yet, how long will it last, this breathing? Can this be the end of Arthur Curry? At least he still breathes even as a shadow falls over him—the shadow of someone supremely pleased to have happened upon a superhero, the shadow of someone who now gives forth with a hearty ‘hehheh-heh!’ ” In time, Aquaman awakens in the alley and finds his wounds miraculously healed. Confused, he races

Marine Marvel and Emerald Archer From the collection of John Schwirian, Dick Giordano’s fantasy cover for Aquaman #57, teaming the Sea King and Green Arrow.

Characters TM & © DC Comics.

14 • BACK ISSUE • Aquaman Issue

TM

by J o

hn Schwirian

to a nearby lake where he, according to Skeates, Fantastic Four adventure entitled ‘This Man, This Monster’— “relatively overjoyed, feeling that his ordeal is nearing that previously mentioned shadowy figure having someits end, rushes toward it, dives in, breathes deep, how (through, no doubt, the use of some big, bulky, and nearly drowns. He breaks to the surface, choking, Kirbyesque piece of sci-fi equipment) stolen Aquaman’s coughing his guts out. Somehow he can no longer powers. How does Green Arrow help Aquaman regain those powers? To tell you the truth, I haven’t the breathe water. He thinks about that, taking an inventory of his inner-workings, slightest idea; that particular piece of the and realizes that his telepathic powers puzzle is lost to me memory-wise.” are missing as well. What’s happened While we will never know where this story to him? And, where should he now might have gone, Skeates adapted the turn? What to do? What to do? plot three times for stories that appeared “His only answer is to get on in Warren’s Eerie #40 (June 1972), Marvel’s home! To be with his people, to see Sub-Mariner #72 (Sept. 1974), and DC’s Mera, to talk to Dr. Vulko (a man he Adventure Comics #449 (Jan.–Feb. trusts implicitly), and with the good 1977). Surprisingly, the first reworking of the plot was instigated by Roy Thomas doctor’s help, hopefully learn what has happened to him. His means of for an issue of Sub-Mariner. Note that, getting back entail first of all getting while most comic companies required to the coast, to New York City, and a full script provided to the artist, the steve skeates his chosen method for doing that is Marvel method was to send a plot the popular-back-then practice of outline, and then dialogue the pages Comic Vine. hitch-hiking. As luck would have it, after they were drawn. This difference it is through just that activity that he meets up with in production resulted in yet another twist in what should Green Arrow, who is piloting a van (one that looks be a simple story. “Yet another splashdown,” Skeates rather like a hippie bus) returning from some sort of elaborates, “yet another plunge, once more into the adventure of his own.” depths of oceanic reality, and, what with yours truly Here ends the script for #57. As for the remaining being most particularly lauded for my work on Aquaman, three issues, Skeates laments, “The rest of the story I now given a chance to write but one story (a fill-in issue) have no actual memory of, except, of course, that the for the Sea King’s one-time crosstown rival, Marvel’s whole thing is based rather loosely upon Stan Lee’s Sub-Mariner, could it possibly come as a surprise to

Trumpeting a Team-Up (left) Note the Bearded Bowman lurking in the background of panel four on this page from Aquaman #55. (right) From that issue’s letters column, note, in column two, the announcement of the upcoming GA team-up (that never happened).

TM & © DC Comics.

Aquaman Issue • BACK ISSUE • 15

SCG The closest thing to a SAG (Skeates/ Aparo/Giordano) photo you’ll find: Steve Skeates, Dick Giordano, and SAG-era Aquaman cover artist (and long-time interior artist) Nick Cardy, at HeroesCon in Charlotte in 2009.

anyone at all that my script for Prince Namor would inevitably become far more a parody of that wing-footed, highfalutin’ dandy than much of anything else?

“So, there I was—not long after the cancellation of the Aquaman book, receiving a phone call from none other than Roy Thomas (whom I had worked with on a Marvel Western, a co-plotting job, way back when the two of us were rather simultaneously starting our respective comic-book careers); Roy (by this point the Number Two man at Marvel) wanted to know if I’d be interested

Photo by and courtesy of John Schwirian.

in writing a fill-in issue of The Sub-Mariner; he even suggested that I might like to use this opportunity to tie up whatever loose ends had been left lying around thanks to the sudden cancellation of that aforementioned other underwater periodical, the one published by DC! I indeed thought this was a great idea, and devised a plot that connected Aquaman to the Sub-Mariner via the suggestion that there had been an alien entity that had snuck aboard the satellite that Aquaman blew out of the sky in order to save the Earth from ecological destruction (most of which, excluding of course that alien presence there, having been originally chronicled within ‘The Creature that Devoured Detroit!’). Now, splashing along with the wreckage of that artificial moon down into the ocean, this entity ultimately decided to build itself a body employing the slime at the bottom of the sea plus parts and pieces of what had once been that aforementioned satellite, thus becoming (in effect) a monster, one which went on to engage the Sub-Mariner in deadly battle!

“There was more to the story, of course, including a guest-star appearance by none other than Daredevil. … This plot (in all its abject wonderfulness) was quickly approved, then sent off to Dan Adkins, who’d be providing the art, whereupon, almost immediately, Dan sent me the first three of his penciled pages.

Beautiful stuff, yet (for the sake of continuity) I wanted a few more of those outsized hunks of art board to work with, a few more pages to be there in front of my face before I’d feel really ready, really comfortable about diving into my initial dialoguing session. So I waited, not for a lot, just for a bit more. I waited and I waited and I waited. Years literally went by. Obviously Dan had gotten distracted by some other project, and then another project, and then another… Meanwhile, since this was a fill-in story and somehow for over two years there hadn’t developed any desperate need within the Sub-Mariner book for anything of that sort, the Marvel editors hardly felt compelled to demand that Dan finish the piece, so there you are—my nifty Sub-Mariner opus was, as they say, lost in limbo!”

About this time, another opportunity arose to use ideas left over from the sudden demise of Aquaman. Skeates had been writing for Warren’s black-and-white horror magazines when he was offered the chance to create an ongoing series in Eerie. Skeates redesigned Aquaman as the younger, sexier, Atlantean prince Targo, who frequented the surface world and the pleasures it offered.

“Producing an underwater character for the blackand-whites,” Skeates points out, “meant I could up the ante when it came to sex and violence, a couple of aspects that made Prince Targo quite the fun series to write, yet simultaneously these were qualities that blatantly demanded that I concoct myriad new and original story ideas, stuff specifically designed for this over-sexed 20-something Atlantean trapped (as he was) within the turbulent throes of facing down a particularly dastardly world (our world, the surface world, even in his own view a place of twisted evil, yet a whereabouts he nonetheless seemed somehow drawn to)—furthermore, since these tales would be published in a horror magazine, my emphasis quite

Reincarnation at Warren Skeates’ adapted Aquaman plot first appeared in the black-and-white horror magazine Eerie, issue #40 (June 1972), in the tale “The Once Powerful Prince.” Art by Jaime Brocal.

Eerie TM & © Warren Publications.

16 • BACK ISSUE • Aquaman Issue

Reincarnation at Marvel The spacefaring entity shown on page 3 of Sub-Mariner #72 (Sept. 1974) was a subtle tie-in to an earlier issue of DC’s Aquaman. Script by Skeates, art by Dan Adkins and Vince Colletta. (inset) Its cover, by Larry Lieber/ Al Milgrom/John Romita, Sr. (alterations).

TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.

emphatically needed to be shifted from the he-man adventure milieu I was used to placing my underwater characters within over toward the hideous and the horrific—all of that, even as my avowed purpose in creating this particular series had been to use up a batch of leftover plots originally devised for the recently cancelled Skeates/Aparo/Giordano Aquaman tome! In other words, it was hard going trying to stuff these babies into the slots I had chosen to wedge them into, and, in the end, only one of the three turned out to be a yarn I was in any fashion happy to have produced.”

That yarn, “The Once Powerful Prince,” appearing in Eerie #40 (June 1972) and magnificently illustrated

by Jaime Brocal, provides a glimpse into what the conclusion to the Aquaman/ Green Arrow team-up might have been.

The plot is simple. Having lost the mystic ring that lets him breathe underwater and communicate with sea life, Targo returns to the surface city where he was seduced and robbed by a beautiful girl.

In the city, Targo reads about recent robberies by a pirate and deduces that this scoundrel has his ring. The ensuing confrontation takes place on the back of a whale on course to ram a cargo ship!

In the course of the conflict, the pirate gets caught between the whale and the ship and is crushed in the collision. Targo retrieves his ring from the corpse and swims for home.

“All in all, a truly worthy superhero tale,” Skeates boasts.

“I particularly enjoy the fitful opening—three pages that are all dialogue except for the last panel on each of those pages where abruptly heavy-handed captions abound, making for a rather sputtering start that’s finally resolved on page four as Prince Targo swims away from Manaii, through calm waters, grimly intent on facing the challenge we’ve been quite sufficiently informed of thanks to all that dialogue on pages one, two, and three. Further on, prior to any of the heavy action commencing, we encounter nearly two pages devoted to an introduction of the villain, told mainly through this lost soul’s crazed and over-the-top thought balloons, yet suddenly the last panel of that two-page spread progresses the story to the point where a sea captain is shocked to see something (an entity the reader cannot as of yet see) headed his way. Whereupon, with a flip of the page, we have returned to viewing this tale through the eyes of our princely protagonist.

“Similar admirable pacing and nifty jump-cuts throughout. In fact, the only problem with this yarn superhero-wise seems to be that the ultimate battle itself comes off as a bit stretched out and repetitive—surely a minor quibble! Far more significant is the fact that despite my efforts (having Targo ultimately fail to save the lives of those on the ship, even as the villain of this piece is forcefully transformed into a squashed and grisly mess), I was basically unsuccessful in my valiant attempt to twist all of this into being a horror story. Therefore, despite its superheroic worthiness, placed where it was (within Eerie Magazine, to be exact) this tale couldn’t help but disappoint.”

Ah, but the tale of this tale does not end here.

Remember the forgotten Sub-Mariner plot? An ironic event revived the Namor story borne out of an Aquaman script.

“Then—wouldja believe it?” Skeates laughs, “the very happenstance that had hung me out to dry vis-à-vis the Sea King suddenly turned around and was doing me a favor, acting in my best interest as far as Prince Namor was concerned, and, yes, I am indeed speaking of cancellation. I had pretty much given up on my Sub-Mariner story ever seeing print, when all of a sudden sales figures of a particularly low and lousy variety indicated that the Namor book should be treated to a rather immediate dirt nap! First, though, it was decreed that all outstanding material should be used up, which meant that unless Dan Adkins wanted to refund the money he’d already been paid for our Sub-Mariner tale, he’d have to draw up the remaining 15 pages, whereupon I would finally be Aquaman Issue • BACK ISSUE • 17

Reincarnation at DC Skeates comes full circle with his Marine Marauder tale, drawn by Jim Aparo, for Adventure Comics #449 (Jan.–Feb. 1977).

TM & © DC Comics.

given my chance to dialogue this baby, which would then be published as the big-deal final issue of The Savage Sub-Mariner!

“Certain changes had been made to my plot, however.

For one thing, for some continuity reason connected with Daredevil’s own book, the Man without Fear was now no longer available for the folks working on the Namor book (actually for anyone working on any book other than Daredevil’s own) to make use of story-wise.

Therefore, Matt Murdock had been replaced within this tale of ours by two overly muscular highly neurotic dudes who (apparently having nothing better to do) were hanging out at the beach and who (for no specific reason that I could fathom) abruptly decided to start a fight with Namor. Truth of the matter is, there really didn’t seem to be much of a story here anymore! Even that bit about this tale being based upon events chronicled within Aquaman #56 had been rendered pretty much meaningless thanks to the passage of time! Time, that is to say, for this particular scribbler to face the simple

reality that, by now, what had happened in the final Skeates/Aparo/Giordano issue of Aquaman was hardly fresh in anyone’s mind! Still, I was quite determined (now that I’d finally been given the opportunity) to make something halfway decent out of this nearly-three-yearsin-the-making close-out issue of Sub-Mariner. Actually, though, there’s really no need for me to get into how I ultimately worked things out here! Better you should find somewhere (like perhaps in the cheapie bin at some comic-book shop somewhere) a copy of Sub-Mariner #72 and read it for yourself. … And, in the end, despite Namor thinking, ‘I have learned a lesson this day— a lesson that will live with me—forever,’ I defy anyone to come up with any lesson that could possibly be derived from such an insane story as this!”

Think Skeates was ready to put this story to bed?

Think again, as once more this plot rears its head in “The Menace of the Marine Marauder,” the lead feature in Adventure Comics #449 (Feb. 1977). Editor Paul Levitz reunited Steve Skeates with Jim Aparo on Aquaman, expecting magic. Skeates recognized this as the moment to finally present the essence of his final Aquaman plot.

However, egos got in the way, leaving the final teaming of Skeates and Aparo on Aquaman a bit lackluster.

The story revolves around the mysterious Marine Marauder, a pirate who raids ships while telepathically controlling marine mammals (his helmet cannot generate telepathic waves that can travel underwater).

While Aquaman cannot override the Marauder’s commands, he quickly realizes that he can still summon creatures of the deep and uses them to defeat the Marine Marauder. Personally, I love this story, and know many other fans who would agree, but Skeates felt that it should have been better.

Skeates initially complained that “much of my dialogue (in that Marine Marauder yarn) comes off as stilted, unnatural, and confusing, and all due to various changes Paul [Levitz] made. The fact of the matter being that once, after a mere 31 years, I had at last calmed down about all of this, I could easily see my own fingerprints all over that dialogue, making me at least as responsible for its egregiousness as was (and is) Paul, and quite likely I (in fact) am even more to blame than he is.

“More to the point, however, it was the push and pull that I spoke of earlier that was the real culprit here— the fact that Paul and I could not within this project see eye-to-eye on anything, two youthful, outsized egos, each of us wanting things our own way, both of us adamant in our refusal to give an inch, making for the script here being rewritten again and again and again, until at last we had ‘successfully’ rewritten every spark of life out of the damn thing. Too bad, too. My big chance to work once again with Jim Aparo—ruined! …

No wonder I wanted so intensely to blame someone other than myself for all of this. Yet, for some reason, nowadays I simply can no longer go that route!”

This experience put the final nail in the coffin.

Skeates had exhausted his interest in this plot, and so did the tale of Aquaman #57 at last come to an end.

By day, JOHN SCHWIRIAN is a mild-mannered college English professor, but by night, he dons the role of comic-book historian.

In addition to his passion for Bronze Age comics, he explores the sunken regions of the DC Universe in his self-published fanzine, The Aquaman Chronicles (www. aquamanchronicles.com).

18 • BACK ISSUE • Aquaman Issue

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All characters TM & © their respective owners.

THE 1990s was the decade when Marvel Comics sold 8.1 million copies of an issue of the X-MEN, saw its superstar creators form their own company, cloned SPIDER-MAN, and went bankrupt. The 1990s was when SUPERMAN died, BATMAN had his back broken, and the runaway success of Neil Gaiman’s SANDMAN led to DC Comics’ VERTIGO line of adult comic books. It was the decade of gimmicky covers, skimpy costumes, and mega-crossovers. But most of all, the 1990s was the decade when companies like IMAGE, VALIANT and MALIBU published million-selling comic books before the industry experienced a shocking and rapid collapse.

TM

Superman, Batman, and Wonder Woman didn’t have to wait very long after their comic-book debuts before appearing on licensed merchandise. While crude to our modern eyes, these initial offerings showed that these characters were so massively popular that they could not be contained in the pages of a four-color comic book.

Their future Super Friend, Aquaman, was not so lucky.

Relegated to the back pages of More Fun Comics and (later) Adventure Comics throughout the 1940s and ’50s, there was a drought (I apologize in advance for all the water puns) of Sea King merchandise that lasted all the way until 1966, a full quarter-century after his debut in 1941. Along with Superman and Batman, Aquaman was part of Ideal Toys’ Captain Action line, where kids could dress up the good Captain as Aquaman and have adventures alongside his sidekick Action Boy (who came along in 1967), who you could dress up as Aqualad. Both sets came up with multiple accessories (a trident, a knife, flippers, etc.), most of which most kids probably lost 15 minutes after opening the box.

The floodgates (see?) really opened in 1967, after the debut of Filmation’s The Superman/Aquaman Hour of Adventure animated cartoon. Ideal released several Justice League-related toys and playsets, and Aquaman was frequently included. He even got his own “Aqua-Family” set of figures from manufacturer Multiple Toymakers, which came with a nifty Aqua-Sub, which now commands thousands of dollars from collectors.

You could also find Aquaman on a board game, Big Little Book, jigsaw puzzle, and Halloween costume, among other items. Mera got in on the action, too, as part of Ideal’s “Super Queens” line of dolls, another item that will cost you more than a car nowadays.

Once The Batman/Superman Hour replaced Superman/ Aquaman on Saturday mornings in 1968, however, the Sea King’s appearance on store shelves similarly dried up (again, sorry). But luckily for Aquaman fans, this period didn’t last long, because Hanna-Barbera’s Super Friends debuted on September 8, 1973, and with that show came a merchandising juggernaut, encompassing numerous products, and Aquaman was along for the ride. And while we don’t have the space here to catalog them all (if that is even possible), we will highlight some of the more memorable, popular, and just plain weird among them.

Any article on Aquaman toys of this period has to start with Mego. The Sea King was one of the first four “action figures” (don’t worry boys, they’re not dolls!) in Mego’s World’s Greatest Super-Heroes (WGSH) line, alongside Superman, Batman, and Robin. Initially released in “solid front” boxes (meaning you couldn’t see the figure inside before buying), Mego’s Aquaman is a pretty good reproduction of the comic-book version.

The one odd detail Mego felt to add was… pointed ears! Maybe the doll’s designer thought this guy was Sub-Mariner, perhaps? All in all, not a big deal—

Mego Mania The King of the Seven Seas was one of the first Mego action figures. From a 1973 Mego product catalog.

Aquaman, Superman, Batman, Robin TM & © DC Comics.

Captain America © Marvel. Tarzan © ERB, Inc.

20 • BACK ISSUE • Aquaman Issue

by R o b

Kelly

Teeth of Terror (top) Mego catalog promo for Aquaman vs. the Great White Shark, inspired by the Jaws craze of the ’70s. (center) A 2015 reissue of the set. (bottom) Aquaman dives front and center onto the Mego Hall of Justice playset art.

Aquaman TM & © DC Comics.

considering how freewheeling Mego could sometimes be with its figure designs, we’re lucky their Aquaman didn’t come with winged feet.

Despite never being a huge seller (a.k.a. a “peg warmer,” in industry parlance), Aquaman remained part of the WGSH line throughout its decade-long run. No matter what packaging changes were made by Mego, you could find an Aquaman figure sporting the line’s newest look. Part of that had to do with the relative low cost of the figure when it came to producing it—unlike Mego’s Conan, Green Arrow, or Thor figures, Aquaman didn’t come with complicated accessories or an elaborate costume— heck, he didn’t even have a chest symbol that needed to be separately produced and stuck onto the doll!

Cost was also a factor in the one playset Mego produced that centered on Aquaman—namely, the infamous Aquaman vs. the Great White Shark set. Produced in 1978, Mego figured that kids’ appetite for Jaws stuff was such that they could whip up a quick little toy and watch it fly (swim?) off the shelves. Despite the playset’s nifty box design, Aquaman vs. the Great White Shark was a flop, and now the toy is nearly impossible to find in good condition. Another odd bit of trivia— in Mego’s catalog that year, the Aquaman doll pictured has webbed fingers! Never released to toy shelves, exactly one example of this fishier Sea King exists, currently in the (presumably non-webbed) hands of a collector.

Mego’s WGSH line didn’t just rely on the 8" figures, of course. There were Mego’s smaller, more Star Wars-y Comic Action Heroes and Pocket Heroes lines, and Aquaman was part of them, too. Mego also dabbled with a 12" line, the sole WGSH variation that the Sea King was not included in. He is pictured front and center— drawn by Neal Adams, no less—on their beautiful Hall of Justice playset, reminding kids that while he may not have been as a big a name as Superman or Batman, he was, and always shall be, part of the team.

With the Super Friends now a globally recognized property, merchandisers realized they could costeffectively adapt products they already had and turn them into the kind of things fans of the show (and the Aquaman Issue • BACK ISSUE • 21

TM & © DC Comics.

tie-in DC comic, which launched in 1976) would want to buy. There was a Super Friends Colorforms set featuring all five heroes doing battle against evildoers on a waterfront background. Strangely, one of the extra pieces in the set resembles Quisp, the inter-dimensional imp from the earliest issues of Aquaman (back then you weren’t anyone in the DCU if you didn’t have your own dimensionhopping imp to annoy you) but who hadn’t appeared in years. There were Super Friends Shrinky Dinks, these weird little plastic things that you colored, cut, and then “baked” in the oven. There were stickers, of course, coloring books, Presto-Magix sets, Underoos (guilty), and party favors. Pretty much any toy or accessory that was made for kids’ consumption had a Super Friends version of it, and Aquaman was (almost) always included, helping him become a beloved figure to a generation of kids (raises hand).

Before we move onto the 1980s and another high point for Aquaman merch, there are two specific items worth shining a lighthouse-like spotlight on. First is a 1976 “Super Heroes” Checker Set that came with little 2" cardboard representations of DC heroes and villains. Because there more pieces were needed than just the five Super Friends, the makers of the set had to go deep into the DC bench, which delighted the six-year-old me when I got the set for my birthday.

Aside from the nice Aquaman piece (drawn by Dick Giordano), you got Metamorpho, Green Arrow, Black Canary, Dr. Light, and even the Shark in this thing. For a comic-book nerd, this game is manna from heaven.

The other item is one of most rare pieces of Aquamerchandise that’s ever existed, an item that is almost never found complete. I’m talking about Aquaman’s Supersea Aquarium, produced in 1974 by a company called Living World. It’s a perfect, if larger scale, example of a manufacturer finding a way after the fact to attach a recognizable character to an item they were already producing. Aquaman’s Supersea Aquarium is pretty much just a small fish tank in molded green plastic that came with a custom-produced cardboard background

This One’s Kinda Fishy Living World’s Aquaman Supersea Aquarium from 1974, an ultra-rare Sea King collectible.

Aquaman figure on box by Dick Giordano.

Aquaman TM & © DC Comics.

22 • BACK ISSUE • Aquaman Issue

of Aquaman (drawn by Dick Giordano, aping the classic Murphy Anderson stock art pose) swimming around Atlantis. You attached this background to your tank, and voila! Your goldfish have been transported into the DC Universe. It also came with a small booklet with Aquaman dispensing advice on how to care and feed your fish (he doesn’t mention that he probably doesn’t like you holding his finny friends in captivity in the first place). I have only seen this aquarium for sale one or two times in my life, and these were not complete.

Aquaman continued appearing on various Super Friends-branded items throughout the late 1970s and 1980s, even as the character itself could never seem to land a permanent home in the comics (from his solo title to Adventure Comics to World’s Finest Comics then back to Adventure Comics…). He continued to appear (if sporadically) on Saturday mornings thanks to Super Friends, but with Mego’s WGSH line winding down in 1982 he didn’t appear much at all in action-figure aisles.

Then, thanks to Kenner, in 1984 he got a big boost as part of the initial wave (sorry, still not done) of the Super Powers Collection, a line of action figures that boasted near-perfect reproductions of DC’s biggest stars.

Featuring hidden mechanisms, which gave the figures “Super Power Action,” these eight heroes and four villains were a hit with kids and collectors alike. Baring gorgeous packaging using now-classic stock art by José Luis García-López (Praise Be His Name), the Super Powers Aquaman came with a trident accessory, an item that would become ubiquitous to the character forever after.

While Aquaman as a comic-book character never achieved the sales of his fellow Super Friends, having him as part of the first wave of heroes was an indication that, thanks to Super Friends, he simply had to be included in any massscale recreation of the DCU. While not as long lasting, the Super Powers Collection line of merchandise was just as big, if not bigger, than had earlier come along in the early ’70s for the Super Friends. There were three comic-book miniseries, coloring books, sleeping bags, crayon sets, drinking

Lots of Aqua-Stuff You’re Gonna Want

glasses, jigsaw puzzles… the list goes on and on. Warner Home Video even dug up the old Filmation cartoons and rebranded them for the homevideo market. As a video-store employee in the early 1990s, I can attest that at least one Aquaman fan ran these cartoons in the store’s closed-circuit television system, generating the occasional rental from customers who thought they would be great for their kids.

One of the biggest differences between the Super Friends merch and the Super Powers Collection was its presentation.

Pre-Star Wars, most film and TV studios didn’t see merchandise as a major source of income, so licenses tended to be awarded haphazardly with not a lot of attention to detail. You can find some pieces of Super Friends merchandise with packaging so crudely drawn you wonder what if the artist had any clue as to what these characters were supposed to look like. The same was not true for the Super Powers Collection, which often used pre-made work by DC Style Guide artist José Luis García-López (and Dick Giordano) that came in thick binders featuring the characters in all manners of pre-approved, spot-on poses, complete with logos, closeups, and group shots. Aquaman has rarely looked better when drawn by García-López, and nowadays even the Style Guide catalogs themselves (an item never meant for public consumption in its original form) command high prices from collectors and people who appreciate great comic-book art.

Aquaman didn’t get a vehicle or playset in the Super Powers Collection, but it didn’t really matter. He was along for the ride, appearing alongside his fellow heroes in battle against the forces of evil. He never got a bad guy of his own to square off against—in Wave 2 Jack Kirby’s Fourth World characters were added, making Darkseid the “big bad” of the line going forward. While all those figures are beautifully rendered (and it helped Kirby receive well-deserved royalties), it did mean we never got a Mera, Black Manta, or Ocean Master Super Powers figure, which is a shame— surely they would have been sights to behold.

Kenner eventually lost the DC Super Heroes license to Toy Biz, which produced a line of figures in the late 1980s about which the less said the better. Thanks in part to Peter David’s work on a new Aquaman series, chronicled elsewhere in this issue, the Sea King would experience a rising tide of popularity that has continued mostly unabated until today. In 2011 DC made Aquaman a lynchpin of their New 52 rebranding, and in the last few years he has been on more merchandise than ever before. This is all a prelude of course to 2018’s Aquaman movie, a turn of events this Aqua-fan would have never imagined was possible when he sat down to watch Super Friends, all those decades ago.

(top left) A screen capture from an Aquaman appearance in a 1978 Underoos TV commercial. (top right) Mego’s Comic Action Hero Aquaman (with questionable hand position). (middle) The Sea King (whose name is misspelled “Aqua Man”) on the 1976 Super Friends lunch box from Aladdin and the box front of the “Superadventure” (a rebranded Super Friends) Colorforms set. (bottom) The Super Powers and Toy Biz Aquaman figures.

Aquaman and characters TM & © DC Comics.

ROB KELLY (wearing Aquaman Underoos in this childhood photo) is a writer/artist/ comics and film historian. He is the host or co-host of several shows on The Fire and Water Podcast Network, including Aquaman and Firestorm: The Fire and Water Podcast, The Film and Water Podcast, TreasuryCast, Superman Movie Minute, and Pod Dylan.

Aquaman Issue • BACK ISSUE • 23

Black Manta first bedeviled Aquaman in the hero’s self-titled book, issue #35 (Sept.–Oct. 1967), but his debut was not all that auspicious. It nearly seemed an after-thought as the Sea King spends much of his energies in that tale battling the Ocean Master.

This new villain was the co-creation of writer Bob Haney and artist Nick Cardy, and this first appearance included a curious bit of dialogue uttered by Aquaman on the third page, when he states, “This vehicle is a lure of my old enemy… Black Manta!” How he got to be an “old enemy” so quickly is anyone’s guess, but it wouldn’t take long for him to make his mark in the murky depths.

HE’S GOT THE LOOK

Manta’s design is a simple, yet striking visual, described aptly by Jim Lee in DC Comics Super-Villains (2014): “That helmet, and that silhouette, is what really defines the character. Why that shape? It can be hard to explain at times. Things that might look silly from the ’50s or ’60s can work if you refine them in a visually striking way.

Look at car design. Cars that have been around for 50 years, like the Porsche 911, have certain elements that you just have to have. But they’re able to refine the edges to make it look modern. And at the same time, retro.”

That diving helmet, essentially an over-sized scuba re-breather, grants Black Manta an unforgettable profile and aside from concealing his features, also serves as a weapon, but that would come later. In the debut tale he is seen using other means of assault, to include his combination underwater headquarters/submarine, the atomic-powered Manta Ship, which resembles its namesake with its energy blasts, along with the mutant Manta-Men that he controls in his nefarious bidding. The new villain describes his mission thusly: “That is why Black Manta was born to conquer… to gain the ultimate power!”

Before the story closes, Black Manta has kidnapped Arthur Curry, Jr., known colloquially as Aquababy, but Mera’s only child is returned unharmed in a hostage exchange with Aquaman. This scenario is perhaps some unintended foreshadowing of things to come.

The capsule containing the tot begins to double back to Black Manta’s sub, but then the Ocean Master intervenes, intercepting the youngster. Later, Ocean Master battles the Black Manta hand-to-hand until they’re caught in a current and carried away.

Black Manta was soon back in Aquaman #42 (Nov.–Dec. 1968), where he is featured on a Nick Cardy-rendered cover with some imaginative use of the Aquaman logo.

We begin to see some of Black Manta’s motivation in this Steve Skeates-scripted story as he has set himself up as the ruler of a primitive underwater people called the Marzons. Manta has a lust for power and will do anything within his abilities to gain it, preferably with Atlantis itself as the brass ring. One notable development in this

Undersea Enmity Black Manta, slayer of Aquababy, traps the late child’s grieving father on the Jim Aparodrawn cover to the Sea King’s comeback issue, Aquaman #57 (Aug.–Sept. 1977).

TM & © DC Comics.

24 • BACK ISSUE • Aquaman Issue

by B r y a n

D. Stroud

story was the first use of that unique helmet as a weapon, with blinding and disorienting beams being shot from the eyes to try to negate Aquaman in battle.

Furthermore, Black Manta is under suspicion by the Sea King of having been the perpetrator of the disappearance of his beloved family back in issue #40.

This subplot brings to light a subtle but significant fact about Aquaman. While Hawkman, and later the Elongated Man, fellow members of the Justice League of America, are also husbands, only Aquaman, in addition to the tremendous responsibility of ruling the seas—which comprise 71% of the surface of the Earth—is also a father.

A couple more appearances by Black Manta in Aquaman’s book occurred as the Bronze Age was dawning, but they were relatively minor, and unfortunately this was also the time for the series’ curtain call with issue #56 (Mar.–Apr. 1971).

Never fear, however, as both Black Manta and the Aquaman title would return.

BRONZE AGE BADNESS

The storyline serial that would forever define Black Manta’s infamy began in the pages of the venerable Adventure Comics, starting with issue #435 (Sept.–Oct. 1974), where the Sea King began as a backup feature for a trio of issues— and, of course, Black Manta came right along with him. By the time issue #441 hit the newsstands in 1975, the Spectre had been replaced

by Aquaman on both the cover and as the lead feature, and soon Aquaman’s life and career were going to get very complicated.

The pressures of being both an active member of the Justice League of America and the King of Atlantis were beginning to take their toll.

The people of Atlantis went so far as to dethrone Aquaman and install a new king named Karshon. Having been effectively exiled, the family relocates to an undersea cave to try to start life anew, but Aquaman’s enemies are never far away. In Adventure Comics #446 (July–Aug. 1976), Black Manta is back, this time involving himself in a smuggling paul levitz operation that seems to be some gun-running. Somehow, he is fully aware of the dethroning of Aquaman and is determined to make © Luigi Novi / things as miserable as possible for his foe. As part of this latest effort, Wikimedia Commons.

Black Manta goes so far as to capture Aqualad in a tank with Manta Rays and Electric Rays, both of the “Order Batoidei,” to threaten the ally of Aquaman.

As the series was continuing to unfold, there was a rotating cast of creative talent contributing to the stories, though the art tasks were consistently and expertly accomplished by the late, great Jim Aparo. Another constant member of the creative team, whether plotting, scripting, or editing, was Paul Levitz. While his memories are a little vague on the Aquaman run, he does share a few anecdotes about his multi-tasked assignment for BACK ISSUE, beginning with how he managed to get involved initially. “The Aquaman series was supposed to be written by me, but when Carmine [Infantino] read (or skimmed) issue #441, he felt I wasn’t ready, so for several issues thereafter, other writers either dialogued over my finished work or wrote the scripts based on my plots. When Carmine was no longer in charge, a few months later, I was able to resume work on it and other scripting assignments.”

Joe Orlando was credited as editor, but according to Paul, his efforts were somewhat limited: “Joe certainly had plot discussions, and edited the scripts. It wasn’t a series he was particularly fascinated by, so it wasn’t deep involvement.”

One of the writers who provided key input during the series was David Michelinie, who recalls joining the team as follows: “I’d been working mostly for Joe Orlando and Paul Levitz since I started writing for DC Comics in the early 1970s, so I was part of their stable and when the series writing chores came open, and they offered the gig to me.

I was delighted, since it was my first change to write a superhero series after several years of war, supernatural, and mystery stories, but it turned out not to be quite the experience I thought it would be.

“At the time, Aquaman was pretty much confined to the ocean,” Michelinie continues.

“He couldn’t easily interact with the ‘normal’ world, do the human things that Marvel had pioneered like hang out with friends at the local coffee shop, catch the latest blockbuster at the downtown multiplex, have relationships with un-super folks— Sinister in the Silver Age things that readers could relate to. It was actually more like writing a character on another planet, with its own environment, culture, and political statements, rather than writing, (inset) Nick Cardy cover to Aquaman #35 say, Spider-Man or Captain America in New York City. I was grateful to have the opportunity, (Sept.–Oct. 1967), Black Manta’s first but it wasn’t exactly what I was expecting.”

Michelinie shares how he and Paul Levitz interfaced: “As I recall, Paul had been writing appearance. Inside, the villain terrorizes the Aquaman before I took over and continued to plot the character for my first couple of depths with (center) his Manta-Men and stories. I think I just wrote the scripts from his plots on those issues. So, we really didn’t collaborate much in the give-and-take sense. I wrote stories from his plots, then wrote my his awesome sub and ominous appearance. own stories and plots when I took over the series solo. I’m sure I discussed plotlines with (bottom) Another stunning Cardy classic Joe [Orlando], but I don’t remember any specifics.”

Martin Pasko was given writing detail for two issues during this run in Adventure Comics cover, for Aquaman #42 (Nov.–Dec. 1968). #446 (July–Aug. 1976) and 447 (Sept. 1976) and has a few recollections to share. “I came in on Aquaman because Paul Levitz, in his staff capacity at DC, got tied up with a big TM & © DC Comics.

Aquaman Issue • BACK ISSUE • 25

Like a Bad Penny… (left) Aparo original art page from Aquaman #53 (Sept.– Oct. 1970). (right) Aquaman was revived in this Skeates/Mike Grell backup in Adventure Comics #435 (Sept.–Oct. 1974)… and look who came along!

TM & © DC Comics.

project that kept him working overtime and cut down to ‘de facto pitch’ in execution. (A ‘de facto pitch’ is the on his freelance hours. So, he needed someone to pinch-hit entire script you’re writing when they don’t know what on the scripting for a few issues till the project wrapped. they want till they don’t see it.)

I wasn’t offered the job because I was an “So, I did my usual research, made my notes, Aqua-maven. No, I only got the nod because and started asking Paul questions about Joe Orlando, the editor, was comfortable what was intended to be held back from the reader; what is really going on here? with me and because Paul was my roommate, so he could always peer over my etc. In other words, what are we shoulder, mid-job. As for me, I leapt at foreshadowing? What subtext am I writing here? But Paul suggested that I the assignment—and I mean leapt— only because I’d always wanted to see write it purely externally, without trying my stuff drawn by Jim Aparo. to get inside the head of the character, “So, Paul handed me his synopsis, and that my ignorance of whoever he would be revealed to be (as opposed to broken down by page, which he’d what he was at the time, in the thenalready written and gotten approved.

That’s how Joe Orlando worked: established continuity), would help writers always had to write an outline, strike the mysterious and suspenseful martin pasko tone they were trying to achieve. even if they were scripting the job “The only other thing I remember themselves. So I could stay close to the outline, but everything else—such as how to play about those two issues is that I was actually being pushed these cryptic scenes that raise the question of who, to write the villains more violently than was my own exactly, is this Black Manta character?—was up to me inclination—meaning, per the way I’d been ‘trained’ to play supervillains by editors like Julius Schwartz. This, on the basis of Joe’s argument that readers root harder for the hero to beat the bad guy the more despicably and cruelly the villain behaves, and so that evil must be dramatized, in a scene early on. (A lesson well-learned, by the way.) But this had more to do with my treatment of the other villain than with Black Manta.”

There was an interesting build-up in the series, with Aquaman encountering multiple villains, such as the Fisherman, who is actually working in conjunction with Black Manta, but interestingly, when David Michelnie took over scripting duties, less-orthodox rogues arrived to put in appearances as well. First up was the Weather Wizard, who typically battled the Flash, in Adventure Comics #450 (Mar.–Apr. 1977), and—going clear back to the first adventure of the Justice League of America in The

26 • BACK ISSUE • Aquaman Issue

Brave and the Bold #28 (Feb.–Mar. 1960)—Starro the Conqueror showed up in issue #451 (May–June 1977).

David Michelinie shares his thought process on bringing in unusual foes: “When I took over the [Aquaman] character, I was pretty much using characters that belonged in, or could work well in, an underwater environment. Even when I brought Weather Wizard in from Flash’s rogues’ gallery, I was able to set the story both on and in the ocean. As for Starro, I remembered his first appearance in a Justice League story when I was a little kid, so it was fun to finally write him myself.”

BLACK MANTA UNMASKED

Adventure Comics #452 (July–Aug. 1977) provided the crescendo of the storyline and contained a significant event in Black Manta’s career. On page 9, a solid decade after his debut, he is shown for the very first time without his helmet and is revealed to be a black man.

We learn as the story continues that part of his motivation is to ensure the superiority of his race under the sea, since it seems to be doomed on the surface.

When asked about the initiative, David Michelinie responds, “I assume that was me. I had attended college during the politically active ’60s and early ’70s and tried to address social issues and their impact on individuals when I could, when it would add some relevance to a story without being preachy.” Later in that same issue, our writer showed his ability to slip in some topical humor, referencing the popular bestseller and blockbuster movie, Jaws, when Black Manta quips,

“You were expecting perhaps Peter Benchley?” That would be the final light moment in this story.

Black Manta has once again kidnapped Arthur Curry, Jr., along with his octopus guardian, Topo, and placed him into an air-filled globe, which means the child will suffocate in approximately five minutes. The villain has staged a fight to the death between Aquaman and Aqualad in a twisted version of an undersea gladiator battle, stipulating that once one of them has been killed, he will flood the globe with water, sparing Aquaman’s son. Once the signal is given, feeling he has no choice in the matter, the Sea King goes on a vicious offensive, startling Aqualad, who is now forced to desperately fight for his own survival.

The back-and-forth fray continues until inspiration strikes Aquaman. He telepathically orders Topo to break free from his imprisonment, then get to Black Manta’s control switch and destroy it. The massive octopus responds, but the action is too late and the unthinkable happens when Arthur Curry, Jr. dies.

Flooded with the powerful twin juggernaut emotions of monumental grief and nearly overpowering rage, Aquaman can think only of swiftly bringing Black Manta to justice. He asks Aqualad to join him in pursuing his fleeing foe, but his young ally, still shaken at seeing his friend trying to kill him, declines, leaving the King of Atlantis, feeling particularly alone, now on his own to capture the man who has killed his only son.

David Michelinie gives the credit to Paul Levitz so far as the decision to allow Arthur Curry, Jr. to die. “I can’t be absolutely sure after all these decades, but I don’t

No Love Lost (left) With Mera’s and Aquababy’s lives imperiled, Aquaman doesn’t hold back in Adventure #448 (Nov. 1976). By Paul Levitz and Aparo. (right) Aquaman— and readers— discovered the man behind under the helmet as Black Manta unmasks in Adventure #452 (July–Aug. 1977).

By David Michelinie and Aparo.

TM & © DC Comics.

Aquaman Issue • BACK ISSUE • 27

think that was my idea. I imagine it was something Paul was moving toward with his plots, though it could have been something Joe [Orlando] suggested.” Michelinie does admit, however, that “I was really glad not to have to write the term ‘Aquababy’ anymore!”

This would be the final chapter for Aquaman in the Adventure Comics series, and after having gone dormant for over six years, he transitioned back to his own title with Aquaman #57 (Aug.–Sept.

1977), where he continued his hunt for Black Manta. Michelinie was still the writer and speculates that the Sea King’s popularity was in ascension. “I assume Adventure Comics’ sales were up enough that the company felt a solo Aquaman book would be profitable. But it could have just been that the folks in charge wanted to increase the number of DC comics on the stands. Either way, it was almost certainly based on financial considerations.”

In “A Life for a Life,” Aquaman does successfully catch up with Black Manta, but in the defining moment of capture, when the craven foe begs for mercy, our hero responds as only a true hero can. After a brief inner conflict, he releases Black Manta to the authorities, effectively closing this chapter of the evildoer’s nefarious career.

David Michelinie continued to write the Sea King’s adventures for a few more issues, but moved on after #61, and the recently revived title itself folded one year and six editions later with issue #63.

When asked if a better gig came along, he offers that it probably had.

“I don’t have a specific memory of the reason, but I think your supposition is probably pretty close,” Michelinie says. “That was about the time I was offered the chance to create a couple of series, and my three goals when I moved to New York to break into comics had been (1) sell a story—which I did in 1973 to House of Secrets; (2) write a series—which I did with ‘Unknown Soldier’ in Star Spangled War Stories; and (3) create a new series that gets published—which I then

did with Star Hunters [covered in BACK ISSUE #81] and Claw the Unconquered [see BI #43]. So, leaving a regular gig to make my dream come true is a reasonable possibility.”

Paul Levitz adds, “The mid-’70s were a very rough time for newsstand comics, so things were constantly being tried and cancelled. I’m sure Aquaman didn’t sell particularly well, but it wasn’t a notorious disaster, either. Just another casualty of the times.”

BLACK MANTA IN THE DARK AGE

Aquaman’s book would return and with it, his nemesis, but it took nearly a quarter century until Black Manta was finally given an origin tale in Aquaman #6 (May 1992). Writer Shaun McLaughlin shares his recollections of that time with BACK ISSUE: “I came up with the origin, but I really don’t remember if it was requested or a part of my plotting. I know that the African-American reveal [in Adventure #452] with no backstory was something that I thought needed to be addressed. I was told that everything was continuity and that I had to work with that.”

The backdrop that was provided in the book is that Black Manta had grown up in Baltimore, Maryland, and as a boy enjoyed spending time by the Chesapeake Bay, but was shanghaied into servitude on a ship for a period of time and was abused by the kidnappers. During this imprisonment, he spotted the figure of a man playing in the sea with dolphins. The boy tried to signal for help but was not seen and ultimately had to use violence to escape the ship, knifing and killing one of the crewmen. This led to a smoldering hatred for the sea and by association, the Sea King.

Shaun McLaughlin shares his thoughts in crafting this angle, explaining also why the figure representing Aquaman was somewhat vague in the story: “My idea was that Manta had been kidnapped and abused as a child aboard a ship. He’d come to hate the sea and especially Aquaman, who seemed to personify the sea. No one had ever come to save the child Manta, yet Aquaman seemed to be there for everyone else.

“This series was plagued by regular editorial flip-flopping about the direction of the book and if we were trying to appeal to adults or a younger audience. A plot would be approved and then would have to be shoehorned into the editorial fiat of the day. I was a new writer and not handling this the best way, so I had to obscure what was obvious in a first draft.”

The plot twists in this pivotal story included an allusion to Manta’s death and Aquaman losing his grip on his sanity, which is further discussed by our writer: “My plot had Aquaman literally beating Manta to death (hence the cover). This would have led to a long storyline of Aquaman in conflict with the United Nations and the JLA and becoming a rogue hero.

“I thought that Manta was the most successful DC villain—he had killed Arthur, Jr. and that led to the dismantling of Aquaman’s life as a king and father. It seemed like Manta should pay a price and then Aquaman should pay a price. I was building Aquaman as a nice guy holding it all together for the first issues (see the sequence at the Aquacave) and then the dam would break and he’d lose control.

“Again, editorial flip-flopped and I was told, ‘Heroes don’t kill’—which is ironic considering the current state of comics,” McLaughlin laments.

“My vision was that Aquaman was going to be the straight-shooter hero gone hard case. Then he’d have to work his way back into the good graces of the UN/Justice League and having to find out who Arthur Curry was in the ’90s.”

Shaun had an extensive background as a fan of Aquaman, so little research was required for his stories, but he does share one interesting fact about his inspirations: “A lot of the backstory came from my memories of Jack London sea stories and trying to look at those through a ’90s lens.”

Begging Bad Guy Black Manta pleads for mercy from a vengeful Sea King in Aquaman #57. By Michelinie and Aparo.

TM & © DC Comics.

28 • BACK ISSUE • Aquaman Issue

MALEVOLENT MOTIVATIONS

Over the years, Black Manta has been a member in “bad” standing of the Legion of Doom, the Injustice League, the Secret Society of Super-Villains, and even the Suicide Squad, and has also made the odd appearance in books like Green Arrow and Captain Atom, but he may be at his most lethal when he is relentlessly pursuing his goals of conquering Atlantis and destroying its protector, Aquaman.

So, what makes this villain tick? Pure hatred? A simple lust for power? A few thoughts on his motivations may serve as a fitting conclusion to this short history of the character.

First, David Michelinie: “I don’t know what was done with the character after I wrote him, but in those tales, he was both brilliant and ruthless—and that’s a hard combination for anyone to beat!”

Shaun McLaughlin finds some deeper psychological issues in Black Manta: “It’s not straight hatred. He’s stunted, emotionally— there’s an injured, abused child who is angry that there was no one there to save him. I was reminded of this watching Mindhunter on Netflix recently. I had probably read some Thomas Harris at this point—Red Dragon—and I was aware of some of the ideas about childhood abuse leading to serial criminals. Manta was focused on the sea. Aquaman was the hero of the sea. The hero never helped the child Manta, so Manta was going to take his revenge.”

Included in the back of Justice #1 (Oct. 2005), Jim Krueger, writing from the point of view of Bruce Wayne in his private files stored on the Batcomputer, described Black Manta in some detail.

“Black Manta’s identity is irrelevant. He has become the mask he wears. There is nothing hidden beneath. This is why, like many other criminals I have faced, I believe him to be completely beyond rehabilitation. At some point in the past, he simply put on the helmet and chose to live in opposition to his fellow man. It is a madness that defines the world in such small terms; everything else is a contradiction to be hated.

“He is not opposed to humanity in its entirety, but to all save a remainder of his own people.

Because of his race, he uses the slavery of generations past to justify his want for a kingdom, a nation of his own. Black Manta has convinced himself that there is nothing he may do against the common man that is unjustified—from brutality to theft to murder.

“He has hated for so long that he is no longer a man who hates, but hate itself. Perhaps this is shaun mc laughlin the danger of prejudice—not merely for the cruelty of one time perpetrated by one people and mindset, but for its potential pollution and condemnation of generations to come.

“Black Manta hunts reassures hidden and lost in the oceans.

He has found criminals to join his cause, some human, others now mutated. These will become the people of his kingdom.

For now, he is a nomad, basing his operations off the coast of various islands in the Pacific. He has set his sights on the wealth of Atlantis. This has made him the enemy of Aquaman.”

He’s Had Enough, Already (top) Kevin Maguire’s forceful cover to Aquaman #6 (May 1992). (bottom) Writer Shaun McLaughlin and artists Ken Hooper and Bob Dvorak provide some backstory to Black Manta in that same issue.

TM & © DC Comics.

Black Manta has endured now for over 50 years and has left an indelible mark wherever he chooses to strike.

He is unmistakably the deadliest foe that Aquaman has battled, and his story is far from over.

BRYAN D. STROUD is a longtime fan of DC Comics, particularly the Silver and Bronze Ages, and has been contributing to the website of his lifelong best friend, Ron Daudt, for over a decade, doing reviews of those classics.

Aquaman Issue • BACK ISSUE • 29

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Forget Rodney Dangerfield. Aquaman’s the real one who gets no respect.

A DC mainstay ever since his debut in 1941’s More Fun Comics #73, Aquaman survived into the Silver and Bronze Age by virtue of being underestimated. A consistent backup feature, he received a solo series in 1962, his popularity waxing and waning like the tides. Through cancellations, relaunches, and revamps, he’s been a Justice Leaguer, a Super Friend, a husband and a father, king of an underwater nation, and ruler of three-fourths of the planet.

But to most of the general public, he’s still just that guy who talks to fish.

From 1986 to 2001, a number of talented creators worked on the Sea King, each trying new things to fight this popular misconception. The result was 15 years that brought more changes to the character than the previous 45 years put together.

POZNER TAKES THE PLUNGE

by J o h n

Tr u m b u l l

Aquaman’s first post-Crisis treatment was in a four-issue miniseries by writer Neal Pozner, penciler Craig Hamilton, and inker Steve Montano. In Aquaman #2’s text piece, On Learning to Breathe Underwater, Pozner shared the genesis of the project: Impressed with an analysis of Wonder Woman that DC design director Pozner wrote, executive editor Dick Giordano invited him to pitch for an available character in the DC Universe. Considering his options, Aquaman caught Pozner’s eye.

In Pozner’s view, Aquaman was “potentially a very neat character. This guy had a rich history and heritage in the DC Universe, and no one had done anything revolutionary with him in the last [15] years. Well, could I bring him a new approach?”

A few days later, Pozner brought his analysis of Aquaman to Giordano: “1. The character looked as exciting as a Waring blender. His costume hadn’t changed in over [40] years, and unlike Superman’s uniform, it hadn’t stood the test of time well.

“2. Having him in above-land adventures made him quite literally a fish out of water. In fact, he had never worked well relating to surface-dwellers.

“3. Atlantis was a vague concept which had never been explored in depth. Or perhaps I should say, several vague concepts within the framework of the DC Universe which had never been related.

“4. Aquaman has consistently been portrayed as a hothead, a totally dislikeable, unsympathetic protagonist, unable to support a book on his own.

“I proposed several things: Integrating several different [versions of] Atlantis from DC’s cosmology

The Acumen of Aquaman Gallopin’ guppies! From maligned monarch to hook-wielding warrior to undersea King Arthur, Aquaman has perhaps been DC’s most frequently changing superhero since 1985’s Crisis on Infinite Earths. Shown here is the Martin Egeland/Brad Vancata cover to 1994’s Aquaman #1, with some other Aqua-issues explored in this article.

Aquaman TM & © DC Comics.

Aquaman Issue • BACK ISSUE • 31

(Aquaman’s, Arion’s, Warlord’s, and so forth) with contemporary theories of what Atlantis might have been in our real world (assuming it ever existed), and figuring out a history of the continent based on mythology and pseudo-archaeology done on the fabled lost continent; a new costume that would be more contemporary and somehow show what Aquaman was all about; a situation which would examine Arthur Curry’s personality as it had been established and force a change to it which would make him a hero people could care about.”

Giordano liked Pozner’s ideas, and had him start work on a story proposal and a new costume design. Pozner dove into his research, reading every Aquaman appearance dating back to the Golden Age, the complete runs of Justice League of America and Arion, Lord of Atlantis, as well as several books on oceanography and the mythology of Atlantis.

Pozner continued, “I remembered a costume designed by the art nouveau artist Léon Bakst for Nijinsky and the Ballets Russes which would be the inspiration for the new Aquaman uniform.

And I assembled a package that had a detailed character analysis, history of Atlantis, costume design, and plot synopsis.”

Breaking from the past, Pozner decided to have the miniseries take place largely underwater, and choose a mystical emphasis rather than the science fiction of most Aquaman stories. In issue #3’s letters column, Pozner explained, “No matter how you look at it, historically and cross-culturally, water is linked to mysticism.

Add this to the mythic roots of the Atlantean legend and a mystical/mythological approach seemed the most logical to me.”

Although he found writing a laborious process, Pozner kept at it, ultimately turning in his final script for the miniseries in July 1984, over a year and a half from his initial proposal.

ATLANTEAN ARTISTS

With the miniseries written, the search began for a penciler, with an emphasis on artists outside of DC’s regular talent pool. As Neal Pozner wrote in Aquaman #2, “I especially wanted an artist who could draw moody, romantic, art-nouveauinspired fantasy. There was also a sensuality underneath the story that I felt was very important to convey. And yet, there was a great deal of emotionalism and violence.”

British artist Alan Davis was the initial choice, but after completing breakdowns on the first issue, Davis was persuaded to take on Batman and the Outsiders as the better career move. Davis intended to return to Aquaman after completing his year on BATO, but within six weeks, the book was reassigned. [Author’s note: For a more detailed account of Davis’ involvement with Aquaman, please see TwoMorrows’ Modern Masters vol. 1: Alan Davis.]

Finally, after close to a year of searching, Pozner met Atlanta College of Art alum Craig Hamilton through mutual friend Klaus Janson, resulting in Hamilton scoring the assignment. Hamilton was thrilled to have his first job in comics working on a favorite character. “Aquaman had always been my favorite Justice League member and when I saw the costume that Neal had designed, I fell instantly in love with it and understood how it craig hamilton worked so spectacularly with anatomy, one of my strong points.

I recognized the Léon Bakst influence of the design and I think that impressed Neal,” Hamilton tells BACK ISSUE. “He set up a meeting with Dick Giordano at the DC offices, which is probably the most exciting thing that could happen for a 19-year-old artist who had been not just dreaming, but aiming for a career in comics.

Aquaman ’86 (top) Aquaman writer Neal Pozner (1955–1994), and an unidentified Aqua-fan. Circa 1993. (center) Courtesy of John Trumbull, a Russian ballet program and photo revealing the possible inspiration for Aquaman’s “camouflage” costume. (bottom) Artist Craig Hamilton (right) and his Atlanta College of Art instructor, Houser Smith, circa 1990, in a photo by Tiffany Brown. Says Craig of his teacher, “Houser Smith was a brilliant portraitist and learning from him made me look at faces and hands as unique structures and utterly essential in visual storytelling.” (inset) Hamilton today.

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“It was an exciting day when Neal told me that we had a meeting with Dick to discuss my samples.

They were being gracious but rather coy and before they could tell me, Joe Orlando popped into the meeting to tell me how excited he was to color my work! I was a bit confused as Joe looked at Dick and said, ‘Oh, you haven’t told him yet?’ Mr. Giordano grinned broadly and said, ‘You got it, kid.’ This is still to this day one of my most joyful memories.”

Hamilton poured himself into Aquaman, taking nine months to draw the four issues. As he wrote in the second issue, “A lot of comics characters can only be distinguished by their costumes. To change that, I based all of my people on friends or celebrities.

Aquaman is a cross between Buster Crabbe and GQ model Jeff Aquilon. Nuada is modeled after Glenn Close, and Brea is based on Grace Jones. The various Atlantean council members are all roommates and neighbors. Mera is Lucille Ball in her starlet days.”

Explaining this practice, Hamilton says today, “I simply like to have a clear picture in my head of what a character’s face looks like, so some ‘casting’ helps me do that. I am drawn to unique faces, so I guess my casting reflects that. Strong, unique faces have features that are more effectively stylized as well. Actors make great models because I can study their expressions through their films.”

When it came to designing underwater worlds for his cast to explore, Hamilton says, “it was mostly tremendous fun! My love of history, oceanography,

astrology, magic, and mythology all came into play.

But we all know I have a tendency to go overboard with the details, and that can lead to unacceptable degrees of overthinking. I tend to think big, want to do too much, and pay attention to every detail. I am a perfectionist. It is both a strength and a weakness and something I will always have to be mindful of.”

When the first issue of the miniseries finally went on sale in November 1985, it had been nearly three years since Pozner’s initial proposal. Would the fans respond? Would it be worth the wait?

AQUAMAN VOL. 2: THE DEPTHS OF ATLANTIS (1986)

As the miniseries opens, Aquaman and his wife Mera find their home of New Venice ravaged by the Ocean Master, Arthur’s evil half-brother. As an enraged Aquaman attacks his brother, the Sea King is mystified

by Orm’s increased power and sudden disappearance.

Summoned back to Atlantis, Aquaman learns that the Royal Seal of Poseidonis has been stolen, the loss of which has the Atlantean people on verge of riots.

Going undercover with a new blue camouflage costume, Aquaman journeys to Thierna Na Oge, a recently rediscovered Atlantean city (loosely based on the Celtic legend of Tír na nÓg) that King Vulko suspects has mystically spirited away the seal.

In Thierna Na Oge, Aquaman finds himself caught in the royal power struggle between sorceress Nuada Silverhand and her evil sister Bres. Learning that Thierna

Aquaman Blue (left) Craig Hamilton’s stunning cover to Aquaman #1 (Feb. 1986), which launched the four-issue miniseries, certainly signaled to longtime readers that things were changing for the Sea King. (right) Courtesy of Craig, a scan of a 1986 illo he believes he produced for a convention. (inset) The artist based Aquaman’s appearance on the chiseled features of male model Jeff Aquilon, here clipped from a GQ cover, as well as Hollywood Flash Gordon Buster Crabbe.

TM & © DC Comics. GQ © Condé Nast.

Aquaman Issue • BACK ISSUE • 33

Man from Atlantis Courtesy of Craig Hamilton, a quartet of gorgeous renditions of the Sea King and his watery world. “They reflect my takes on the character’s various looks over the years and sum up the joy and love I have for Aquaman.”

Art © Craig Hamilton. Aquaman and related characters TM & © DC Comics.

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Na Oge’s own mystical talisman, the Lia Fail, has been stolen, Aquaman and Nuada escape the city together to find the lost icons. They soon discover that the thefts are the work of the Ocean Master, gathering up ancient Atlantean crystals to tap into their mystical energy. And since Orm’s magicks are emotion-based, Aquaman’s rage has been inadvertently fueling his brother’s rise to power. With the assistance of Nuada, Aquaman fights his brother on the astral plane, reliving the triumphs and tragedies of his life and feeling the emotions behind them fully for the first time.

The emotional onslaught proves to be too much for the Ocean Master, who is apparently destroyed in a blast of mystical energy. Although he mourns the loss of his brother, Aquaman emerges from the battle a new man: less swift to anger, more in touch with his emotions, and ready to start a new life.

A NEW WAVE

The 1986 Aquaman miniseries was one of DC’s more successful titles of the year, and plans began for a sequel series. Fandom was divided on the blue costume, with some preferring the new look, and others requesting a return to the orange and green. In the end, the difficultly of drawing the new costume was probably the deciding factor in restoring Aquaman’s original look.

As the main who drew the blue costume more than anyone, Craig Hamilton, says, “There is some nostalgic love for the blue camo suit and I think it outweighs the few who dislike it. Dislike isn’t a strong enough word.

People who dislike it flat-out hate it. The nostalgia stems, of course, from the fact that it didn’t last, but looking back, I think it was perfect for the ’80s. I loved it when the Brave and the Bold animated series introduced Arthur, Jr. with the blue suit and nu-wave hair! I think that was also the moment when I felt like I joined the ranks of the great Aquaman illustrators before me: Ramona Fradon, Nick Cardy, and Jim Aparo, all of whom I met and adore.

I still get sentimental (read: I’m crying like a baby) when I think of the friendship I had with Nick. He was so open and kind and when I first met him at Heroes Convention decades ago. He pulled me close and told me I was an Aquaman artist and that made me family.

“One change that I made in the series beyond the striking blue costume was one that did stick around in a big way,” Hamilton points out. “Ocean Master’s storyline involved his use of vast, dangerous magicks that he didn’t fully comprehend. I came up with the idea that this dark energy should manifest on his rather cheesy facemask. After all, Aquaman had a new look; why shouldn’t Orm? Neal and Dick both loved the idea and told me to go for it 100%! Over the course of the four issues it would gradually grow into something monstrous and more befitting an evil wizard. It has been drawn that way ever since!”

LOST AT SEA

With the miniseries a success, work started on a follow-up for ’87. Pozner plotted and scripted the first two issues of a new miniseries, picking up just minutes after the first. The sequel focused on Aquaman’s supporting cast, with Atlantis dealing with the nefarious Sunderland Corporation, Aquaman torn between Mera and Nuada, Mera coming into her own as a hero, and Aqualad beginning a new romance with Tawna, a girl from the surface world.

But Craig Hamilton, still burned out from drawing the first series, was only able to produce a handful of pages in two months’ time. Editor Barbara Randall Kesel hired penciler Jerome K. Moore to complete the series, but Moore also ran into deadline trouble.

Today, Moore says, “I think I only completed five or six

pages. Barbara initially asked me to ape Craig’s art style.

She suggested I use what I could from the pages he turned in, since they were already bought by DC. I culled what panels I liked, and redid what I did not. My choice.

But once I started turning in my own pages, Barbara expressed a great admiration (thankfully).”

Like his predecessor, Moore says, “I wanted to use real people as inspirational models for the characters where possible.” In addition to Meryl Steep as Nuada and Olympic gymnast Mitch Gaylord as Aqualad, “For Mera, I used supermodel Paulina Porizkova,” Moore says. “My Aquaman was just some male model I found, at least partially. I think I used an older Grace Kelly as my Makaira. I used Shamu for my killer whale.”

Although the project was never completed, Jerome Moore still considers his brief association with Aquaman a positive one. “I thoroughly enjoyed the experience, even though the project crashed and burned,” Moore tells BACK ISSUE. “I enjoyed working with Barbara, and I was excited to know that Kevin Nowlan was to be my inker.

Years later, I was delighted to finally meet Craig at ComicCon. He was extremely gracious and complimentary.

I spoke to Pozner on the phone after he left DC over this debacle. I was very apologetic, believing that the project

You Asked for Moore Courtesy of Jerome K. Moore, a page of original art from the aborted sequel to the 1986 Aquaman miniseries.

TM & © DC Comics.

Aquaman Issue • BACK ISSUE • 35

fell apart because of my deadline issues. But he assured me that it was not my fault. He, too, was quite complimentary of my work, and he was very kind. But he remained bitter over the experience.”

Craig Hamilton points out, “One of the pleasant things that has comes out of that was people discovering the marvelous Jerome K. Moore artwork! It is a bit weird that he was instructed to draw in my style, but I took it as acknowledgement that I had one and it was distinctive. My friendship with Jerome has flourished through social media over the years and I gladly pull him close and tell him that he’s an Aquaman artist, and that makes him family. There are too many instances of ‘Greatest Stories Never Told’ in comics and even though never published, these works definitely have a validity to the artist who created them.” [Author’s note: For more on the cancelled Pozner/ Hamilton/Moore miniseries, see Richard A. Scott’s article “The Aquaman Sequel That Wasn’t” in BACK ISSUE #46.]

But all the false starts had taken their toll on the Sea King. The 1986 miniseries was now a distant memory for many readers, and outside of a few brief guest appearances, Aquaman hadn’t seen print for the better part of two years.

AQUAMAN SPECIAL #1: THE MISSING PEACE (1988)

The task of following up the miniseries eventually fell to the writing team of Dan Mishkin and Gary Cohn, with art by George Freeman and Mark Pacella. Together, they produced “The Missing Peace,” a story continuing the themes of the 1986 mini in a more typical Aquaman adventure. It was released as Aquaman Special #1 in March of 1988.

Picking up shortly after the miniseries, the Special begins with a happily reunited Aquaman and Mera saving a fishing trawler from capsizing. Upon returning to Atlantis, Arthur demands that King Vulko return the throne to him, insisting he can now be a better king. But as

Arthur’s behavior grows increasingly erratic, his severe mood swings worry Vulko and Mera. When an Atlantean patrol craft is reported missing near the Ocean Master’s last known location, Aquaman, sensing an opportunity to prove himself, goes to investigate.

In the Antarctic, Aquaman and Mera find a Russian nuclear submarine, where Professor Vladimir Magus has been transformed by the mystical energies of the Atlantean crystals into a giant entity with incredible mental powers. With Magus unwilling to listen to reason, Aquaman enters the worlds of the zodiac crystals in the hopes of restoring him to sanity. But Aquaman gradually realizes that he is handicapped by the absence of his astral twin, who didn’t properly reunite with him at the end of his battle with the Ocean Master. Aquaman is able to defeat Magus by shifting the zodiac crystals out of their mystical alignment, restoring both the scientist and himself back to normal.

Finally whole once again, Aquaman muses, “Once I sought to control everything—myself and all that I touched! Magus now knows the danger of walking down that path! Yet the other way—pure emotion— leads just as swiftly to disaster! […] True happiness is found along a middle road! There lies the balance and the harmony—with reason and emotion not at war, but hand in hand!”

In retrospect, the story reads as something of a placeholder, leaving Aquaman in something very much like his old status quo: happily married to Mera, back in his classic costume, and an adventurer based in Atlantis, but not its king.

Today, co-writer Dan Mishkin says, “I don’t know if DC was trying to walk back the miniseries (written by the much-missed Neal Pozner).

I’d put it under the heading of one more damned attempt to try to make the character work, my thesis being that Aquaman started as a backup character and should have remained a second banana.

Despite loving many Aquaman stories, I see him as a character who has been constantly reinvented and never with long-term success.”

Rereading the Special today, Mishkin says, “It’s an okay story written in a classical late-Silver Age DC style. I know we were well past the Silver Age [by 1988], but it’s what we grew up on, and I think, to some extent were trained in. When I did this kind of job on an established character, I tried to let the character’s history speak through me rather than try to impose myself on it. I think it’s pretty clear we were trying as best we could, and in limited space, to integrate pieces of Aquaman’s history, both literally in the narrative and also commercially, I guess you’d say, to try to make him viable again. As to the substance of the story, I kind of like the emotional/spiritual angle of the divided self, but I think it would have needed to be told at a slower pace without so much rush-rush-rush in the main action.”

Mishkin’s collaborator Gary Cohn has a blunter assessment: “That wasn’t a good story. And it didn’t make a whole lot of sense, either,” to which Mishkin jokingly replies, “As you can probably guess from our differing assessments of the story, we haven’t spoken to each other since.”

Eventually, both the 1986 miniseries and the follow-up Special were retroactively removed from DC continuity. The next time Aquaman appeared in a solo story, he’d have a new origin for the post-Crisis DC Universe.

THE LEGEND OF AQUAMAN SPECIAL (1989)

Although readers often think of DC continuity as being revamped immediately after 1985’s Crisis on Infinite Earths, it actually took years to take shape, with some characters’ histories still being rewritten in the late ’80s. Aquaman received his new origin for the post-Crisis DCU in 1989’s The Legend of Aquaman Special. The creative team was plotter and breakdown artist Keith Giffen, scripter Robert Loren Fleming, penciler Curt Swan, and inker Eric Shanower.

In an interview with Darwin McPherson in Amazing Heroes #172 (Oct. 1989), Keith Giffen confessed that doing Aquaman “wasn’t my

Back to Basics In 1988’s Aquaman Special, co-written by Dan Mishkin and Gary Cohn, the Sea King transitioned back to his traditional garb. Art by George Freeman and Mark Pacella.

TM & © DC Comics.

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Perfectly Curt idea. I believe Barbara Randall [now Kesel] approached me about doing an Aquaman miniseries. She asked me if I’d be interested in the character. It gave me the chance Photocopy of Curt Swan’s pencils for the splash to work with Bob Fleming again, and I always wanted to do something with Curt page of The Legend of Aquaman Special #1 Swan, so I said sure.

“From there, they decided to do a Secret Origins [issue] about Aquaman, so we (1989), and the published version, with inks by did it. They asked us to expand it a bit and it became The Legend of Aquaman, which came out first. It looks like I was meaning to do it in that order, but actually, Eric Shanower, who contributed the pencil copy.

I signed on for a miniseries and The Legend of Aquaman came after the fact.

TM & © DC Comics.

“When I thought of Aquaman, the first thing that jumped into my head was an aquatic feral child,” Giffen told AH. “I thought that was an interesting idea to play with, so I said yeah. I thought it might be a challenge.”

Originally intended as the lead story in Secret Origins #30, The Legend of Aquaman was ultimately published as a standalone special in March of 1989. Clarifying the change to John Schwirian in BACK ISSUE #27, Secret Origins editor Mark Waid explained, “Because Eric Shanower was and is one of my favorite artists, I put him on Curt Swan to ink, and as the pages came in, they were so breathtakingly beautiful that the higher-ups at DC decided we could break it out of Secret Origins and issue it as its own one-shot so it could be on better paper with better production values.”

Legend of Aquaman inker Eric Shanower tells BACK ISSUE, “I do remember there were some last-minute changes to some of the pages.

I remember inking half pages because there were some changes to the story, so maybe that was part of it. I know that the epilogue was added relatively late. That was the section that included the half-page artwork.

“I didn’t have contact with Curt Swan while inking the story,” Shanower recalls. “I met him a couple years later at a DC Comics dinner. When we were introduced he referred to this project and said something like, ‘Oh, you’re the guy who put in all those little tiny lines.’

His attitude was that the technique I used took too much time and was too much work. eric shanower “My approach to inking Swan, pretty much my approach to inking any penciler, was to ink what’s there,” Shanower says.

“Some of his pencils on this project were rough, so I had to make Georges Sequin. specific line choices. There were places in the pencils early on where I wasn’t sure whether he intended solid black or a pattern. The patches of shaded coral on page 2 is an example. He’d scribbled over those areas with pencil. I started inking them by just going over the pencil lines that were there, not filling in with solid black. I liked the lacy look of the lines, so I kept up with that technique throughout the job. The result was that there are very few areas of solid black in the story.

I thought it looked good on the inked pages. I’m not sure it was the best result for the colored, printed pages.”

AQUAMAN’S NEW ORIGIN

The Legend of Aquaman opens with an infant abandoned underwater on Mercy Reef.

Exiled from Atlantis due to his blond hair, the child is expected to suffocate at low tide. Instead he survives, instinctively ordering away a hungry shark with his telepathy. As the child grows up, he gradually learns to live in the hostile seas, honing his hunting skills to survive.

Upon discovering the surface world, the now-teenage boy forms an unlikely friendship with a lonely lighthouse keeper. The two become surrogate father and son as the boy grows to manhood and the man enters old age. On his death, the old lighthouse keeper wills his name to the boy to use as his own: Arthur Curry.

Alone once more, the young man now known as Arthur Curry seeks out his birthplace of Atlantis in the hopes of finding his mother. But Atlantis, still under the dictatorship that tried to kill him as a child, throws Arthur into a prison called the Aquarium, where he is given the derisive nickname “Aquaman” and an orange and green prison uniform. There, he befriends Vulko, a former professor and fellow prisoner. Vulko teaches Arthur the Atlantean language so that he can one day speak to his mother, a prisoner in the women’s facility. When his mother dies before they can reunite, Arthur breaks out of the Aquarium, becoming known to the outside world as the hero Aquaman.

Returning to Atlantis years later, Aquaman discovers that his escape triggered a revolution, and its government is a benign one once again. As royal advisor Vulko shows him portraits of the former Royal Family, Aquaman recognizes his mother in one, learning she was the former queen. As the rightful heir to the throne, Arthur is reluctantly crowned king of Atlantis. Aquaman’s marriage to Mera, his partnership with Aqualad, and the death of his son Arthur, Jr. are all mentioned in the epilogue, confirming their places in the new continuity.

Aquaman’s pre-Crisis adventures were still largely intact. Only his beginnings had changed.

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AQUAMAN VOL. 3: THE TIDE OF BATTLE (1989)

TM & © DC Comics.

The five-issue follow-up miniseries, titled simply Aquaman (June–Oct. 1989), hit the stands that April, a month after the Special. The creative team of Giffen, Fleming, and Swan remained the same, with Al Vey replacing Eric Shanower on inks.

The miniseries opens with Aquaman returning to Atlantis after many months away only to discover that an invading force has captured the entire city and enslaved the populace. Allowing himself to be captured to uncover more information, Aquaman finds himself back in the Aquarium, in the political prisoner division. There, he learns that his absence created a power vacuum in Atlantis, with Vulko dead, a grieving Queen Mera committed to an insane asylum after the loss of her son, and Aqualad unwilling to succeed his mentor. The chaos leaves Atlantis vulnerable to invasion and occupation by jellyfish-like aliens. Aquaman soon joins the underground rebellion, turning their scattered strikes into a more organized resistance.

But just as the rebellion is preparing its final assault, Mera breaks out and blows their cover. Insane with grief and rage, Mera attacks her husband, accidentally getting

impaled on wreckage in the ensuing fight. Issue #3 ends with Aquaman grieving over his fallen bride, as the rebellion’s cries of victory echo in the distance.

Issue #4 (Sept. 1989) finds Atlantis still in peril.

Although the invaders have been driven from the city, they still surround the dome of Poseidonis, cutting off the city’s outside food supplies. And as the people look to their king for leadership, Aquaman is still mourning the death of his queen. But Mera has another shock in store when she suddenly springs from her coffin, revealing her injury was far from fatal. A hysterical Mera screams to her former husband, “Think, ‘my love!’ I’m not from this world!! I’m not even from this plane of existence!!

Haven’t you ever wondered about the difference in our physiologies?? Haven’t you ever considered that at all??”

And with that, Mera summons a whirlpool and disappears to her home dimension, pledging to never return.

In his Amazing Heroes interview, Keith Giffen revealed that Mera’s impalement at the end of issue #3 was originally meant as final. “Actually, to be perfectly honest with you… initially, that was her death,” Giffen confessed.

“Dick Giordano came down and said, ‘Y’know, Keith, I really like Mera.’ I’ve always been one who can take a hint. So in hindsight again, the way the story worked out and with the plotlines it leaves open for the [regular] Aquaman series, I’m glad we kept her around.”

In the final issue of the miniseries, as a desperate direct assault is planned against the invaders, Aquaman figures out how to save the city. Standing atop the highest tower in Atlantis, the Sea King summons all the creatures of the deep to defeat the invading forces once and for all. Overwhelmed by a flood of whales, sharks, and eels, the invaders flee, vowing to return someday.

As Atlantis returns to normal, Aquaman has to decide whether or not to reclaim his throne. The series closes with a sequence of the Sea King swimming free in the ocean, as first person captions explain his decision: “I can no longer—will no longer—be your king. I cannot be limited to one small portion of the seas. You must learn from this! Let the people choose a ruler! Just as my subjects have chosen me. For you see, I am not an Atlantean! The seas were my mother and father. And no matter where I go in them, I’m at home.”

The miniseries left DC with an Aquaman more unencumbered than ever before: No wife, no sidekick, no child, no royal advisor, no kingdom in Atlantis, with the entirety of Earth’s oceans as his realm instead.

It was a fresh start for the Sea King, but without any new elements to replace the old ones.

THE ATLANTIS CHRONICLES (1990)

The year 1990 featured no new Aquaman comics, but it did bring The Atlantis Chronicles, a seven–issue series

by Peter David and Esteban Maroto, detailing thousands of years of Atlantis’ history, from the continent’s sinking to the birth of Aquaman. [Author’s note: For an in-depth look at The Atlantis Chronicles by its original editor, see Robert Greenberger’s piece in this issue.]

Marine Marvel’s Miniseries (top) This Dave DeVries painted cover for the first issue of 1989’s Aquaman limited series might have appeased fans of the Pozner/ Hamilton mini, (bottom) but inside, Curt Swan returned from the Legend one-shot, now inked by Al Vey. TM & © DC Comics.

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Issue #7 of TAC expanded on the revised origin from The Legend of Aquaman, showing the events leading up to Atlanna’s child being abandoned on Mercy Reef.

Confirming that the post-Crisis Aquaman was no longer the human/Atlantean hybrid of old, Aquaman’s new father was revealed as Atlan, a centuries-old Atlantean wizard.

Impregnating Atlantis’ Queen Atlanna to fulfill an ancient prophecy, Atlan pledges to father another son with a surface woman. He predicts that like their ancestors, the two brothers will forever battle for the fate of Atlantis.

Believing her encounter with Atlan to be a dream, the newly pregnant Atlanna assumes that her baby’s father is her husband, King Trevis. But when the young prince is finally born, his blond hair marks him with the Sign of Kordax, one of the great villains of Atlantean history.

With superstitious Atlanteans sure that the baby Orin’s birth is a sign of their imminent doom, King Trevis is convinced to abandon the child on Mercy Reef. As the despondent King Trevis commits suicide and Atlantis sinks into revolt, Atlanna writes her memories into the final volume of the Atlantis Chronicles, unsure of her final fate.

And unbeknownst to all, the abandoned baby Orin survives the ocean depths, fulfilling the first part of Atlan’s prophecy.

AQUAMAN VOL. 4: SHIFTING TIDES (1991–1992)

Aquaman received a new monthly series in 1991, his 50th anniversary year. As editor Kevin Dooley explained in the first issue’s letters column: “This Aquaman series begins essentially where the 1989 series left off. He has no wife—Mera’s gone back to her dimension. There’s no Aquababy, Aquaman’s son—he’s still dead, killed by [Black] Manta. Aquaman is not king of the Atlantean city of Poseidonis anymore, nor is he a member of the Justice League. […] We begin with a man who has nothing left in his life but being a hero.”

Out of this beginning, Dooley planned to make Aquaman a more proactive hero: “The time has come for Aquaman to stop whining and get on with his life.

The time has come for Aquaman to deal with a lot of what has been bothering him. The time has come for Aquaman, and the man he is, to undergo a catharsis and a rebirth, as a hero and as a man.“

Dooley also had plans to unify the Sea King’s contradictory backstories: “At last count, Aquaman has had at least five origins. […] In this series we will try to logically tell you which one is for real and maybe why there are so many.

“We will try our level darnedest not to contradict the past, respecting those that have gone before us while realizing it all needs a bit of smoothing. And if we do something, we’ll have a reason. For instance, Vulko was not killed in the miniseries. It was a trick by the aliens to demoralize the Poseidonians.”

The creative team Dooley chose was a surprising one: comics newcomers Shaun McLaughlin and Ken Hooper, with covers by fan favorite Kevin Maguire. Recalling how he got the assignment, writer Shaun McLaughlin tells BACK ISSUE, “I got it after several more high-profile people either turned it down or were passed over. I had worked with Dooley at Fantagraphics and he wanted to get me to write something.” When asked on editorial’s instructions for the book, McLaughlin says, “The only thing I remember was a vague notion that he should be an environmental hero and that all continuity was sacrosanct. I couldn’t reboot but had all the backstory—which I didn’t mind. I thought the approaching middle-age hero who had lost a throne, a wife, and a child was a pretty great setup.”

The 1991 series also tried to give Aquaman greater importance to the DC Universe, with his actions having repercussions on the surface world. As McLaughlin recalls, this was sometimes easier said than done. “I can tell you, the water-based hero isn’t the easiest guy to shoehorn into a superhero universe,” he says. “One of the things I wanted to do in the first issue was undercut that, and that’s why he punches through the side of a submarine and stops a war.”

The war was with Oumland, a surface country in the North Sea near the Atlantean border. Oumland attacks Poseidonis with six nuclear submarines in Aquaman #1 (Dec. 1991), shattering the city’s protective dome and killing dozens. Aquaman takes the battle to Oumland in #2 (Jan. 1992), only to learn that Poseidonis was the aggressor in the conflict. Meanwhile, a school of sharks, attracted by the blood in the water, attack the exposed Poseidonis in a feeding frenzy.

Maguire Dives In The Sea King’s 50th birthday was celebrated with the launch of a new titular monthly, originally featuring covers penciled by Kevin Maguire.

Three stunning Kevin Maguirepenciled covers to incarnation of Aquaman: #1 (inked

by Joe Rubinstein), 3 (inked by Art Nichols), and 5 (inked by Eric Shanower).

TM & © DC Comics.

Aquaman Issue • BACK ISSUE • 39

As Aquaman fights off the sharks in issue #3 (Feb. 1992), Lord Iqula, a merman from Tritonis, leads troops to Poseidonis to protect the city. Aquaman defeats Iqula in combat in issue #4 (Mar. 1992), earning himself a new ally. Meanwhile, Atlantis’ King Thesily seeks to prevent further international incidents by appointing Aquaman Poseidonis’ Ambassador to the United Nations.

In Aquaman #5 (Apr. 1992), the press conference announcing Aquaman’s ambassadorship is attacked by Aquaman’s old foe Black Manta and an army of Tritonians.

Aquaman, Martian Manhunter, and Iqula defeat the Tritonians, but Manta escapes and destroys Aquababy’s memorial at Mercy Reef. An enraged Aquaman attacks Manta in issue #6 (May 1992), but Manta critically injures our hero and escapes once again.

McLaughlin originally wanted a more radical ending to the plotline, with Aquaman killing Manta for murdering his son. “I wanted Manta dead. He was, to my mind, the most successful villain in the DC Universe and I wanted him to pay for killing Arthur, Jr.” McLaughlin tells BI. “My idea was then Aquaman would become an outcast and the Justice League would want to track him down because a hero shouldn’t kill.”

Issue #7 (June 1992) finds Aquaman injured and delirious from his battle with Manta, and vulnerable to an attack by Thanatos, his evil doppelganger from the 1960s series.

As Aquaman fights off Thanatos’ hallucinations, we learn that the mentally fragile Mera is now with Thanatos in the Netherworld, believing him to be her husband.

Nicodemus, a disciple of Batman’s foe the NKVDemon, tries to assassinate Aquaman after his speech at the UN in issue #8 (July 1992), but Aquaman tracks and defeats the villain. Aquaman #9–10 (Aug.–Sept. 1992) features a two-part team-up with the Sea Devils, reimagined as eco-terrorists, in a story that McLaughlin originally planned to open the series.

With cancellation imminent, McLaughlin was told to wrap up his plotlines in Aquaman #12 (Nov. 1992). Disappointed with their service, King Thesily removes Aquaman as UN Ambassador and throws Vulko off the Atlantean council. The duo then travel to Tritonis, where King Firtf’s treachery leaves Lord Iqula and his wife S’Ona as the city’s new king and queen. Vulko gives Arthur the Atlantis Chronicles, hoping that they will clear up the questions about his past.

This was originally planned to lead in to McLaughlin’s version of Time and Tide, a four-part storyline exploring Aquaman’s origins. “I was going to frame it with a reporter character who, when he can’t get the story from Aquaman, just makes things up,” McLaughlin tells BI. The reporter’s story was going to be Aquaman’s Golden Age origin of a scientist father who teaches his son to live underwater. McLaughlin also planned to connect Aquaman’s pre- and post-Crisis origins by having Atlan working behind the scenes to bring Atlanna and Tom Curry together. The final issue of the regular series was #13 (Dec. 1992), a planned fill-in featuring a sick child named Tony (dying of AIDS in the original script), who wants to meet his hero Aquaman before he dies.

On his plans for a possible second year of Aquaman, McLaughlin says, “I wanted to explore the differences between Tritonis and Poseidonis more. I also was going to do an arc where he tried to connect with the Currys, his father’s family [DC war hero Capt. Storm was going to be revealed as Tom Curry’s estranged brother]. I was also setting up a subplot in the first 12 that Orm was hidden in Poseidonis [as Aquaman supporter Minister F’ancha] and plotting against Aquaman. I loved the idea of a bad guy getting tired of getting beaten up and trying something less direct.”

Looking back today, McLaughlin clearly has frustrations over how his run turned out.

“There was just never any clear editorial direction and I was a new writer working on instinct.

I never felt my feet were under me because I had to change direction so often. The book was aimed at [ages] 15–25, then at 12–15, then 6–11. It kept changing and I had laid out a year or two of stories and I kept having to shoehorn in characters. Dooley also insisted on rewriting dialogue and I thought he had a terrible ear for dialogue. I later found out my problems were the same as Peter’s, but he, of course, was much more skilled and experienced than I.”

AQUAMAN: TIME AND TIDE (1993–1994)

Aquaman in the ’90s (top) Original Vince Giarrano cover art for Aquaman #9 (Aug. 1992), guest-starring the reimagined Sea Devils. Courtesy of Heritage (www.ha.com). (bottom) Jumpin’ Jonah! A dilemma from issue #11 (Nov. 1992). Story by Shaun McLaughlin, art

by Ken Hooper and Bob Dvorak.

TM & © DC Comics.

“Peter” was Peter David, writer of The Atlantis Chronicles, and now the new regular writer of Aquaman’s adventures. He came in determined to make the Sea King respected at long last. “They never seemed to know what to do with him or make his powers seem cool,” David says. “I never had that issue; I saw him as the Tarzan of the Apes of the DC Universe.

His domain was someplace that mere ordinary mortals couldn’t survive, and Tarzan spoke to apes, elephants, whatever. Aquaman was a guy who could enlist blue whales to do his bidding. If you were stupid enough to do crimes in his domain, he could take you out with a few words. To me he was the ultimate bad ass.”

But before David could take over the title, he and editor Kevin Dooley first had to clear up a misconception about Aquaman’s conception. As David explains to BACK ISSUE, “Kevin and I went out to lunch, and he explained to me that he had thought, from the events in Atlantis Chronicles #7, that Aquaman had been a result of an immaculate conception. That I was positioning him as a messiah. But that never occurred to me as an interpretation of his conception. No, Atlan had sex with Atlanna and conceived a son with her. She was in something of a dreamlike state when it happened and so she might well have misinterpreted it; I’m willing to allow that much. But I told Kevin that, no, Aquaman was conceived the same way that everyone else is. It just so happened that Dad was an Atlantean wizard.”

40 • BACK ISSUE • Aquaman Issue

Enter: Peter David Issue #1 of the four-issue Aquaman: Time and Tide, with art by Kirk Jarvinen and Brad Vancata.

TM & © DC Comics.

[Author’s note: Kevin Dooley was unable to respond to BACK ISSUE’s interview request by the deadline for this issue, but his recollections of his time on Aquaman will appear in the next issue.]

For David’s version of Time and Tide, illustrated by Kirk Jarvinen and Brad Vancata, the writer chose to expand on Aquaman’s latest origin.

“I felt there was so much in his background that remained unaddressed, and so I decided to capitalize on it wherever I could,” he explains.

Aquaman: Time and Tide #1 (Dec. 1993) begins with the present-day Arthur writing in the Atlantis Chronicles, dismissing his mother’s story of her affair with Atlan as the ramblings of a madwoman. Orin/Arthur then relates how he came to be known as the superhero “Aquaman” on the surface world, helping the Flash defeat the Trickster— against his better judgment.

Issue #2 (Jan. 1994) builds on Keith Giffen’s aquatic feral-child concept by detailing Aquaman’s history with his dolphin mother, Porm, a character introduced during McLaughlin’s tenure. Known as “Swimmer” to his dolphin family, young Orin gradually learns to survive in the ocean, until Porm tells her son that it’s time for him to join his own kind on land.

Time and Tide #3 (Feb. 1994) shows young Orin’s time in a fishing village in Alaska, his love affair with the Iñupiat girl Kako, and his encounter with the evil Inuit goddess Nuliajuk. Despite his best intentions, Orin is driven away from the village, thought to be cursed by the gods when Kako is severely injured. Meanwhile, a mysterious half-breed Iñupiat named Orm is lurking in the background…

Time and Tide #4 (Mar. 1994) picks up during Aquaman’s happiest days, as King of Atlantis, husband to Mera, mentor to Aqualad and Aquagirl, and father to a newborn son, Arthur, Jr. In the post-Crisis version of Aquaman and Aqualad’s first encounter with the Ocean Master, the villain reveals that he was the one who assaulted Arthur’s childhood love Kako. But it’s not until the present day, when Aquaman compares his mother’s Chronicles entries with the Ocean Master’s claim of being conceived by an “undersea wizard,” that he realizes that he and Orm are actually half-brothers.

out loud! I am so sick of the brooding and depressed bit and the whole melancholy ex-king shtick! Like you’re the only person on the planet who’s ever had problems!

Peter David’s regular run on the Sea King began with It’s getting boring!” When Aquaman’s only response is a August 1994’s Aquaman #1 (that’s vol. 5, for those swift kick to Garth’s stomach, the message comes of you keeping count). But after so many cancelations through loud and clear: this Aquaman was mad, bad, and relaunches, David discovered that Aquaman’s and dangerous to know. peter david biggest foe was fan apathy. In his introduction to the With Mera gone, Peter David introduced Aquaman’s © Luigi Novi / Wikimedia Commons.

2018 trade collection Aquaman by Peter David Book new female lead in issue #2 (Sept. 1994): Dolphin, One, David wrote, “the fans didn’t care and the retailers didn’t care. the mysterious nymph from Showcase #79 (Dec. 1968), who’d finally Any stores I was in, and fans I chatted with at conventions, all displayed been given an origin in Secret Origins #50 (Aug. 1990). On his selection of Dolphin, David says, “She was a good-looking character who lived indifference. They just didn’t care about Aquaman.

“So I knew I was going to have to do something drastic to get underwater. When I was considering a new romantic interest for people on board.

Aquaman, she seemed the natural fit. Not much was known about her “What it came down to was, I wanted to change his visual. background, so there was plenty of room for me to play with her.”

I immediately decided that he would be depressed and despondent, Dolphin and Aquaman meet while prisoners of Charybdis, a sadistic whiling away his time in his Aquacave somewhere, letting his hair and terrorist who drains their powers. When Charybdis unsuccessfully tries his beard grow out to give him a far more savage look. Also, if he had to control piranha with Aquaman’s telepathy, the Sea King clarifies how long hair, it would always be moving around underwater, which I his powers work, to both the villain and the readers: “I don’t ‘control!’

I suggest, or bargain, or cajole. Sometimes I even command, and they thought would be interesting.”

The artist chosen to draw Aquaman’s new look was penciler Martin choose to respect me. But undersea denizens are independent creatures Egeland. As Peter David tells BACK ISSUE, “We wound up getting with independent minds, you murderous cretin! And piranha, of all Marty because Kevin [Dooley] showed me a book of artist examples things! They’re vicious, mean-spirited, and only give a damn about from Mike Friedrich, who was operating as an artists’ rep at the time. skeletonizing anything that moves!” The Sea King’s words prove I saw Marty’s stuff and immediately loved it. His art was so flowing that prophetic as, at the end of issue #2, Charybdis sticks Aquaman’s hand everyone looked like they were floating even when they were on land, into a river of piranha that devour his hand down to the bone.

Recovering from his wounds in the Zero Hour tie-in Aquaman #0 so he was the ideal person as far as I was concerned.”

And Aquaman #1 makes it quite clear that our hero was done (Oct. 1994), Aquaman decides to turn the injury to his advantage, moping. In a meta-moment where he could be speaking for the readers, saying, “I need a symbol […] so the sea creatures know I’m of the Aqualad loses his temper at Orin, telling him, “Lighten up, for crying surface, and the surface men know that the sea can turn their weapons

AQUAMAN VOL. 5, #1–46: PETER DAVID DIVES IN (1994–1998)

Aquaman Issue • BACK ISSUE • 41

Biting the Hand That Feeds Them The shocking second issue of Peter David’s Aquaman monthly, where Charybdis and a pool of piranha cost the Sea King his hand!

Art by Martin Egeland and Brad Vancata.

TM & © DC Comics.

against them. Plus, I’ll know I must never let down my guard, or be hurt, again.” He then reveals his replacement for his missing hand: a harpoon. Vulko tries to talk his friend into a more practical prosthetic in issue #3 (Nov. 1994), but Aquaman refuses, explaining, “There’s many ways to downplay the loss. I’m choosing not to. Don’t you see? I could cover it up, but I won’t. That’s the point.”

It was a radical shift in both Aquaman’s attitude and appearance, and getting DC to approve it was the toughest challenge of all. “That took a bit of tap dancing,” Peter David recalls. “I had to pitch the whole story to Paul Levitz to explain what I was going to do and how I was going to eventually resolve it. I had a whole lengthy storyline involved that was going to have him recover his hand. But then I left the book when Kevin wouldn’t let me embark on the story that I’d already gotten approved. And several years later, they wound up doing my story anyway.”

But even without David’s planned ending, the harpoon hand did the trick: Readers were talking about Aquaman again. Sales started to climb.

After fights with Superboy and Lobo in issues #3 and 4, Aquaman finally found someone who could throw him for a loop in issue #5 (Jan. 1995): his son Koryak, the product of Orin’s youthful encounter with Kako.

On introducing the rebellious Koryak to the book, Peter David says, “I thought he’d make an interesting new character and he would also be someone for Aqualad to react off of. Since Arthur, Jr. was dead, it was also a chance to have Aquaman act and react like a father again.”

42 • BACK ISSUE • Aquaman Issue

Issue #5 also introduced another significant person to Aquaman’s life: penciler Jim Calafiore. Remembering getting the call from Kevin Dooley to be Aquaman’s new regular fill-in artist, Calafiore says, “When Kevin called, I said ‘Oh, you must’ve liked the Aquaman piece (a colored pinup I had done months before just for myself) I had in the samples.’ Kevin didn’t know what I was talking about; he had missed the piece in the stack.

And when he asked if I’d like to fill in on Aquaman, I said great. I liked the character a lot and was juiced to get to draw the orange and green costume. He said, ‘Um, about the costume....’ ” The costume that debuted in issue #5 was the final step in the new visual that David had proposed months before. The long-haired, bearded, and harpoon-handed Aquaman was now shirtless, sporting gladiator-styled armor on his right arm and looking tougher and more aggressive than ever before.

But even though it was his idea to revamp Aquaman’s look in the first place, Peter David confesses that he wasn’t taken with the final result. “I wasn’t really wild about it,” he says. “I had no idea why he was wearing armor on one arm. It just made no sense to me.” As far as Calafiore recalls, “Marty designed the costume, I think.

The only thing I had a hand in was the battle-armor look used a few times later. Funny thing was, Peter liked it and kept calling for it until Kevin put his foot down.

They had spent a lot of time redesigning his costume, and they were going to stick with it, dammit.”

On drawing the book, Calafiore says, “I took [to] the sea scenes pretty naturally. I’m a big nature program nut, and already had lots of reference on marine life.

Generally unless Peter asked for specific fish, most of the choices were mine there, like the one issue’s first page where fish were passing along a message [#10]. I spent a lot of time picking the fishes for contrasting look and color. [The] biggest challenge may have been not having the time to get all the detail in. Sometimes I had to default to the character floating in the colorist’s blue. Also, for some weird reason, I started drawing the harpoon smaller without realizing it. Peter had to point it out to me.”

Aquaman gets an improved harpoon hand from S.T.A.R. Labs in issue #9 (June 1995) that can respond to his mental commands, fire out a cable, act as a drill, and even retract into its housing. Aquaman tests the harpoon’s new abilities against Deadline, an assassin hired by the jealous King Thesily. Meanwhile, Koryak finds an ally in Vulko, who thinks that Aquaman’s son might be able to lead Atlantis better than his father.

But Koryak’s intentions are revealed to be less than benign when he purposely lets the treacherous King Thesily die at the end of #10 (Aug. 1995).

With Poseidonis ravaged by seaquakes, Koryak and Vulko lead the populace on a quest for a new home in issue #11 (Aug. 1995). Left alone in the abandoned city, Orin and Dolphin begin a romance, but they are startled by the return of Mera, sanity regained and back from her home dimension. Aquaman and Dolphin follow Mera back to the Netherspace in #12 (Sept. 1995), where they discover A. J., Mera’s rapidly aging young son, who may be Arthur’s child—or Thanatos’.

Poseidonis rises out of the ocean in issue #15 (Dec. 1995), revealing that the city lies atop of the meteoroid that sunk the continent thousands of years before. Investigating further, Aquaman learns that the skull-shaped meteoroid is actually an alien spacecraft that has been giving him visions of possible futures. Meanwhile, Vulko and Koryak’s party uncovers the monstrous Kordax in the ancient tunnels beneath Atlantis, and are soon under the villain’s mental control. By the end of #16 (Jan. 1996), Aquaman, having telepathically bonded with the cyber-organic ship beneath Poseidonis, learns of another upcoming threat.

Explanations come in Aquaman #17 (Feb. 1996), as Aquaman tells Dolphin about the Hunter/Gatherers, an alien race that visited Earth millennia ago. After hunting the dinosaurs to extinction, they plunged the Earth into its Ice Age. Generations later, they returned and interbred with humans, creating the Atlanteans. Now allied with a dragon-like race called the Anunnake, the Hunter/Gatherers are coming back again, this time to conquer Earth.

With the invasion on its way, Aquaman and Dolphin resolve to find the fabled Five Lost Cities of Atlantis, hoping to unify them against the incoming threat.

Together, they travel to Hy-Brasil (the legendary Phantom City of Ireland, location of an ancient Atlantean armory) in issues #17–18, the Dreaming City of the Himalayas (an Atlantean outpost of spirituality) in #19–20, Thierna Na Oge (a stronghold of Atlantean sorcery, returning from the 1986 miniseries) in #21, and the floating city of Basilia (last seen in The Atlantis Chronicles #6) in #22.

Along the way, they face the return of Ocean Master, now cursed to never let go of the trident that powers him, as well as Garth, no longer Aqualad but trained by Atlan to be a powerful mage in his own right [Author’s note: For more on Aqualad’s transformation into Tempest, see Marc Buxton’s article in this issue].

Aquaman gathers his allies in Arion’s City of the Golden Gate in Aquaman #23 (Aug. 1996): his father Atlan, the New Guardian of Hy-Brasil, Arion the Lord of Atlantis, Garth of Shayeris, Tsunami of Japan, Nuada of Thierna

Na Oge, Dolphin of the Waves, the Sea Devils, and Power Girl. They soon gain another ally: Deep Blue, the mysterious daughter of Tsunami and Neptune Perkins, who possesses the ability to enlarge and command sea creatures. Today, David is slightly murky on Deep Blue’s origins himself.

“I think I came up with the name and liked it so much I created a character to go with it,” he says.

Together, under the leadership of Aquaman, the team fights the invaders at all of the Lost Cities. Meanwhile, representatives of the Hunter/Gatherers, calling themselves “The Explorers,” appear at the White House, giving a sanitized version of their history and promising to lead the Earth into a new golden age.

The invasion storyline reaches a climax in Aquaman #25 (Oct. 1996) as Kordax and the Anunnakian dragon Tiamat storm the White House. After the monsters’ defeat, Aquaman deduces that the Explorers plan to start Earth’s new “golden age” by wiping out all existing civilizations. Aquaman broadcasts the aliens’ true intent to the world, forcing their retreat. But the long-lived Explorers promise to return.

A three-parter follows in Aquaman #26–28 (Nov. 1996– Jan. 1997). When Aquaman’s dolphin mother Porm is

Guest Cover Artists Look who dropped in for Aquaman covers during David’s run: (top) Mike Mignola (#6) and Mike Zeck (#21), and (bottom) Glenn Orbik (#25) and John Totleben (#32).

TM & © DC Comics.

Aquaman Issue • BACK ISSUE • 43

TM & © DC Comics.

violently killed, the Sea King declares war on Japan until they turn over Demon-Gate, the villain responsible.

A mutated Black Manta returns in #29–30 (Feb.–Mar. 1997), combating Aquaman in the trench known as Devil’s Deep.

Aquaman also begins to mutate in issues #31–32 (Apr.–May 1997), as he takes on the monstrous form of Kordax and loses his ability to speak to sea creatures.

After a vision quest in issue #33 (June 1997), Aquaman is restored to normal except for a single webbed hand, a reminder of the Curse of Kordax (inset). When asked why he chose to leave Aquaman with the webbed hand, Peter David simply says, “I thought it looked cool.

Really, when you get down to it, you’d think that all undersea humanoids would have webbed hands. Much easier to get around.”

Fill-in penciler Jim Calafiore officially became Aquaman’s regular artist with issue #34 (July 1997), as Aquaman kills the sea god Triton in combat and is blinded by Triton’s father Poseidon in retaliation. The issue is a favorite of Calafiore’s, as “I kind of co-plotted it, pitching the non-linear storytelling aspect to Peter and Kevin. When it’s

appropriate, I like to try something different in the story structuring. The odd thing in that issue was when Aquaman impales Triton on the trident, I drew the points coming through his chest. That was no-no, so they had someone in production draw in a weird bulge to his chest plate; but they illustrated it with hatching lines, which I never do, so it didn’t match my style.”

In issue #36 (Sept. 1997), Aquaman becomes connected to the Clear, gaining greater perceptions of sea life around the world. Dolphin, frightened by Orin’s new intensity, turns to the newly mature Garth for solace, and a romance blossoms between the two. Although intended as just a temporary development by Peter David, it became the new status quo under later creators. Today, David admits, “I never thought about her ending up with Garth. Indeed, the fact that she became sexually involved with both of them creeps me out a little.”

Atlantis is opened to tourists from the surface world in #38 (Nov. 1997), as Aquaman gives his blessing to Dolphin and Garth. A succession of foes follow, with Aquaman combating Rhombus in #38–39, Dr. Polaris and Maxima in #40–41, the Sea Wolf in #42, and the Millennium Giants in #43.

But although all seemed calm on jim calafiore the surface, a tempest was brewing © Luigi Novi / behind the scenes.

Wikimedia Commons.

AQUAMAN: ELEMENTAL

According to Peter David, disagreements with his editor Kevin Dooley had been building for some time.

“Kevin’s instructions would contradict each other,” David tells BI. “For instance, he said he wanted me to show Aquaman serving as a leader of men, but he also wanted stories with Aquaman operating on his own.

How can you show someone being a leader if he has no one following him? He also told me that he wanted stories with lots of politics, but he didn’t want stories set in Atlantis, which was the political capital of Aquaman’s world. What finally drove me off the book was that I wanted to kill Aquaman and have Aqualad take over the mantle, and then bring Aquaman back in a couple of years. And I was told no, I couldn’t do that, even though I had cleared the story with Paul [Levitz] four years earlier. So I just threw up my hands and walked away.”

David planned for Aquaman to be resurrected as Earth’s water elemental, with much more power than ever before.

“I figured the story would then focus on Aquaman adjusting to being an elemental; it would expand his reach and power base and I figured would trigger a whole new slate of stories with new and interesting characters,” David explains. “But I never got to write any of those.”

Aquaman #45–46 (June–July 1998) present an abbreviated version of Peter David’s lead-up to the elemental storyline, with Triton invading Atlantis and killing Aquaman. In the Greek underworld of Hades, Aquaman makes a bargain with the Lord of the Dead to bring Triton’s father Poseidon back to life. The resurrected Poseidon slays Triton and leaves the earthly realm,

Opposites Attract Green Lantern rogue Dr. Polaris makes life tough for the Sea King in Aquaman #40 (Jan. 1998). Original Jim Calafiore/Peter Palmiotti art courtesy of Heritage.

TM & © DC Comics.

44 • BACK ISSUE • Aquaman Issue

leaving behind his trident. But just as everything returns to normal, the Silver Age Aquaman enters the throne room, wondering what happened to Mera and Artie, Jr., and who the long-haired, one-handed imposter is.

And with that cliffhanger, Peter David was gone from Aquaman.

From Jim Calafiore’s perspective, the bosses at DC ended up sabotaging their own book.

“I know things were going on at a higher editorial level; some I found out later,” Calafiore says. “It came down to DC thinking that the King Arthur of the DCU should be selling in the top ten; they weren’t happy with a book being just profitable. Kevin had started to mention some things to me about the art, and I found out that upper editorial didn’t consider me a fan-favorite, Image-y artist. So they hired an Image guy to write, and an artist they [thought] fit the mold. And we know how that worked out. Honestly, as much as I liked the stories, Peter’s clout was mostly holding the numbers up; he was one of the top writers in sales at the time. So if you’re asking me if it was smart to dump the guy who was keeping the book afloat...

“In reality,” Calafiore continues, “we were all let go as a whole, even though it looked like I was still on the book for three more issues (with Abnett and Lanning) as they got Larsen up and running. The whole crew was canned; writer, penciler, inker, colorist, and letterer. So I didn’t leave as much as was shown the door.”

Despite the acrimonious end, the David/Egeland/Calafiore run proved that Aquaman could sell. But one question remained: Could the Sea King sustain sales momentum with a new approach and a new creative team?

The Changing Guard (top) Peter David’s final issue was Aquaman #46 (July 1998)… but look at this cliffhanger the scribe left behind! (bottom) New writers Dan Abnett and Andy Lanning stunned readers with this Aquaman vs. Aquaman match-up in issue #47 (Aug. 1998).

TM & © DC Comics.

AQUAMAN #47–49: INTERIM ADVENTURES (1998)

The writing team of Dan Abnett and Andy Lanning took over Aquaman for four issues, #47–49 (Aug.–Oct. 1998), as well as November’s #1,000,000, the tie-in with DC’s One Million crossover. In these issues, we discover that the Silver Age Aquaman is actually an aged A. J., who brings the real Aquaman back to the Netherworld of Oceanid to fight off galactic parasites. After a hard-won victory, A. J. is hailed as the Aquaman of Oceanid.

Believing that his parents should be together, A. J. tosses his mother Mera back into Aquaman’s dimension at the end of #48.

Aquaman #49 (Oct. 1998) finds Tempest temporarily corrupted by the power of Poseidon’s trident. Aquaman frees him, but Koryak uses the confusion to try to usurp Atlantis’ throne. Defeating Koryak’s attempted coup, Orin banishes him from Atlantis for life. And as Atlantis welcomes its queen back into its heart, Mera announces that she and Arthur are no longer married by Atlantean law.

AQUAMAN #50–62: ERIK LARSEN SETS OUT TO SEA (1998–1999)

Aquaman #50 (Dec. 1998) welcomed the Sea King’s new writer: Erik Larsen, who for six years had been writing and drawing his creation The Savage Dragon at Image Comics. Recalling how he got the job, Larsen says, “[letterer] Chris Eliopoulos told me that there was an opening on the book and the two of us started talking about the book and what had been done with it and what hadn’t been done. After a short while it became obvious that I just had so many ideas of what could be done that it’d be a shame not to do something with them.”

While Larsen had many ideas for Aquaman, he also took the book to boost his profile.

“The thought at the time was—I’d been doing my own thing at Image and that maybe I should do some work elsewhere to remind people outside of that bubble that I still exist,” he says. “So I took on a few assignments at DC and Marvel with the hope of readers following me back to Savage Dragon. Ultimately, that’s my main gig.”

And with Aquaman, Larsen saw a lot that he could bring to the party. “One of the book’s weakest aspects was a thin rogues’ gallery, and I wanted to do what Ditko did on Spider-Man or Kirby did on the Fantastic Four and add so many cool villains that successive creators would have an abundance of bad guys to play with,” Larsen tells BACK ISSUE. “I [also] would have liked to have done a more thorough redesign of Aquaman and Mera, both of whom just didn’t have very strong designs. Mera looked like she was wearing kid’s pajamas with feet in them and Aquaman’s outfit still looked lacking. The costume I’d pitched was blue, and the green compromise just failed to deliver.”

As an artist himself, Larsen had plenty of opinions about the book’s visuals. “I wanted to make Aquaman’s world more interesting,” he says. “There were too many standard-looking humans just sitting around as though this was the surface world. I came in with a strong mantra to remember—‘We’re underwater.’ And I set about telling artists not to have characters walking and not to have them drinking from glasses and having candlelit dinner tables and such. Doors to dwellings can be on any level—there’s no need for them to be at the bottom—that sort of thing.”

Larsen also helped pick the new art team of penciler Eric Battle and inker Norm Rapmund.

“The editor had Eric’s samples on hand and he was one of two artists whose work I was given to look at. I’m not sure what Norm’s story was other than he had done a fair amount of work and was a solid, capable inker,” Larsen says. “Eric struggled a bit on the book, honestly. There were times I had to cover for storytelling deficiencies with dialogue explaining what we should have been seeing. This was an early assignment for him and he still had a few bugs to work out. He got better.”

The team’s first issue, Aquaman #50, immediately brought big changes to the Sea King.

As Aquaman celebrates his birthday, he also welcomes an influx of new immigrants to Poseidonis, Aquaman Issue • BACK ISSUE • 45

The Savage Sea King (top) Erik Larsen took over as writer (and briefly, cover artist) with Aquaman #50 (Dec. 1998). (bottom) Original Erik Larsen cover art to Aquaman Secret Files and Origins #1. Courtesy of Heritage.

TM & © DC Comics.

46 • BACK ISSUE • Aquaman Issue

officially changing the city’s name to Atlantis to mark its rebirth.

Explaining the reasoning behind the name change, Larsen says, “People think of Aquaman as being from Atlantis, so why not call it that? It just seemed like an extra layer of confusion. And it’s not unprecedented. There’s a New York City in New York state, after all.”

Larsen also introduced new supporting characters in the Landlovers—Blubber (a whale who invents a translating device and an exoskeleton to help him interact with Atlanteans), Lagoon Boy (an enthusiastic teen who resembles the Creature from the Black Lagoon), and Sheeva, a mermaid. All three are as fascinated by the surface world as land dwellers are with Atlantis. Interrupting the festivities is King Noble, ruler of the Lurkers, an aquatic race from a realm even deeper than Atlantis. Noble proves himself as a formidable foe, easily ripping off Aquaman’s harpoon hand in combat and becoming a rival for Mera’s affections.

Issue #51 (Jan. 1999) has Aquaman again replacing his lost limb, this time with shapeshifting liquid metal that could be anything from an offensive weapon to a prosthetic hand. Erik Larsen says, “I thought he needed something a bit more functional. A hook may be fine in a fight, but a life isn’t all fights, and if you’re having to perform ordinary tasks like buttoning a shirt or taking a whiz, it’s nice to have something more versatile. My thought was that this gold hand would be eventually be revealed to be a revived Gold from the Metal Men. That character had recently died [in the 1993–1994 Metal Men miniseries] and I thought, ‘Hell, he’s a robot—the pieces are all there’—but I wasn’t on the book long enough to pay that off.”

But for former penciler Jim Calafiore, Aquaman’s new hand came all too easily. “I thought Larsen didn’t get what Peter David had done, especially with the hand/harpoon,” Calafiore tells BI. “Peter could’ve given him a prosthetic hand at any time; the point to the harpoon was that Aquaman did this to himself. A choice. It said erik larsen something specific about his personality. I didn’t © Luigi Novi / mind the new hand, but it shouldn’t just have Wikimedia Commons. been, ‘I need a new hand. Cool!’ Don’t just gift him with it. Show the character get to that point where he was no longer ‘limiting’ himself in that way.”

A notable issue of Larsen’s run is #52 (Feb. 1999), presenting a split story contrasting Aquaman’s initial courtship of Mera with Mera’s current infatuation with King Noble. The issue also brings back the Fire Trolls from 1962’s Aquaman #1 and introduces their new leader, the Lava Lord. The flashback portion was penciled by classic Aquaman artist Jim Aparo and inked by Bill Sienkiewicz.

For Larsen, having Aparo draw one of his stories was “a real treat.

I was a big fan of his work growing up and I’d read a ton of comics that he’d drawn, including an awful lot of Aquaman stories.

Funny thing is—in all those years Jim had never drawn from a plot and he wasn’t about to start doing it with me! He had always worked from a full script where he had every piece of action described and every line of dialogue written down, so I accommodated him and expanded on what I had.”

Charybdis, Aquaman’s first foe of the 1994 series, returns in #55 (May 1999). Mutated beyond recognition and now calling himself Piranha-Man, he kidnaps and tortures Aquaman’s friends and family in a scheme for revenge. On the villain’s revamp and name change, Erik Larsen says, “the defining moment of the character was him having Aquaman’s hand gnawed off by piranhas, but his name doesn’t say anything about that—it’s hard to spell and it’s hard to pronounce and given that I wanted to transform him into a less human-looking character and emphasize the piranha backstory, it made sense to ditch the pretentious moniker and go with something more direct.”

Renaming was obviously in the air, as Deep Blue announces that she is now going by “Indigo.” Erik Larsen explains, “ ‘Deep Blue’ wasn’t a particularly cool-sounding name to begin with— and it was kind of nonsensical for a character from Atlantis to be named after a chess-playing computer from the surface world.

‘Indigo’ just sounded more like a name that might originate from Atlantis and it meant the same thing so—I opted for that.”

Issue #55 marked changes behind the scenes as well, as Larsen began partnering with co-writers, Chris Eliopoulos and Gary Carlson. Explaining the switch, Larsen says, “I’d taken on too much work with [my] Marvel commitments and I needed to step up the process. We’d talk through the ideas, they’d type things up, I’d edit them, and then they’d do a pass on the script which I would rewrite.”

Issue #55 also featured Dolphin giving Garth the surprise news of her pregnancy. After some initial hesitancy and misunderstandings, the couple gets engaged in issue #56 (June 1999). Piranha-Man steps up his plans in #57 (July 1999), as he steals Aquaman’s ability to converse with sea creatures. And the villain’s most surprising prisoner of all is revealed: Aquaman’s mother Atlanna, back from the dead!

Aquaman #59 (Sept. 1999) featured more worldbuilding, as Aquaman and Tempest deal with Atlantis’ growing drug problem, the crimelord Kingfish, and his henchman, the Eel. In addition, Atlan reveals the reason behind the similarity of Aquaman and Indigo’s powers— they’re brother and sister.

Garth and Dolphin get married in issue #60 (Oct. 1999), with Vulko presiding and Arthur as best man. And as the now rapidly aging Atlan returns to his own dimension, he confirms that he is Indigo’s father. In #61 (Nov. 1999), Mera and Vulko discover that King Noble’s pheromones intensely affected Mera’s alien physiology, making her think she was in love with him. The revelation ends her infatuation with the Lurker King, and she and Arthur

are reunited. It was a sudden end for a major subplot, and today Erik Larsen admits some disappointment with how the Noble character turned out. “Noble was supposed to be a Namor substitute,” he confirms, “but I didn’t end up designing him, and the guy just didn’t look as strong and handsome as I’d have liked.”

Larsen’s last issue, #62 (Dec. 1999), ties up the rest of his plotlines, as Arthur and Mera reconcile and King Noble departs to find other Lurkers. A newly sane Piranha-Man returns, making his apologies by restoring Aquaman’s telepathic powers before disappearing once again. With the status quo restored, the Larsen/Battle run ends with an uncharacteristically upbeat Aquaman, looking forward to the future once again.

In his 1999 press release announcing his departure from the book, Larsen explained that he’d run into the same problem as previous Aquaman writers McLaughlin and David: creative differences. Editor Kevin Dooley and his teams just couldn’t see eye-to-eye, with neither side happy with the results. Today, Larsen simply says, “I was fired. I forget the details. That’s not the kind of thing my brain hangs onto. When I move on from a project I move on. I do recall [being] given a number of issues to wrap things up and I found that tedious. Once you’ve been let go, it just seemed like a death march continuing.

Kevin was canned before my run ended but he’d hired my replacement and things were in motion. The new editor apologized to me and had said he would have liked to have seen me continue, but at that point another

Two Stories in One Larsen told a dual tale in Aquaman #52, (top) a flashback illo’ed by Aqua-legend Jim Aparo inked by Bill Sienkiewicz, and (bottom) the Mera/ Noble storyline, drawn by Eric Battle and Ray McCarthy.

TM & © DC Comics.

Aquaman Issue • BACK ISSUE • 47

guy had the gig and work had been begun so—that was the end of that.”

The abrupt end also meant that Larsen had to leave several upcoming story ideas on the table. “I thought it would have been fun to do a story at Image, DC, and Marvel with similar-looking characters and do an unofficial crossover of sorts. Use Namor and Triton in Wolverine, use Roman and Ripclaw in Savage Dragon, and Timber Wolf and Martian Manhunter in Aquaman.

The clock ran out on that idea.”

And has Larsen kept up with Aquaman since leaving the book? “I have not read a single word,” he says.

“When I leave a book I’m gone for good. It’s like a bad breakup. I really don’t want to know what my ex is up to. I’ve moved on. I was happy to see Lagoon Boy show up in a few different books. The worst part of giving away new characters to somebody else is having them be neglected. It’s frustrating to think— why don’t they use that character? I’d use that character if I’d have kept them! But that’s all part of the game.

They can do whatever they want with characters you’ve given them, including putting them on a shelf and never touching them again.”

AQUAMAN #63–75: RETURN OF THE KING (2000–2001)

The new year brought another new creative team for Aquaman: writer Dan Jurgens and penciler Steve Epting, with Norm Rapmund staying on as inker. Together, they would do their best to rescue Aquaman from his greatest villain yet: sinking sales.

But if circumstances had been different, Dan Jurgens could have taken over the book even sooner. “Editor Kevin Dooley had actually asked a year earlier if I was interested,” Jurgens tells BACK ISSUE. “I was, but had no time to fit it in. Erik Larsen took the book. By the time he ended his run, DC called and asked again.

This time though, they admitted that the book was on life support and near cancellation. In fact, I was told that if I turned it down, they’d probably do exactly that.

“But,” Jurgens continues, “I gave it some thought and realized that kind of situation can be a bit liberating so I decided to give it a shot, fully aware that it would be an uphill climb. At that point, it’s simply a matter of stepping up to give it your best shot.”

For his part, artist Steve Epting explains, “I had started working on the Superman titles when there was an editorial shake up at DC. There was suddenly a new editor overseeing Superman and he wanted to bring in all new creators. Dan Jurgens (who was writing the book I was drawing) was moving over to Aquaman and I was offered the chance to draw it.” Jurgens specifically requested Epting to continue working with him. “I was, and still am, an enormous fan of his work,” Jurgens says. “We worked Marvel style because I honestly believe that in most cases, that makes for a better comic.

It allows the artist to emphasize the necessary visual elements that work best for them. It’s a more collaborative experience.”

Steve Epting quickly took to Aquaman, giving Atlantis’ architecture and vehicles distinctive looks suited to an underwater city. “I got most of my inspiration by asking myself, ‘How would Syd Mead design this?’ I don’t feel like any of my designs were terribly original,” Epting says modestly, “but I hope they enhanced the story somewhat.” Although an accomplished artist in his own right, Jurgens didn’t do any layout or design work on Aquaman himself, saying, “When you have an artist the caliber of Steve Epting, you let him run with it!” Similarly, Epting did not suggest plots for the book. “I almost always leave the writing to the writers,” he says. “It’s probably best that way.” Jurgens adds, “It’s also worth noting that we had wonderful covers by the incredibly talented Michael Kaluta. Just gorgeous art, many of which could have been great posters.”

Jurgens proposed relaunching the book with a new #1, a request turned down by editorial. “I understood

Atlantean Changes Among the revolving door of new characters and new looks for the Sea King: (top left) The first appearance of Noble, from Aquaman #50. (top right) From #55, a new costume, clean-shaven face, and hook with new “toys.” (bottom left) The re-dubbed Piranha-Man, from #56. (bottom right) Arthur makes a TV appearance, in Aquaman #63.

TM & © DC Comics.

48 • BACK ISSUE • Aquaman Issue

why they didn’t want to do that, of course,” Jurgens says. “There had already been too many relaunches and it’s a problem that continues to affect our industry. But, as a creator, I know it would have gotten more attention and more sales.” Epting agrees, saying, “I think in this case it would have been a good idea. Sales had been steadily declining and I think a lot of readers bailed out of the series at that point. A new #1 certainly wouldn’t have hurt, and maybe some lapsed readers would have been enticed to give it a try.”

CAMELOT BENEATH THE WAVES

Aqua-Creators and Battling Beards! (top) Aquaman inker Norm Rapmund (left) and scribe Dan Jurgens, at the 2017 Phoenix Comicon. (bottom) Aquaman vs. Travis Morgan, a.k.a. the Warlord, in Aquaman #71 (Sept. 2000). Original cover art by Michael Wm. Kaluta, courtesy of Heritage.

Photo by Gage Skidmore. Aquaman and Warlord TM & © DC Comics.

Jurgens had a simple take on Aquaman’s book. As he stated in an interview with Rob Kelly on The Aquaman Shrine in 2009: “As far as I was concerned, he was King Arthur. It just so happened that his Camelot was beneath the sea.”

To further emphasize Arthur’s mythic nature, Jurgens framed each issue with scenes set years in the future, as an elder Garth tells the story of Atlantis to his granddaughter Donna, who is writing a new edition of the Atlantis Chronicles for a school report. “I found it to be a nice way to describe Aquaman,” Jurgens told The Aquaman Shrine.

“We really can’t have Aquaman run around saying, ‘I’m king.

I’m important. I’m impressive.’ It’s far more interesting to have someone else think that so we see it through his eyes. Tempest held the reader’s place in the story. In addition, it made Aquaman a bit more remote and, I hope, a bit more regal in nature. I don’t think of him as a character that a lot of people would ever get to know well.”

Once again, old plotlines were abruptly dropped, with Aquaman’s mother Atlanna and the Landlovers disappearing from the book.

But like David and Larsen before him, Jurgens introduced a new supporting character to Aquaman’s world: Rodunn, leader of the palace guard and confidant to the King. Rodunn was Aquaman’s constant companion, and another way to emphasize Arthur’s royal status. “If you read through history,” Jurgens tells BI, “any great leader is often dependent on a particular advisor or two. I wanted to get some of that into the book.”

The Jurgens/Epting team debuted in Aquaman #63 (Jan. 2000), as King Arthur appears on The Grant Gibson Show to condemn the island nation of Cerdia’s military buildup and aggressive actions toward Atlantis. Arthur and Garth prevent a bomb from blowing up the talk show’s studio, but are immediately called back to Atlantis by an emergency.

They return to find the city under attack by coral creatures, as Dolphin gives birth to her and Garth’s son. The duo fight off the coral creatures in issue #64, but at a huge cost, as Dolphin and Garth’s newborn baby is kidnapped!

Aquaman and Tempest take the war to Cerdia to recover Garth’s son in Aquaman #65 (Mar. 2000). This draws the attention of the JLA, forcing a standoff on the Cerdian beaches. Issues #66 and 67 reveal the real power behind Cerdia: Arthur’s brother the Ocean Master, who’s been mystically disguising himself as Counselor Whynt, advisor to Cerdia’s Queen Charlanda.

Aquaman rescues Garth’s son in Aquaman #68 (June 2000), preventing a tragic repeat of Arthur, Jr.’s fate. The issue ends with the future Garth taking his granddaughter to see Atlantis as it exists in their time: as a nation existing both over and under the sea, the most powerful and peaceful nation on Earth; a testament to their king’s vision and leadership.

Aquaman #69 (July 2000) shows Donna giving her report, telling the story of how Aquaman captured the Ocean Master and annexed Cerdia after the war, aiding its citizens and giving Atlantis a permanent presence above water. Donna marks this as the dawn of the Third Age of Atlantis, stating that “within a few years, Atlantis went from being a curious legend—to a true force in the world.” Arthur enlists Mera and Garth to help cement the new alliance in issue #70 (Aug. 2000).

To commemorate the unification of the two countries, Ambassador Garth and Dolphin announce the name of their newborn son: Cerdian.

After a three-part team-up with the Warlord in Skartaris (#71–73, Sept.–Nov. 2000), Aquaman and Mera return to Atlantis in #74, only to find Tempest thought to be dead. Aquaman refuses to accept this, and he and Rodunn track down the kidnapped Garth, rescuing him and a stolen aircraft carrier from the villainous Omniguard. The climax in issue #75 (Jan. 2001) serves as a grand finale for the series, as Aquaman calls on the entire Atlantean army to rescue his protégé.

Aquaman Issue • BACK ISSUE • 49

One Big Happy An Aqua-family portrait concludes the series in issue #75 (Jan. 2001).

By Dan Jurgens, Steve Epting, and Norm Rapmund.

TM & © DC Comics.

The book ended on a high note, but unfortunately, it was too little, too late. Although Jurgens and Epting had turned Aquaman around creatively, sales stayed at the cancellation level. “As I recall, we actually ticked up just a bit, but not enough to keep the book going,” Jurgens says. And as usual, the cancellation came too quickly to tie everything up properly. “I had always suspected we’d end with #75 but could never get it confirmed,” Jurgens tells BI. “By the time the actual decision was made, it was a bit late in the game and things did become a bit rushed.”

And like his predecessors in the writer’s chair, Dan Jurgens had plans for Aquaman’s future he wasn’t able to implement: “I was considering two things: One, moving it back to the present. Two, jumping even further into the future, which would have intrigued me more.

DC wasn’t thrilled with that idea because they felt I was building too much of an end game they couldn’t get out of.”

SEA CHANGE

All in all, the fifth volume of Aquaman was a momentous one for the character. It redefined his look and characterization for the 21st Century and, at 75 issues, plus assorted Annuals and Specials, it remains the longestrunning Aquaman series to date. In the final issue, editor Tony Bedard wrote, “Sometimes the best thing you can do for a character is to give him a rest. I could explain how the cruel realities of low sales eventually forced us to this conclusion, but it would only sound like making excuses. For many of you, no explanation of our cancellation will ever be satisfying, because you love the character. And so do I. “Ceasing our monthly publication of Aquaman certainly doesn’t mean we’ve given up on Aquaman himself. When the time is right, which could be much sooner than you think, we’ll begin anew with a monthly Aquaman book. For now, enjoy his regular appearances in JLA. I promise you, we will do right by steve epting Arthur, one of our most venerable and beloved heroes.”

William Tung.

Although the book was ending, the finale left Aquaman in a good place, on the throne of Atlantis once again, surrounded by Vulko and his extended family of Mera, Garth, Dolphin, and Cerdian. And Garth’s narration gives readers one last reminder of what sets Aquaman apart in the DCU: “So many heroes seem to struggle. They seem unable to resolve the conflicts in their lives. Their personal relationships are often disasters because of their commitment to serving others. But Arthur has overcome all that. It’s an incredible testament to the strength of his character! While some colleagues live on accumulated fortunes and others struggle to stay employed—Arthur has the most demanding job of all… and he thrives on it.

“His surface friends seek relief and refuge in disguises and insignificant jobs—while Arthur does neither and assumes greater responsibility. He is nothing less than a global leader, charged with safeguarding an entire nation and all its people—and leading them into tomorrow.

For Arthur, there is no dual life, no opportunity to ignore the needs of others.

“He is king.

“Of the seven seas and more.”

Thanks to Jim Calafiore, Gary Cohn, Peter David, Steve Epting, Craig Hamilton, Dan Jurgens, Erik Larsen, Shaun McLaughlin, Dan Mishkin, Jerome K. Moore, and Eric Shanower for sharing their memories with BACK ISSUE. And an extra-special thanks to Aquafan Number One Rob Kelly (www.aquamanshrine.net) for providing digital copies of Aquaman’s post-Crisis adventures. This article could not have been possible without his help.

JOHN “Tadpole” TRUMBULL misses Tusky and Topo.

50 • BACK ISSUE • Aquaman Issue

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Open the ancient scrolls of Atlantis with me, dear historians, and read of a time long ago. A time beneath the waves of history where a sidekick, superhero, Teen Titan, and underwater champion known as Aqualad was a pretty darn big deal amongst the pantheon of DC superheroes.

During the ancient period of the surface world’s history known as the Silver Age, Aqualad was regularly appearing with Aquaman in the pages of Sea King’s comic series and the myriad backups that Aquaman frequented.

The soggy sidekick was a founding member of the Teen Titans and regularly appeared in the pages of that groovy series. In addition, Aqualad appeared on Saturday mornings in the popular Filmation animated series The Superman/Aquaman Hour of Adventure (1967), both in the Aquaman feature and in the Teen Titans segment. Finally, Aqualad had his own costume set as part of the Captain Action line of dress-up toys and his own Mego figure (inset) as part of a Teen Titans set.

Moving forward in history, our waterlogged tomes tell us that to claim that Aqualad, real name Garth, stayed a big deal in the hearts and minds of DC fans and creators would be an exaggerated fish story. It seems that during the post-Silver Age era of Aqualad, it became clear that in a new sophisticated wave of comics, Aqualad would have a hard time finding traction with a new breed of fan because of the derivative nature of the character.

Aqualad may have been redundant, but the once popular young hero just would not allow the currents of ennui to pull him under the waves. In the 1990s, Aqualad would transform from a typical kid sidekick into a powerful and unique hero—the mighty Tempest.

But even before Tempest arrived, there are a few hidden Aqualad treasures floating beneath the waves of the Bronze Age, stories that are often overlooked by deep divers into comic-book history. So join us and journey back to a time where Aqualad only surfaced sporadically in the pages of DC Comics and help us chart a course into a new era where DC transformed the former kid sidekick into the powerful Tempest.

THE BRONZE AGE ADVENTURES BEGIN

It is always difficult to find a line of delineation between the Silver and Bronze Ages, but for Aqualad, the cover blurb of Adventure Comics #446 (July–Aug. 1976) reads, “Featuring: The Return of Aqualad,” so let us begin our undersea exploration there.

Adventure Comics #446, written Paul Levitz and Martin Pasko and drawn by Jim Aparo, features Garth in a very different role. Aqualad, along with Aquagirl, was on the

Tadpole and Tusky Ye ed’s all-time favorite (maybe yours, too) Aqualad illo, by Stupendous Steve Lightle, from Who’s Who in the DC Universe #7 (Feb. 1991).

TM & © DC Comics.

52 • BACK ISSUE • Aquaman Issue

TM

by M a r c

Buxton

case to bring down a diamond-smuggling ring on a gambling riverboat as fans are treated to a Mark Twainby-way-of-Atlantis mini-adventure. It seems like Adventure #446 was designed to bring Aqualad back into the spotlight. He looks older and he acts more like an adult (even though he admonishes Aquagirl for… “gasp”… drinking champagne). Aqualad and Aquagirl (real name Tula) force Black Manta to retreat, but the villain would return, and when he does, the innocence of the Aquaman family would forever be tainted by heartbreak.

TRAGEDY STRIKES THE AQUAMAN FAMILY

At this time in Aquaman history, the Sea King was struggling to regain the throne of Atlantis from the usurper Karshon, who was being aided and abetted by Black Manta. In Adventure Comics #448 (Nov.–Dec. 1976)

by Levitz and Aparo, Aqualad plays a supporting role in helping his super-friend get his kingdom back. Yet, Garth is still relegated to the background and even has to share with Aquagirl what little spotlight he gets. At this point, Aqualad’s lone bit of characterization is making moon eyes at Aquagirl, but soon things take an interesting turn in this issue’s subplot as Levitz introduces a man named Mcann who is looking for his long-lost purple-eyed son.

Naturally, this would lead readers to believe that Mcann was Aqualad’s father, but the answer was a bit more complex than that. With Levitz’s introduction of Mcann, new writer David Michelinie got to flesh out Aqualad’s rarely addressed past. Like all writers that had to find a direction for Aqualad, Michelinie inherited a decades-old tabula rasa and attempted to fill in the blanks.

“He was basically a supporting character from a plotline that was already in place when I started writing Aquaman stories,” Michelinie remembers. “I really didn’t do much with him except to move him on through that storyline.” Certainly, from the days of riding on the backs of seahorses and making fish puns, there was an inherent silliness to the Aquaman family, but Michelinie tried to find a new direction with his take on Aqualad.

Aqualad could be puerile, but as Michelinie puts it, “I think it depends on how he’s written. I personally choked every time I had to use the term ‘Aquababy,’ so I admit there was a certain amount of silliness back in the ’70s stories. But if you handle a character with believable emotions, dialogue, and actions, there’s no reason for them to be silly, unless that’s what you’re looking for.”

In Adventure Comics #452 (July–Aug. 1977), the Aquaman family suffered a loss that seemed unimaginable at the time. In the previous issue, longtime Aquaman ally Topo the octopus kidnaps Aquababy. Aquaman sets off in pursuit but is delayed by a battle with Starro the Conqueror. When Aquaman regains pursuit, he meets two purple-eyed members of a pacifist cult known as the Idylists. The Idylists help Aquaman find the lost Aquababy, but the three get waylaid by mysterious assailants. When Aquaman wakes up, he is bound next to Mcann and Aqualad. Mcann reveals that he is in search of his own son, a purple-eyed boy named Syan who joined the purple-eyed Idylist cult. Mcann believes that the purple-eyed Aqualad could help him find his son, but was shocked when Aqualad revealed that he not only knew nothing about the Idylists but was also not

Roots (left) A page from Adventure Comics #448 (Nov.–Dec. 1976), which investigates Aqualad’s past.

By Paul Levitz and Jim Aparo. (right) In writer David Michelinie’s Adventure #452 (July–Aug. 1977), two allies are forced to battle to the death.

Cover by Aparo.

TM & © DC Comics.

Aquaman Issue • BACK ISSUE • 53

Swimming Solo Once Aquaman vacated Adventure Comics for his own title, Aqualad stuck around for a threeissue backup series written by Paul Kupperberg.

Opening page to chapter one, from #453 (art by Carl Potts and Joe Rubinstein).

TM & © DC Comics.

aware that there were other purple-eyed Atlanteans.

With the introduction of the Idylists, Michelinie fleshed out Aqualad’s world and finally gave the sidekick a bit more meat on the bone of his sparse background.

But the Idylist saga would have to wait, because tragedy strikes. Black Manta is revealed to be behind the abduction of Aquababy and places the infant in a bubble filled with water. Manta slowly fills the bubble with air, saying he will only release the young prince if Aquaman and Aqualad fight to the death [more on Black Manta’s malevolence can be found in Bryan Stroud’s villain history of the character, elsewhere in this issue—ed.]. All of a sudden, an old friendship is torn asunder as Aquaman furiously tries to take down his ward and sidekick. Aquaman eventually manages to free his child, but it is too late. Aquababy had drowned in the air-filled bubble.

At that moment, the innocence of the Aquaman family is shattered and so is the sanctity of Aquaman and Aqualad’s relationship. A fighting-mad Aquaman wants to pursue Black Manta, but

54 • BACK ISSUE • Aquaman Issue

Aqualad is too emotionally hurt by his mentor’s fierce assault to accompany his longtime partner.

It was a daring move by Michelinie to kill Aquababy, but without Aquaman’s true son in the picture, Aqualad no longer seemed as redundant. But that’s not why Michelinie committed comic-book infanticide. “I actually don’t remember if that was my decision,” the writer tells BACK ISSUE. “I was carrying on with plots that were in motion before I took over the series, and my feeling is that the death was previously planned—but I can’t say for sure..”

A FEW SOLO LAPS

After the death of Aquababy, Garth would finally have a chance to star in his own feature, in Adventure Comics #453 (Sept.–Oct. 1977), as writer Paul Kupperberg and artist Carl Potts presented the first part of a solo Aqualad backup strip. Kupperberg and Potts continue the saga of the Idylists and, more importantly, begin to fill in the gaps of Aqualad’s past. Kupperberg’s job was to finally make Aqualad more than just a redundant sidekick. Remembering the assignment, Kupperberg recalls, “I didn’t and don’t have any particularly strong feelings about Aqualad, then or now. paul kupperberg When I started reading comics in the © Luigi Novi / early 1960s, he was another in a cast of Wikimedia Commons. dumb DC kid (or kid-like) sidekicks. Even when he spun out on his own in Teen Titans, he was still just Aquaman Junior, but with the really, really, really stupid teen/hipster dialog the 50-year-old writers were sticking in their word balloons.” In the three backup features, Kupperberg endeavored to make Aqualad more than that.

“The Aqualad backup story in Adventure Comics (#453–455) was an assignment, not my idea,” Kupperberg says. “As I recall, Garth had gone off on a quest to find his true identity and where he was from in the Aquaman title, so the three-part backup told the story of that quest.”

At this time, Aquaman was removed from Adventure Comics to star in a new solo book, and while the Sea King was, as Kupperberg so deftly puts it, “being pissed off and angsty,” Aqualad began his quest for his own identity. During his time with the purple-eyed Idylists, Aqualad discovers that his father, King Thar, was a monarch of the offshoot race of Atlantaens. As if this wasn’t shocking enough, Aqualad also discovers that the pacifist Idylists murdered his royal father. A fighting-mad Aqualad confronts the Idylists, but soon stumbles on a cavern filled with advanced weapons. Aqualad discovers that the stash was built up by Thar in order to destroy Atlantis, and the peace-loving Idylists committed regicide to avoid further bloodshed. Aqualad quickly forgives not only the Idylists but Aquaman as well and swims off to find his former partner. With his heritage discovered, as dark as it was, Aqualad exits his own feature as a character that finally had a backstory that allowed him to stand out from his undersea mentor. Kupperberg succeeded in what he set out to do with Aqualad, creating a fleshed-out narrative past that writers could latch on to.

Aqualad would return to the world of Aquaman in Aquaman #63 (Aug.–Sept. 1978) to help his friend and mentor defeat the Ocean Master and join his extended family in mourning the unthinkable loss of Arthur Curry, Jr. During this return, penned by Kupperberg with art by Don Newton, Aqualad acknowledges his own quest. By the time the time Kupperberg wraps his tale, Aqualad and Aquaman are reunited, but this time, there is a bit more depth to Aqualad than before the death of Aquababy and the introduction of the Idylists. Aqualad’s journey was deftly closed by Kupperberg, but it was started by David Michelinie,

who recalls his brief but important time with the character: “During the time I wrote Aqualad I thought his motivation was effective and believable— trying to find the ‘family’ he never knew existed.” As for the fateful choice to separate Aqualad and Aquaman, Michelinie recalls, “…I liked his decision when he declined to accompany Aquaman on the hunt for Arthur, Jr.’s killer. The cliché would have been for him to accept Aquaman’s actions in the gladiator arena, understand that he was only trying to kill Aqualad to save his own son’s life. Then they’d go off to hunt and fight together like nothing had happened. But understanding and forgiving are two different things, and Aqualad’s inability to deal with the fact that his friend actually tried to kill him, for real, was both realistic and surprisingly human.” Indeed, Aquababy’s death changed Aquaman and Aqualad’s relationship moving forward, as would the presence of the Idylists, a group that would play a role in Aqualad’s transformation into Tempest decades later.

THE FORGOTTEN TITAN

While Aqualad was always overshadowed by Aquaman, in the Silver Age, the youthful character did shine in the pages of Teen Titans, and there are plenty of Aqualad adventures with the Titans to uncover before we can relate Aqualad’s transformation into Tempest. Teen Titans #45 (Nov.–Dec. 1976), the second issue of the Teen Titans’ Bronze Age revival, sees the Titan known as Mal receive a mystical horn from the Angel Gabriel. When Mal reveals the horn to his teammates, he blows it and summons Aqualad. Aqualad doesn’t miss a beat and rejoins his friends for the first time since the Silver Age. One has to wonder why DC chose to not have Aqualad take part in the team’s new first issue— after all, Aqualad was founding member of the TTs. But that’s the story of Aqualad in the Bronze Age, isn’t it? Always an afterthought.

That off-to-the-sidelines role was never more pronounced than in the Bronze Age Teen Titans run written

by Bob Rozakis. This time in Titans history was quite tumultuous. In a handful of issues, Mal, Bumblebee, and Joker’s Daughter all join the team and are vying for page time even before Rozakis introduces a new squad of heroes with Titans West.

With all these Titans being squeezed into each issue, Aqualad was basically written out of the series. In Teen Titans #47 (Apr. 1977), Aqualad contracts something called Hydro-Asian flu and spends the bulk of the late-’70s Teen Titans run stuck recovering in a tank of salt water and being tended to in Atlantis. Aqualad even becomes an afterthought to his own teammates in Teen Titans #48 (June 1977) when, caught up in an adventure involving Two-Face and Joker’s Daughter, the Titans forget to change the water in Aqualad’s recovery tank!

And things get worse. In Teen Titans #51 (Nov. 1977), during the first meet-up of the Teen Titans and the Titans West, it is revealed that Aqualad never had HydroAsian Flu. It turns out Aqualad had psychosomatic symptoms because, compared to the rest of the Titans, he feels useless. It’s ironic that as these issues of Teen Titans were on newsstands, Aqualad was trying to find his history and identity in order to become his own mind in the pages of Adventure Comics. Truly, the Bronze Age narrative of Aqualad was a tale of two heroes, one on a journey of discovery and one on a journey to find his place among his peers—while soaking in a fish tank.

TITANS TOGETHER

When the New Teen Titans by the immortal creative team of writer Marv Wolfman and artist George Pérez debuted in 1980 and took the comic-book world by storm, Aqualad, an original Titan, was notably absent, but that’s not to say that the character was forgotten. “I like the freedom of doing whatever kind of story I want and Aqualad forces the team to deal with water-based problems,” Wolfman tells BACK ISSUE. But like many writers before him, when there wasn’t a soggy problem to be solved, Wolfman had difficulty finding page time for the undersea hero.

“I used him when I had that kind of story,” Wolfman remembers.

“But he was too limited to be a full-time member…. He was ‘kid Aquaman.’ I wish I could have found something unique about him.”

But that’s not to say that Wolfman did not have respect for Aqualad and his long history. “There’s nothing inherently silly about him or Aquaman except for speaking to fish,” Wolfman says. “But let’s face it, that was a 1950s concept and most of the material then was pretty silly. But as a concept Aqualad can be cool, especially when dealing with Atlantis and mythology.”

Aqualad’s first significant appearance in Wolfman and Pérez’s epic run was in The New Teen Titans #33, and even though the Titans take on the nautical-themed villain Trident in this issue, Aqualad sadly swims off early in the tale. It’s back to the tank in Aqualad’s next Titans appearance in Tales of the Teen Titans #45 (Aug. 1984).

This story not only marks the return of Aqualad, but it also returns the long-absent Aquagirl as well.

In this issue, Aqualad arrives at Teen Titans HQ with a dying Aquagirl in his arms. The two are clearly suffering some mysterious malady and pass out before they can reach the Titans’ pool. The Titans find the Aqua-couple and find out they are suffering from some kind of radiation poisoning.

Nightwing cures them both and Aqualad relates that it was the villainous H.I.V.E. that set off an explosion in Atlantis that caused the near-fatal illness.

The story continues in Tales of the Teen Titans #46–47 (Sept.–Oct. 1984), as Wolfman and Pérez present a confident and fightingmad Aqualad. In these issues, Aqualad and Aquagirl lead the charge against H.I.V.E. and play a key role in defeating the criminal organization before it can destroy Atlantis. Wolfman and Pérez present Aqualad as an unstoppable powerhouse, competent and strong-willed. Pérez adds a new visual element to the young hero as the artist forgoes Aqualad’s signature red tunic for a bare-chested look. This new, more barbaric-looking Aqualad makes the character seem more like an Edgar Rice Burroughs hero rather than a kid sidekick and adds an element of masculinity that,

Inferiority Complex Aqualad’s spirits are soggy in the Bob Rozakis/Don Heck/ Frank Chiaramonte-produced Teen Titans #51 (Nov. 1977).

TM & © DC Comics.

Aquaman Issue • BACK ISSUE • 55

It’s Tula Late!

The death of Aquagirl. Page 19 of Crisis on Infinite Earths #9 (July 1983). By Wolfman/Pérez/Jerry Ordway.

TM & © DC Comics.

RETURN TO THE TITANS

Aqualad would return to the Titans in The New Teen Titans #19–20 (Mar.–Apr. 1986), a Wolfman issue with art by Eduardo Barreto that sees the original Silver Age Titans reunited. Aqualad is back with his pals front and center, but this is a Titans tale with an Aqualad in mourning for those lost in the Crisis. The idea of loss is deftly explored by Wolfman in these issues as Titans Aqualad, Hawk, and Wally West all must deal with the deaths of Dove, Aquagirl, and Barry Allen, respectively.

Aqualad helps the team fight Cheshire and the Hybrid, but he is withdrawn and depressed. An uplifting moment comes in The New Teen Titans #25 (Nov. 1986), when Aqualad uses his memories of Aquagirl as inspiration to bust out of his malaise. He takes the fight to the Hybrid and saves the Titans from drowning by summoning a pod of whales. In this issue, Wolfman reminds us what a powerhouse Aqualad can be when not drowning in his own depression. Despite his show of force, Aqualad is captured by Mento and the Hybrid and held captive.

AN UNDERWATER SPOTLIGHT

The plot thread of Aqualad as Mento’s captive dangles for months until it is assumed by writer John Ostrander and a young Erik Larsen, penciler, in the pages of Teen Titans Spotlight #10 (May 1987). This issue is a fascinating change of pace for Aqualad because it explores Garth as a telepath rather than as an Aquaman clone. As Aqualad and Mento do battle on the mental plane, Mento forces Aqualad to experience his past as Ostrander and Larsen take readers on a tour through the now-rich history of Aqualad. Aqualad confronts his father, the late King Thar, and must once again experience the death of Tula.

Aqualad proves to be the more powerful telepath and defeats Mento at his own game. When Mento first took Aqualad prisoner, it seemed like once again Garth would be confined to a tank, awaiting rescue.

But in the pages of Teen Titans Spotlight, Garth takes another step on the road to maturity and frees himself, and while doing so, proves to the DC faithful that he is a telepath to be reckoned with.

Garth got another Teen Titans Spotlight focus in issue #18 (Jan. 1988).

This issue, penned by Dan Mishkin and Gary Cohn with visuals by Art Thibert, is part of the Millennium crossover and is another exploration of Garth’s powers. It seems that as a result of his grief over the loss of Aquagirl and the abuse at the hands and mind of Mento, Aqualad’s ability to talk to fish has been disrupted. Mishkin and Cohn pick up this story thread in Spotlight as Aqualad and Aquaman must team up to take on a squadron of underwater Manhunter robots.

Looking back at his Aqualad issue, Cohn recalls that his mission statement for the Spotlight was simple: “I see that we tied in some continuity—he’d lost his mental powers, fought Mento (isn’t that a candy mint?), and this issue was supposed to give him back those powers (which it does).” Despite co-writing a rather effective Aqualad adventure, Cohn does not have many memories or feelings for the character. “At some point frankly, the character always lacked. The H.I.V.E. years ago I might have known his name is ‘Garth,’ storyline was truly one of Aqualad’s (and Aquagirl’s) but I wouldn’t have now, without you using the name marv wolfman finest hours as Titans, but when the character next in your questions.” But Cohn does fondly remember appeared in a Wolfman and Pérez production, tragedy Noel Wolfman. one aspect of his time with Aqualad: “My last thought would strike the Aquaman family once again. is that the artwork on this TT Spotlight Aqualad issue is nice. Must be pretty early work by Art Thibert. I remember I first heard his name over AN UNDERWATER CRISIS the phone while talking to Dan Mishkin, and the way Dan ran the name Aqualad was a guest at Donna Troy’s wedding in Tales of the Teen Titans together I thought he was saying, ‘Artie Bear.’ [Editor’s note: The artist’s #50 (Feb. 1985), but this happy affair would serve as an ironic contrast name is pronounced ‘Art Tee-bear.’] Good artist, nice line, and the to what was to come for the undersea Titan. Just one year from when credits tell me that he inked the book, too. Given the paper stock, Aquagirl helped take down H.I.V.E., she is killed battling an army Adrienne Roy’s colors were always well done. Flipping through the of Earth’s supervillains in the pages of Crisis on Infinite Earths #9 pages, the book looks good.”

Cohn’s partner Dan Mishkin also did not have strong feelings for (Dec. 1985). In this fateful issue, Aquagirl is poisoned by the toxic monster known as Chemo and dies in Aqualad’s arms. According to Aqualad. “Here’s where I have to reveal that I don’t think of Aqualad Wolfman, even though Aquagirl was a part of the Titans family, it was as an inherently interesting character, mostly because he’s just so not the writer’s idea to kill the longstanding member of the Aquaman similar to Aquaman,” Mishkin tells BACK ISSUE. “Which I think was family. “I assume it was recommended by whomever the Aquaman just fine when he was first introduced to play a generic sidekick role, editor was,” Wolfman recalls. “Except for the big characters we chose creating a father-son dynamic that helped give Aquaman a little more before I began the story, the editors made the suggestions.” Whomever range… and also gave him someone to talk to besides fish. Outside of it was that choose to kill Aquagirl, there can be no denying that her that dynamic, I think that Aqualad is only as interesting as the situation death influenced the character of Aqualad for years to come. he’s put into. The character would have been stronger with a compelling 56 • BACK ISSUE • Aquaman Issue

Head Games The psychedelic Bill Sienkiewicz cover art for Aqualad’s solo shot in Teen Titans Spotlight #10 (May 1987).

Courtesy of Heritage Comics Auctions (www.ha.com).

TM & © DC Comics.

Aquaman Issue • BACK ISSUE • 57

Marine Manhunters Aqualad—with a familiar co-star— took the stage again in Teen Titans Spotlight #18 (Jan. 1988). Cover art by Art Thibert.

TM & © DC Comics.

backstory and a sense of mission, something that he was make his powers somewhat different from Aquaman’s, fighting for that distinguished him from Aquaman and but I can’t tell you the history of that decision. Did it come all the other heroes.” from Gary and me? I can see some thematic resonance In Mishkin and Cohn’s issue of Spotlight, Aqualad was with our other work in the way the story implicitly challenges the assumption that the power to fighting for his powers. Aqualad’s powers may have made him sometimes redundant, but command confers a right to command, but they also defined him. In this Millennium that’s hardly definitive. It may well have been crossover, Aqualad was fighting for his the outcome we were instructed to reach. place in the DC Universe, because The fact that the change in Aqualad’s without his powers, what was he? powers now seems pretty minor (they’re By the end of Mishkin, Cohn, and still way too close to Aquaman’s, in my Thibert’s issue, Aqualad’s powers subtly opinion) makes me hope that this is what transform. During his battle with the we were told to do, rather than being a sign of our limited imaginations.”

Manhunters, Garth found that he could no longer command fish to do his bidding— Whatever the case, with the subtle he had to ask for their help. This set changes to his abilities, Aqualad was no Garth’s ability apart from his mentor’s, longer an exact replica of his partner. but the distinction was thin at best.

The issue also has the distinction of gary cohn being one of the first times Aquaman As to why this minor power change and Aqualad worked together without took place, Mishkin says, “It’s been such a long time that I can only guess about what our bitterness after the death of Tula. In the two Aqualad goals were. Obviously, there’s an effort to issues of Teen Titans Spotlight, Aqualad continued his growth as a hero and as a person, something, according to Mishkin, the character needed. “I think it goes back to that issue of his having been created as a pretty cookie-cutter version of the kid sidekick: same powers as his mentor, and learning how to use them in a mature and responsible way in the context of a substitute parent-child relationship.

That worked just fine in 1960, but in the 1970s and beyond, a fairly substantial rethink or retcon would have been dan mishkin needed for him to have a reason to show up anywhere but in Titans stories.”

TANKS FOR THE MEMORIES: THE ROAD TO TEMPEST BEGINS

And that rethink was coming in a big way. Aqualad’s transformation into independence, adulthood, and his own distinct identity began by his almost dying. In New Titans #72 (Jan. 1991) by Wolfman and Tom Grummett, Aqualad and Golden Eagle were attacked by a member of the villainous Wildebeests. Aqualad was tossed off a cliff and by issue’s end, he was found not breathing. Thus began the “Titans Hunt” storyline by Wolfman, which promised to change or remove many existing Titans from this mortal coil.

It was back to the recovery tank in The New Titans #73 (Feb. 1991) as Deathstroke saves Aqualad from certain death. Yeah, Aqualad was pushed to the med bay once again in the pages of a Titans book, but at least a major storyline like “The Titans Hunt” used Aqualad as the inciting incident that kicked off the epic tale. In The New Titans #85 (Apr. 1992), Aqualad is still recovering as Wolfman reaches back to the Kupperberg days for the Idylists. As a last desperate hope, Aquaman and the Titans decide to find the Idylists to help Aqualad recover.

Thanks to the medical aid of the Idylists, Aqualad makes a full recovery and saves the day in The New Titans #92 (Nov. 1992) as the young seagoing Titan returns in a Tom Grummett-designed new costume. Grummett’s costume used the same color scheme as Aqualad’s classic costume, but it was sleeveless and sleek. The new look really accented Aqualad’s swimmer’s physique and finally set his look apart from Aquaman’s. Grummett would play with his Aqualad design throughout his Titans run, adding long sleeves (and eventually, a leather jacket—it was the ’90s, after all) to the new look. This was the first costume change for Aqualad in his, at that point, over-30-year history, but another new look, and a new name, was right around the corner.

58 • BACK ISSUE • Aquaman Issue

SIDEKICK NO MORE

Aqualad’s involvement in Peter David and Martin Egeland’s Aquaman began in the first issue of that series (Aug. 1994).

When the series begins, Aquaman had become a recluse.

He was the powerful king and superhero no longer, but thanks to his old friend Aqualad, Aquaman would soon return to action. David tells BACK ISSUE that he felt that Aqualad “was a steady balance for Aquaman.” David recalls, “Remember that when I started the series, Aquaman had basically withdrawn from the world and taken up residence in a cave. It was Garth who came to him, managed to remind him of his responsibilities, and pull him out of his funk.”

Indeed, Aqualad was the catalyst for David’s series.

Unlike other creators, David did not see Aqualad as redundant, but as a vital part of the Aquaman mythos, as “Aquaman’s heir apparent, especially with the passing of Aquababy years ago.” Building on that history, David transforms Aqualad into Aquaman’s equal and his confidant.

Aqualad is the only being capable of bringing Aquaman back to his heroic self after the Sea King suffered so much tragedy. As soon as Aqualad convinces the bitter Aquaman to return to his duties as protector of the seas, they encounter Charybdis, a new enemy with the power to possess the bodies of others and control sea life. Charybdis defeats Aquaman and commands a school of piranha to devour the hero’s hand, an infamous moment in Aquaman history. While fighting Aquaman, Charybdis dismisses Aqualad to Aquaman as “a smaller, weaker version of you… not worth the effort… I’m sure others will find use for him.”

The “others” Charybdis speaks of are sharks about to rip Aqualad to shreds—but if one looks at this moment from a metatextual angle, David was foreshadowing his intent to build up Aqualad as a character. And indeed, Aqualad changed more in David’s Aquaman than he did in any previous Aquaman or Teen Titans series.

David set the stage for Aqualad’s evolution long before the debut of the writer’s Aquaman series. In the David-penned Atlantis Chronicles #5 (July 1990), the writer introduced a character by the name of Atlan. A powerful sorcerer and the being who would sire both Aquaman and Ocean Master, Atlan would play an important role in Aqualad’s transformation into Tempest—but before we get there, let’s check back in with the now-one-handed Aquaman.

Aqualad is present when Aquaman first reveals his hook hand in Aquaman #0 (Oct. 1984) and spends most of the early issues of the series helping his mentor fight through adversaries like the new Superboy and Lobo. Aqualad also develops a crush on another sea-going DC hero, the lovely and mysterious Dolphin, and a very interesting love triangle develops between Aquaman (who was separated from Mera at the time), Aqualad, and Dolphin. This was new ground for Aqualad, a character who had not had a love interest since the death of Aquagirl. Speaking of Aquagirl, a spectral figure claiming to be Tula appears to Aqualad in Aquaman #2 (Sept. 1994), a moment that would foreshadow huge things for Aqualad moving forward.

Aqualad and Aquaman separate in Aquaman #5 (Jan. 1995), with the younger hero beginning his quest to find the “ghost” of Tula. Meanwhile, David introduces another character that could have once again reduced Aqualad to redundancy. In Aquaman #5, David and artist Jim Calafiore introduce a young Inuit who possesses powers similar to Aquaman’s. This young man, Koryak, is the son of Aquaman and an Inuit woman. Koryak accompanies his just-discovered father to Atlantis and becomes a focal point of the series during Aqualad’s quest to discover the truth of Tula’s “ghost.”

It turns out that the false Tula was actually a mermaid named Letifos, but as soon as Aqualad makes this discovery, he is abducted by Letifos’ people. In Aquaman #8 (Apr. 1995), Aqualad is seemingly consumed by “flesh-eating water” as Letifos watches helplessly. With Aqualad out of the picture,

David is able to focus on Koryak, Aquaman’s actual son.

It seems like Aqualad was forced out of the spotlight again, but this could not be farther from the truth. David and DC had huge plans for Aqualad, but fans would have to wait awhile before these undersea machinations were revealed.

DON’T CALL HIM ‘AQUALAD’

Aqualad’s next appearance was not in the pages of David’s Aquaman but in short tale in Showcase ’96 #1 (Jan. 1996).

In just ten short pages, writer Phil Jimenez and artist Scott Kolins reveal Aqualad’s fate after the young hero’s encounter with the “flesh-eating water.” It turns out the eternally young Aqualad was not so young anymore. After being devoured by the deadly water back in Aquaman #8, Aqualad’s spirit was taken to a mystic plane of existence where Atlan, Aquaman’s birth father, trains the former sidekick in the arts of elemental sorcery. In the Showcase ’96, feature, Garth’s new elemental powers are revealed as is his mission to become the protector of all undersea peoples of the Earth.

Jimenez and Kolins show off Garth’s new powers to make water freeze and boil, to control undersea currents, and to wield incredibly enhanced telekinesis and telepathy.

Garth also has a new look. He now wears a plain black-and-

A Whole New You Aqualad’s new costume, as seen in New Titans #92 (Nov. 1992) by Marv Wolfman, Tom Grummett, and Al Vey. TM & © DC Comics.

Aquaman Issue • BACK ISSUE • 59

Taking Charge (top) Garth confronts the self-pitying Arthur in Aquaman #1 (Aug. 1994), by Peter David, Martin Egeland, and Brad Vancata. (bottom) Phil Jimenez and Scott Kolins brought changes to Garth in Showcase ’96 #1 (Jan. 1996).

TM & © DC Comics.

white-strapped singlet and has glowing scars over one eye. Gone were the bright colors that visually defined the former Aqualad for so long, replaced by a masculine and Spartan look that befitted a warrior. After so many years of simply being mini-Aquaman, Garth had new abilities that set him apart. No longer is the Titan a smaller version of his mentor, forgotten and derivative. Now, after the time spent with Atlan—three years, to be exact—Garth has become a powerful sorcerer and warrior, a way to connect the mystic side of the DC Universe with the underwater world of Aquaman. At the end of Jimenez and Kolins’ feature, Garth returns to his reality, ready to aid Aquaman and all the undersea people not as a lad, but as a powerful man with newfound confidence and maturity.

That man shows up in David’s Aquaman #19–20 (Apr.–May 1996) to help Aquaman fight Ocean Master. Even with Koryak around, Garth’s new elemental magic finally allows him to stand out amongst the other undersea heroes of the DC Universe. He is now a superhero who could not be confined to a fish tank any longer.

In Aquaman #21 (June 1996), Garth shows the world how independent he has become. He not only fights side-by-side with Aquaman and shows off his vast new powers, Garth also confidently plants a kiss on Aquaman’s paramour Dolphin, showing readers that he is taking steps to move on from Tula. David forged Garth into a hero who was not only more powerful than Aquaman, but he was now Aquaman’s masculine equal in every way.

In the early issues of David’s run, it seemed like Garth might be overshadowed by the arrival of Aquaman’s son Koryak, but after Aquaman’s real son Koryak fights Aquaman’s surrogate son Garth in Aquaman #23 (Aug. 1996), Garth proves himself to be vastly more powerful than his mentor’s biological offspring.

The recently mega-powered Garth defeats a mind-controlled Koryak in the span of three panels, dispelling any doubt over who Aquaman’s true heir should be.

Garth asserts his dominance over Koryak once again in Aquaman #25 (Oct. 1996), a gathering of some of the DC Universe’s greatest undersea heroes. One could only imagine how lost Aqualad would have been in the Bronze Age if characters such as Aquaman, Tsunami, Neptune Perkins, the Sea Devils, Arion of Atlantis, and Power Girl all formed an undersea assault force, but this new magically powered Garth was the team’s true powerhouse as Aquaman’s squad took the fight to a horde of undersea usurpers. But that was Garth under scribe Peter David, a character who was no longer an afterthought or to be brushed away into a recovery tank. Garth was now the most powerful undersea hero in the DC Universe, a lad no longer.

After Aquaman #25, David had huge plans to evolve Garth even further, but he came up against a surface threat that not even the powers of all Atlantis combined could hope to defeat—editorial conflict. Garth would move on to his own miniseries, an event we will cover in two shakes of a squid’s tentacle, but after Garth took another solo lap around the DC Universe, he was to become heir to the mantle of Aquaman. After Aquaman #25, David was going to build to a story where—well, why don’t we let the chronicler of lost Atlantis tell you himself? “Yes,” David reveals to BACK ISSUE. “I was going to kill off Aquaman and Garth was going to be the new Aquaman. DC said, ‘Absolutely not.’ I quit the book and then eventually they went ahead and did exactly what I wanted to do.” During the next year or so on Aquaman, David began planting seeds for Garth’s eventual ascension into the role of Aquaman, but alas, DC nixed the idea. “I actually embarked on the story until I was told that I could not conclude it the way I wanted to,” David reveals. “I was told that because of the death of Superman, fans would never accept Aquaman being killed off. Eventually I was going to bring him back as an elemental being who would, through the efforts of Mera, find his way back to humanity. But I was told no, I couldn’t do it. As for Garth… why wouldn’t he be the heir apparent?”

Why, indeed? Because under David, Aqualad had become the character he was always meant to be. He swam from the shadow of his mentor and transformed into a man and an independent hero. When David took over the Aquaman family of characters, DC felt that Garth was, as David recalls, “Obviously… a stronger character, and I used some of the groundwork I laid—including Atlan, whom I created for Atlantis Chronicles—to build him up as a character.” Using his world building in Atlantis Chronicles, David built Garth up to be a mighty hero and warrior, but it’s a shame the writer never got to see his plans for Aqualad 60 • BACK ISSUE • Aquaman Issue

come to fruition, because they would have truly completed that journey begun when Aqualad swam off on his own so long ago in the Bronze Age pages of Adventure Comics.

But like so many aspects of Atlantis, that time in Aqualad’s history would become lost forever.

FINALLY… TEMPEST

But we are not closing our lost scrolls of Atlantis just yet, for we have one more chapter of Aqualad to chronicle.

After Garth helped Aquaman regain control of Atlantis, the former Aqualad swam into his own comic series for the very first time. Phil Jimenez returned with Tempest #1 (Nov. 1996), and in the pages of the first issue of this four-issue miniseries, Garth returns to Shayeris, the city of the Idylists. Jimenez writes and draws this series and recounts the entirety of Aqualad’s origins, from the Silver Age tale of Garth being abandoned because of his purple eyes, to the Michelenie and Kupperberg tale of King Thar’s murder at the hands of the Idylists, to the death of Tula and the recent events of Garth’s training with Atlan. Jimenez deftly distills these myriad elements into a concise and fantastical origin story. Jimenez also phil jimenez brings back Lefitos, the mermaid warrior © Luigi Novi / Garth once mistook for Tula. Jimenez Wikimedia Commons. also shocks readers by seemingly bringing Tula back from the dead as well. By the end of the first issue, Atlan is abducted by time-displaced Atlantaen warriors and Garth, Lefitos, and the back-fromthe-grave Tula quest to find the ancient wizard in order for Garth to find the key to his new powers.

Under Jimenez, Garth begins his journey proper to become Tempest. No longer is Garth a sideline player or a derivative sidekick—he is the protagonist in an epic quest that spans the history of DC’s undersea kingdoms, a powerhouse that holds the mythology of DC’s underwater worlds together. With Tempest #2 (Dec. 1996), readers finally witness Garth adopting the name of Tempest.

Before he undergoes an ancient Idylist ritual, Garth dons a new red-and-black costume and adopts his new codename. The transformation that began when Garth met Mcann so long ago had been completed, Garth is now truly his own man. Sadly, Tula is revealed to be a pawn of the ancient wizard Slizzath, the brother of King Thar and Garth’s uncle. According to Idylist history, Thar went mad trying to amass an arsenal to fight his wicked brother’s forces which led to his own people turning on the king and murdering him—or at least that’s what Garth was Aquaman, Tempest, and Dolphin that ended with told. Jimenez reveals that before Thar died, he cast a spell Dolphin leaving Aquaman for Tempest and the two to trap Slizzath in another dimension. Any heir of Thar having a son together. There was the strained could be manipulated in opening the dimension and relationship between Garth and Aquaman’s actual son freeing Slizzath, so Thar’s pregnant queen Berra was exiled Koryak, and there was a reforming of the original Teen and fled to Atlantis. She gave birth to a purple-eyed baby Titans as the 20-something Titans. It may have taken named Garth who was then exiled himself because of the decades from the halcyon days of Silver Age stardom color of his eyes. Yeah, it’s all very convoluted and epic, on the newsstand, on TV, and on toy shelves, but through but finally, Garth had an origin and history all his own it all, Garth, now Tempest, that separates the former Aqualad from Aquaman. would forever more swim as Jimenez’s Tempest concludes with the reveal that his own man. the returned Tula was actually a puppet controlled by Slizzath. Tempest has to defeat his former love in order MARC BUXTON is a proud contributor to defeat his enemy once and for all. With the help to websites like Comic Book of the Idylists, Garth succeeds and in a very moving Resources and Den of Geek US. conclusion, Tempest reburies the former Aquagirl. Garth Marc is an English teacher, and his tearfully says, “Yeah, so what if all the other Titans did loving wife thinks he owns way too it years ago. I’m a slow learner, okay? It might have many comic books. Marc has been taken me a little while, but I’ve finally grown up, Tula.” reading comics since the dawn of And indeed Garth had. Sure, there were more time and is still deeply in love with adventures to come. There was the love triangle between every era of the great medium.

The Wizard of Idylists Phil Jimenez’s poster-worthy covers for 1996’s four-issue Tempest miniseries, wherein Garth achieves adulthood and a new role in the DC Universe.

TM & © DC Comics.

Aquaman Issue • BACK ISSUE • 61

by J o

hn Schwirian

The Saga of Seadragon Covers to Elite Comics’ Seadragon #1 (May 1986)– 6 (Jan. 1987). Cover art by Tom Floyd (issues #1–3), Dennis Yee (#4), and Yee (pencils) and Floyd (inks) (#5–6). (opposite page, top left) Floyd’s back cover art to issue #2. © Carl Knappe and Tom Floyd.

Back in 1984, the comic-book market was evolving.

Long-established publishers like Gold Key, Harvey, and Charlton had either quit the business or were soon to do so, and spinner racks were dominated

by Marvel and DC. Meanwhile, the direct market was gaining ground, with new independent publishers skipping the traditional distribution system and shipping directly to comic-book stores.

This allowed for many new and different series to edge their way onto the scene—series like Cerebus, Elfquest, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, and, of course, Seadragon.

What? You say you don’t remember Seadragon?

Well, then, allow me to refresh your memory.

DEEP IN THE HEART OF TEXAS

tom floyd

ERBzine.com.

62 • BACK ISSUE • Aquaman Issue

It all began in Texas with Tom Floyd and Carl Knappe, two Vietnam vets looking for a change of pace. Knappe and Floyd had been friends for a while, and Knappe, who worked as a surveyor for the city of Midland, Texas, wanted to go into business for himself. “Carl and I were both inspired by the fact that we didn’t like our jobs at the time,” writer/illustrator Tom Floyd explains. “My oil field job was starting to wear me down. I was an engine mechanic working for a Caterpillar Tractor dealership, but mostly I was recovering from a bad case of pneumonia and had light duty jobs and hated it. I liked being an engine mechanic, but had a hard time getting back up the ladder of jobs at work.

Things Go Better with Koch (right) From Seadragon #4 (Sept. 1986), a close look at Walter Koch’s aquatic supersuit.

Art by Dennis Yee and Butch Burcham. © Carl Knappe and Tom Floyd.

“I always wanted to work in or produce comics,” Floyd continues, “and once Carl had mentioned he had an ‘in’ to some money, I started talking to him about doing comics. Carl was the business- and money-type person, and I was the idea, creative side of things.”

Initially, they called their new company Independent Comics, but soon discovered that another company held that title. “So we changed our company name to Elite Comics,” Floyd laughs, “which everyone liked better.”

The company logo proudly incorporated the Texas flag.

“We were Texans and wanted it to show on the books,” Floyd proclaims. “We wanted people to know you didn’t have to be from New York to make comics.”

Both men drew upon their military experience for their first two characters—Nightmare and Seadragon.

Floyd had done some art for fanzines and a little ghost work for a couple of inkers for Marvel, so he had some idea of how to assemble a comic book. His ideas came together in Epsilon Wave, the tale of an Army vet whose subconscious created the hero Nightmare.

According to Floyd, “Epsilon Wave was the most developed strip we had. Nightmare was the main character, the dream state of Arthur Williams, a soldier with PTSD—something I battled and still do. The Epsilon Wave was the dream state that he went into to tap his power. Delta Wave sleep is where dreams happen to normal people, so I just went one step further.

Seadragon was something Carl wanted to create, as he had served in the Navy in the Vietnam era, so Seadragon was more or less his thing.”

Seadragon was Commander Walter Koch (pronounced “coke”), Navy Seal, who had been chosen to field test an experimental diving suit that gave divers more freedom in deeper waters. His initial outing in the suit was to retrieve drums of toxic waste leaking on the ocean floor, but this ended in disaster when he and his team discover a Russian sub operating in US waters. The Russians torpedo the seal team, killing three men and bathing Koch in toxins.

He awakens in sickbay, only to find that the suit is now permanently grafted to his skin. The Navy restricts his movements and tells his girlfriend and family that he is dead. On the bright side, he can now breathe underwater, see in murky waters, and is a more powerful swimmer!

A GATHERING OF THE ELITE…

Epsilon Wave #1 (Oct. 1985) featured Nightmare in the lead with Seadragon as the backup. This continued for three issues, after which Seadragon was launched into a solo title. At first, Floyd and Knappe did everything, which quickly convinced them that they needed help. The Elite Comics’ payroll soon added Jarri and Jonni Parker, Butch and Debbi Burcham, G. R. Guinan, Robert Buckley, Thomas

© 1985 Tom Floyd.

Aquaman Issue • BACK ISSUE • 63

Search for a Trident Digital photo of a signed original art page by Dennis Yee from Seadragon #3, courtesy of John Schwirian. © Carl Knappe and Tom Floyd.

Caffall, Chuck George, Steve Erwin, Richard Paolinelli, “Butch Burcham was an inker that came with the Twilight Dennis Yee, and R. A. Jones. John Wooley and Terry Tidwell Avenger deal. And Debbi was a hell of a letterer, so she moved also brought their pulp serial Twilight Avenger to Elite. into that job. Richard Paolinelli was a writer that came on board for a few Seadragon tales. Chuck George was “We seemed to grow pretty fast at first,” actually an EMT tech from El Paso that I met Floyd recalls. “As Carl and I had to always be putting out fires, we started cutting at a comic convention. I liked Chuck’s style down on our creative time. Jonni Parker and he wanted to break into comics. But was a local artist I picked to come on something happened in his life and he didn’t board to color our stories. We used the continue, so that is where Steve Erwin came gray-line method from Pat Boyette’s in. I met Steve at a con in Dallas. He was working on or had just ended a run on Impact Productions out of San Antonio. the Shatter series for First Comics.

I went down there and set that process up, meeting Pat and his crew. Too bad “G. R. Guinan was going to handle the printers we tried in the area screwed the colors on some of the associate books up the colors so bad. Robert Buckley we had coming up. We had the idea was a high school friend of mine. We to branch out and provide a service to used to bounce comic ideas/stories off small comic teams to get their books richard paolinelli of each other when we were in high up and running. That is where the school, so I hired him at the beginning Twilight Avenger deal came in. We also to help me write ‘bibles’ for some of the characters. had some feelers out for a printing consortium kind of Thomas Caffall was a friend of Carl’s, and he was going thing. We thought we could find a better printer if we to do the lettering as he was better than me at that. could get them more business. We tried to get together with other small companies and gang-print the books Thomas is still one of my closest friends to this day. so all that would be needed would be a series of plate changes but the runs would add up together to a higher run, hence cheaper per copy for us.”

SEADRAGONS LIVE FOREVER, BUT NOT SO, COMIC BOOKS…

For Epsilon Wave #1–3, Knappe, Floyd, and the Parkers handled everything on the Seadragon feature, but things had to change when the strip expanded into its own book. In his first three stories, Seadragon was pretty busy (1) becoming a superhero, (2) getting drunk and tearing up a bar, and (3) discovering the sunken land of Mu. Now that his adventures were about to double from ten to 21 pages an issue, Floyd and Knappe decided they needed a new team for Seadragon. Enter artist Dennis Yee and writer Richard Paolinelli. “I had just started as a freelance writer in late 1983/early 1984 while living in West Texas,” Paolinelli explains. “I came across an ad for a comicspublishing company in Midland, Texas, that was looking for a writer. I applied for the job, spoke with Carl Knappe and Tom Floyd, and got the gig for the first two issues of Seadragon.” Paolinelli worked with ideas from Knappe, but the script faced great challenges when Floyd pulled the character back into Epsilon Wave #6 for a big team-up issue. Paolinelli did his best to maintain continuity between the books, but it was artist Dennis Yee who finished the story in Seadragon #3. Then Yee did the story and pencils for what should have been a four-issue adventure, but the last issue was fated to never see print.

Yee, who had experience with DC Comics, was hired in a similar manner as Paolinelli. “I was browsing a comics shop,” Yee says, “and saw the first copy of Epsilon Wave…

Work from DC, where I had gotten a start in their New Talent program, was slow in coming. I thought my artwork was just as good as anything I saw in the new comics, so I sent an artwork submission to Independent Comics. I got the job as there was only one other artist working for them, Tom Floyd. A few months later, the writer of Seadragon left and I either offered or was asked to take over the writing.

Even though aquatic comic characters are problematic sellers (i.e., Aquaman and Sub-Mariner), I was very excited to get the art chores for Seadragon. Carl Knappe told me he got the idea of a superhero Navy diver as he recently learned to scuba dive in Hawaii. I learned to scuba dive as a young teen and majored in marine biology in college.

I took what Knappe told me and the origins of Seadragon to form my basis for my first couple of stories. In my initial story, he became a sorta Super Navy Seal, performing a 64 • BACK ISSUE • Aquaman Issue

covert rescue mission. I planned to send According to Floyd: “We were planning him on more military missions. I did one all kinds of things, or maybe I should or two stories involving female assassins say I was. We had the two flagship titles, trying to kill Seadragon (sorta an evil and published a one-shot that R. A. and Butch Burcham did called Night Wolf Charlie’s Angels). And having majored [actual title: Elite Presents]. We had quite a in marine biology, I was determined to make my art accurate.” few strips we were going to publish.

Hell’s Belles (the female assassins) To be totally honest about it, I really don’t worked for the sinister Mr. Caine, a know the real reason it all imploded. dennis yee menace in the mold of a James Bond It wasn’t the money. Something villain. The story and art improved with happened and all of sudden Carl and his each issue, but the series ended before the advertised avenue of funds were gone! I wasn’t around one weekend, seventh issue saw print as Elite Comics folded in early 1987. off at a con, I believe, and came back to the office on that Monday and all the secretary’s stuff was gone, all of Carl’s A FUTURE SO BRIGHT, YOU GOTTA stuff was gone, a lot of the company art files were gone, damned near everything was gone. And no one could WEAR SHADES? With two books on the shelves, Elite sought to expand their get a hold of Carl or anything. I was crushed, for sure.” market and improve their product. To accomplish the first, they made a deal to publish Twilight Avenger. To accomplish GONE BUT NOT FORGOTTEN the second, they hired R. A. Jones, writer of a comic-book One could think of Seadragon and Elite Comics as a brief review column for Amazing Heroes magazine. “R. A. brought flash in the pan, but some still remember. “It is funny a ton of knowledge about the publishing business, comics, to think of it,” Floyd recalls, “but the last time I was at and quality,” Floyd recalls. “Plus, we wanted to publish the Kansas City Comics Con, some guy brought up a some of R. A.’s characters. I remember a discussion R. A. copy of the first issues of Epsilon Wave for me to sign, and I had about Seadragon—R. A. wanted to ‘open up his and I hadn’t even seen those books for years, and sure mask’ so the audience could see him emote better and I didn’t think anyone actually owned copies.” Now, 30 was opposed to that.” Jones wasn’t alone in this, as Dennis years later, Tom Floyd is thinking about trying again with Yee also states that “I planned to change Seadragon’s look, characters like Captain Spectre and the Lightning Legion, but the company went under before that could happen.” Mr. Fright—the haunted man, Sam Justice, and Lone Star Jones used his connections to line up Paul Gulacy (a Texas mix of Captain America with the Lone Ranger). and Tim Truman to do covers for future issues and the And who knows, maybe Seadragon will be there books were showing a profit. So, what went wrong? swimming beside them.

Seadragon Unpublished Penciled pages 10 and 11 from the uncompleted issue #7 of Seadragon, courtesy of Dennis Yee. © Carl Knappe and Tom Floyd.

Aquaman Issue • BACK ISSUE • 65

The first half of the 1980s saw things creatively percolating in the DC Comics offices with expectations running high after the success of projects like Camelot 3000 and Ronin. Everyone knew Crisis on Infinite Earths was going to be unique, but as that 12-issue maxiseries was being produced, Frank Miller was already deep into Batman: The Dark Knight and Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons were talking to Dick Giordano about a maxiseries involving the Charlton heroes, a project that would become Watchmen.

In the wake of Crisis, 1986 was explosive for DC. Dark Knight, Watchmen, Howard Chaykin’s The Shadow, and John Byrne’s Man of Steel were a crescendo—all mammoth sales successes. As the year ended, DC was reprinting these books and starting the bookstore graphic novel category, something still being enjoyed today.

It was a heady time in the DC offices, and its editorial department was being encouraged to find creators they wanted to work with and bring their passions to reality.

Publisher Jenette Kahn was open to almost anything editors or creators were fervent about. Everyone wanted to get in on the fun, and I, as a DC editor, was no exception.

Once the Crisis dust settled, I was tasked with tidying up things in and around the new DC Universe, which gave me plenty of time to ponder what might make for a good story. Flipping through Who’s Who now and then for inspiration, I hit upon the notion of something sweeping in scope focused on Atlantis.

THE SEARCH FOR ATLANTIS

One common element in all of DC’s versions of Earth that have existed within the multiverses has been the sunken continent of Atlantis. In all instances, Atlantis began as a legendary civilization lost to surface world history, having sunk into the Atlantic Ocean around 9,600 B.C. In each case, its existence only became common knowledge thanks to the appearance in the 20th Century of such citizens as Aquaman and the beautiful mermaid Lori Lemaris, Superman’s friend.

Readers may have asked editors George Kashdan and Mort Weisinger why their versions of Atlantis were different if Superman and Aquaman were Justice League members, but the explanation for the conflicting versions of Atlantis—that they were separate cities named Poseidonis and Tritonis that evolved independent of one another—was expressed in Action Comics #475 (Sept. 1977), DC Special Series #5 (a.k.a. Superman Spectacular, Nov. 1977), and, in greatest detail thanks to E. Nelson Bridwell, in Super Friends #9 (Dec. 1977).

Len Wein and Marv Wolfman added a bit more to the lore in the Atlantis Who’s Who entry in issue #1 (Mar. 1985), weaving in that the city-state dated back 45,000 years ago, as depicted in Paul Kupperberg and Jan Duursema’s Arion, Lord of Atlantis series. The Marshall Rogers art for the Atlantis Who’s Who entry was particularly inspiring.

But how did that all happen, and when?

The Saga Begins First issue cover to scribe Peter David and artist Esteban Maroto’s epic Atlantis Chronicles, which ran seven issues coverdated from March to September 1990.

TM & © DC Comics.

66 • BACK ISSUE • Aquaman Issue

by B o b

Greenberger

There was a story buried in the depths, and I decided to find it. Not long before, there was a series of bestsellers by John Jakes, a sprawling generational saga called The Kent Family Chronicles. (During this period Jakes partnered with artist Gil Kane to co-author the novel Excalibur! in 1980.) As a result, I began thinking of the project as Atlantis!

To me, this had the same scope—a generational saga from Arion to Aquaman, and how the cities evolved differently, and when did they unite? During this period, writers Roy Thomas and Gerry Conway had formed a partnership and were pitching themselves as Hollywood screenwriters. They had a few successes, so I thought they might be able to share my visions. I approached them with all the enthusiasm I could muster.

As they say in Tinseltown, they gave it a pass.

Undaunted, I thought of who else might be able to bring fresh eyes to the story, someone who would respect but not be slavishly tied to the continuity and could make the characters feel fresh. At the time, I had been working with Peter David on DC’s Star Trek, and he had additionally been writing novels. So I rang him up and discussed the notion.

“Well, it sounded really fascinating to me that what you proposed was doing this massive history of Atlantis, which to the best of my knowledge no one had ever written a comic book quite like that,” David recalls to BACK ISSUE. “Right at the time I was very enamored of a TV series called I, Claudius, based on books by Robert Graves that told the story of Tiberius Claudius, the stuttering, limping emperor of Rome.

I was fascinated by that tale in terms of how it covered so many years and focused on individuals. That, in my mind, was the best way to tell a story that was supposed to be history. In addition, I decided to tell about specific characters in Atlantis’ history, none of whom we ever heard of before, but would give us the entire progression of Atlantis.”

Regarding the snippets of Atlantean history already established in DC lore, David says, “I don’t recall requiring a lot of research into the Lori Lemaris Atlantis or the Arthur Curry Atlantis. There was a lot of blank slate involved. I did have a couple of things that needed to be touched on, such as Arion. There was also the whole thing about purple eyes as a problem, blond hair, and the whole thing about just how did they survive under the domes that separate them?”

SEEING PURPLE

The purple-eyes taboo stemmed back to the introduction of Aqualad, the last of the teen sidekicks, introduced in a 1960 issue of Adventure Comics. For reasons left unexplained until the 1970s, purple eyes were seen as a bad omen, much as it was decided by plotter Keith Giffen that Aquaman was abandoned by his mother for being born with blond hair in a story that finally saw print in the Legend of Aquaman Special in 1989.

Arion, Lord of Atlantis, introduced in the back of Warlord before gaining its own ongoing series in 1981, presented different complications because it was set further back in time and talked of the waning days of magic and told of Atlantis’ sinking… something to do with aliens. Arion felt too far back to do the new story right. Peter David knew he needed to sink the continent on his own.

“I felt that showing the sinking of Atlantis was a very important thing,” David reveals. “I didn’t want to just simply repeat what had been done in the Arion comic books. I wanted to do my own take on it. So I came up with the concept that part of Atlantis had sunk but that a city that was further inland had managed to survive. That seemed to me to make sense. I mean, if Manhattan sank, Queens, Brooklyn, Staten Island, and Long Island would be fine. So, no, that was the angle that I took. I had a gold statue of Arion that was in the middle of the square, which we showed in the first issue. I don’t recall we ever showed it again.”

With that out of the way, David readily signed on to pitch the series and develop the concepts. This meant doing research above and beyond the DC library. “Most of my research into Atlantis had almost nothing to do with DC history aside from

Atlantean Lore (top) Atlantis’ twin cities were mentioned in this Lori Lemaris backup in Action #475 (Sept. 1977)

by Elizabeth M. Smith, Win Mortimer, and Frank Chiaramonte. (bottom) Paul Kupperberg and Jan Duursema’s Arion, Lord of Atlantis also laid some groundwork for the legendary locale.

TM & © DC Comics.

Aquaman Issue • BACK ISSUE • 67

Man in the Moon Meteor (left) DC’s Lord of Atlantis is referenced on the first page of Atlantis Chronicles #1. (right) A language-translation snafu led to this fearsome fireball’s human-like face on page 40 of issue #1.

TM & © DC Comics.

the aspects directly tied to Aquaman: purple eyes and blond hair,” David explains. “I actually did a lot more research into Atlantis as it was being written about by modern-day scholars. I found out that Plato was the first one to write about Atlantis, and I wound up incorporating the stuff Plato wrote. Some of the scientists believe that Atlantis had been sunken by a meteorite. So that’s how I had my Atlantis get sunk.

The real-world aspects of Atlantis were, to my mind, the most important things to work into it.”

THE SERIES TAKES SHAPE

David wrote up a pitch, which was readily accepted by executive editor Dick Giordano. Soon it was blessed by publisher Jenette Kahn, who was taken with the notion.

As David turned the outline into a first-issue script, I began the hunt for an artist. This series required an artist that could draw lots of sea life, architecture, and many non-superpowered characters.

As it happened, Karen Berger had been working with famed Spanish artist Esteban Maroto on DC’s Amethyst, Princess of Gemworld, which was winding down.

Maroto grew up in Madrid, adoring Flash Gordon comics and training as an engineer. He eventually felt that his love of illustration was stronger than his interest in engineering, so he began working with artist Manuel Lopez Blanco. Maroto made his solo debut in 1962 and was soon illustrating adventure and fantasy stories in Spain, France, Scandinavia, and the UK. In time, he worked with other artists creating strips for the

68 • BACK ISSUE • Aquaman Issue

German market before being discovered (with other international talents) in the United States by comicmagazine publisher James Warren. Maroto quickly became among the early fan-favorites, and as historian David Roach noted, “his style came to personify Spanish art.” Maroto’s “Dax the Warrior” strip in Warren’s Eerie cemented his reputation. He was also one of the few to branch from Warren to Marvel Comics, producing stories for Marvel’s black-and-white magazines including “The Kiss of Death” (featuring Satana) in Vampire Tales #3 (Feb. 1974), “The Drifting Snow” in Vampire Tales #4, and Red Sonja in Savage Sword of Conan #1 (Aug. 1974).

Maroto moved away from American comics to the illustration of magazine and book covers, starting with the pulp Fantastic; he produced paperback covers for Dell, Avon, Playboy (where Peter David briefly worked on staff as an editor), and DelRey. He then concentrated on European work until being lured back to color comics, specifically DC with Amethyst in 1986–1987.

Memories are fuzzy after 30 years, but either Dick Giordano suggested Esteban Maroto to me for Atlantis Chronicles, as Esteban recalls, or I came up with it on my own. Either way, he seemed like the ideal candidate.

I recalled loving his stuff a decade earlier and was excited at the prospect—and thrilled when he accepted.

In describing what became known as Atlantis Chronicles, Esteban Maroto tells BACK ISSUE, “The idea seemed fantastic to me from the first moment [I learned of it].

I always liked fantasy, and the Atlantis theme offered enormous possibilities, so I happily accepted.”

Atlanteans All (top) Peter David and some dedicated Atlantis Chronicles fans, circa 1990s. (middle) Esteban Maroto at the Barcelona Comicon Ficomic 2015. Courtesy of estebanmarotoblog.blogspot.com. (bottom) Esteban Maroto’s artwork began to catch the eye of US readers in Marvel black-and-white tales such as this Satana story from Vampire Tales #3 (Feb. 1974).

Satana TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.

Although David was at work and Maroto was dreaming of designs, the project hit the first of several roadblocks. Initially pitched and approved as a 12-issue maxiseries, in the same format as Camelot 3000 (heavy white Baxter paper with one or two more story pages, direct market distribution only), DC’s marketing department had concerns.

Bruce Bristow, then the head of the department, liked the concept well enough, but didn’t think it could sell for a year. It wasn’t superheroes, and back then science-fiction comics sold poorly… and fantasy sold even worse.

With Kahn and Giordano behind it, Bristow came back with the request we reduce the run from 12 to six issues but double the page count. Peter David and I went over the story material and begged for a seventh issue, which was grudgingly approved. That gave us more than enough room and allowed David to plot accordingly, so the story could breathe a little.

This meant, though, that scheduling the book would be a challenge since penciling and inking 43-page issues plus covers would take some time. I worked with Bob Wayne, Bristow’s number two at the time, on keeping the book off schedule until we had enough completed issues in-house to assure monthly shipping. A project like this had to run like clockwork, otherwise retailers would have excuses to trim back orders.

PRODUCTION BEGINS

Work on Atlantis Chronicles began in fall 1987, if our collective memories are correct.

The challenge for Peter David was making sure everything was spelled out clearly since his script would be translated into Spanish by one of Esteban Maroto’s daughters. This didn’t daunt David, who says, “I didn’t give him a ton of instruction about what the characters looked like with the single exception of Kordax, who had to look in a very specific manner for the character to work. But I didn’t give him a ton of detail of what things look like because he’s Estebanfreaking-Maroto!”

Maroto says, “When I got the first script from Peter, I did not make any sketches, nor did I send the pages in pencil for approval.” Maroto still felt the sting of an earlier disagreement with Marvel over his design of Red Sonja’s metallic body armor. “I have always liked being totally responsible for my drawings, that is to say, pencil and ink, although I understand that sometimes this is difficult in the complicated publishing world.”

David admits to being unfamiliar with Maroto’s work before they began working on the series and notes, “The details that he added were spectacular. When I write something, I picture things in my head.

Esteban is one of the rare instances where the things I pictured in my head paled in comparison to what was actually on the page.”

Back then, international packages were things to behold. Most hailed from Europe, where smoking was not yet frowned upon. Many artists smoked cigarettes as they drew and their studios filled with smoke, which permeated the pages. Maroto’s original art pages were redolent with his tobacco scent, but they aired out as we looked through each issue, page by page, marveling at his work. David would come in soon after a package arrived and was quite happy with what Maroto drew.

“I was blown away by it,” says the writer.

Maroto and I spoke rarely during the production, but he seemed happy with the material and never had a problem with David’s art Aquaman Issue • BACK ISSUE • 69

directions. Since this was going to follow a family through the years, it was decided to design the covers to prominently feature a character with background imagery, not dissimilar to a Who’s Who page. He would send in some sketches and the cover would follow with the completed issue.

Given the large amount of dialogue and text in Atlantis Chronicles, including the device of the stories being told by the various scribes through the generations, the series needed a distinctive look with its copy. In my mind, letterer Gaspar Saladino was the perfect man for the job. The voluminous word count did not daunt him, nor did he disappoint.

LOST IN TRANSLATION?

Working a continent away and in a different language could be daunting to many creators, but not a veteran like Esteban Maroto. He recalls of his editor and writer, “With Bob I did not have any pressure, and Peter happily accepted all my ideas and suggestions. I never made a correction and there was no censorship, no criticism. On the contrary, everything was praised so I felt enormously satisfied, and they went to a lot of effort in each new chapter.

“I translated the scripts with the help of my daughters, Gemma and Laura, and tried to add elements which graphically enriched the story,” Maroto says.

“This led to a curious anecdote with the character ‘Cora.’ It is a feminine name in Spanish, and so I drew a girl.” As Peter David explains, “I had several characters with names ending the letter ‘a’ that were supposed to be male, and since in Spanish, names ending in ‘a’ implied females, all of a sudden, two of the guys who were drinking buddies became female. And as it turned out, I actually think the story worked better that way.”

Another time where interpretation led to something unanticipated involved the meteor that sank the continent of Atlantis.

As Peter David tells it, “Well, the wonderful thing about Esteban is that even when he screwed up, he just improved things. For example, [in issue #1] I described the meteor that was getting gradually closer and closer to Earth. And at one point I wrote something like, ‘The meteor has drawn closer. We can now see its craggy face, its surface, and exterior.’ When I meant ‘face,’ I meant front of, of course.

Esteban’s daughter was translating the script into Spanish and Esteban took it literally. And when the pages came back, I was stunned. I was astounded to see that he had put a death’s head skull face onto the meteor.”

While I, as editor, suggested that we have DC’s art department redraw the meteor, the series’ writer had a different idea. “I looked at it and I said, ‘No, I really like it,’ and I’ll tell you why. If a meteorite is coming toward you and it’s just a big piece of rock you can hope that you’re going to be able to survive. If it was coming towards you with a death’s head skull on it, that’s it.

It’s sending you a message that says, ‘Don’t be reading any good news stories, get your affairs in order. You’re going to die.’ And then recently, we saw an article about a real meteor that looked exactly like that. So that really happens.

There really is a meteor out there with a skull on its face. Thank God Atlantis has already sunk, because otherwise I’d be worried about [a meteor with a face] hitting Earth and the rest of us.”

Regarding the female characters in the miniseries, Maroto tells BACK ISSUE, “I always tried to draw beautiful and sensual women, but I do not like obscenity or pornography. I prefer beauty and soft and suggestive eroticism.” That said, this might be a good time to note that the bare female nipples that appeared in the final issue were not something Maroto added to try and get away with nudity.

Atlantis Chronicles was colored and separated using the “newfangled” computer color system developed by an Irish production outfit. DC had licensed the technology, bought computers, and opened up a coloring department. As it grew, new hires were added including a Southerner, Eric Kachelhofer. He had a keen color sense and an enthusiasm for the project, so it was decided he would work on it, coloring guides at home and overseeing their separations in the office. As a result, he decided that the veil being held up in issue #7 should be transparent and added the nipples. I didn’t see those proofs for some reason and was stunned when the book arrived from the printer. Marketing had a fit and sent out an advisory to the retailers, but if I recall correctly, there no complaints or returns or figures of Eric burned in effigy.

Treachery and Survival (top) Shalako murders his wife, from Atlantis Chronicles #2. (bottom) Also from issue #2, Orin’s exploration of water breathing (plus a rare Atlantis Chronicles joke by Peter David).

TM & © DC Comics.

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NEW HORIZONS

As each issue arrived, David was energized and continued to pour a lot of effort into the stories. By comparison his scripting of the continuing adventures of Spider-Man or the crew of the Enterprise was easy. Atlantis Chronicles required more time and effort. It also helped that the book was not tied to current DC continuity.

“Not only that,” David agrees, “but I felt that I chose to really stretch as a writer. One of the things that I’m known for is my humor. Atlantis Chronicles has many things, but it’s not a terribly funny project. Sure, there were a couple of [funny] lines here and there, just as there is some humor in real life, but that’s about it. The series was not remotely funny, which opened up a lot of readers’ eyes who thought that everything I wrote was insanely humorous, and then they got Atlantis Chronicles and it’s like, ‘Oh, holy crap, Peter David can write dialogue without jokes.’ ” Maroto also stretched a bit here, working in a medium he knew would be colored by someone else, and a newcomer at that. “I prefer black-and-white comics,” he admits, “but the color of the series was very carefully done and was right. The series had very good printing and in general, I was very satisfied with all of the technical team, even when they returned the originals. They were perfectly looked after and labeled, unlike other publishers who treat them as if they were low-quality by-products (including some of them who have not wanted to give them back to me yet, and I do not think they will do so now after 40 years).”

Picking up on the theme of brother versus brother as seen with Aquaman and his half-brother Orm (a.k.a.

Ocean Master), David decided this was something built into Atlanteans’ DNA. In the first issue (Mar. 1990) we met Orin, leader of Poseidonis, and his brother Shalako, the city’s religious leader. After his realm had been pillaged one time too many, Orin decided to build a dome to protect the people, something Shalako objected to, fearing it would anger the gods. Along comes the meteor, seemingly proving him right.

The dome protected the city and its inhabitants, but now that they were underwater, survival was of paramount importance. Shalako and his followers used tunnels to access the abandoned Tritonis. As they settled in, Orin’s scientists developed a serum that allowed them to breathe underwater. In time, this was offered to Shalako’s people, but as they took it, he placed a curse upon them and the people grew scales, setting them on the road to becoming mer-people. Angered, they killed Shalako.

Shalako’s son, Dardanus, helped orchestrate his father’s murder and now sought redemption through marriage to Orin’s daughter, Cora. She, though, had eyes for Bazil and intended to wed him. On the night before her marriage, Dardanus raped her, something she kept secret.

By issue #4, Cora has become Queen with Orin in retirement, preparing for a coming war from Tritonis. Things grow tense when Dardanus turns up with Kordax, a blond-haired, scaled young man he claims is a result of the rape. When Cora denies Kordax his right to the throne, war breaks out.

As the spirits of Orin and Shalako battle on one plane, the fate of the domed city is at stake, with Cora and Kordax leading the charge. When defeated, Kordax is banished as are all who bear his mark, blond hair.

Generations later, three brothers—Kraken, Haumond, and Atlan—are in line to rule. Blond Atlan is ostracized, and it is he who discovers that life on land survived the meteor strike centuries earlier. The siblings’ father, Honsu, wanted to conquer the surface world, but only Kraken supported him. In fact, he was rather successful conquering his way north until he encountered the Egyptians, who handed him defeat. He turned south and tried his luck with Greece, while Haumond discovered a small subset of Atlanteans, descendants of explorers Orin sent out in the wake of the meteor strike.

To resolve the Greek war, Honsu agreed to a contest between champions, which pitted Kraken against their champion, who turned out to be Haumond. Atlan, meanwhile, turned to science and sorcery, finding a way to extend his life… and more.

Sometime later, Atlanna discovered the Chronicles, no longer being maintained, until she encountered a blond stranger who seduced her. When she gave birth to a blond son, the baby was placed on Mercy Reef, left to the fates.

Her husband Trevis committed suicide over the affair and cursed the child while Atlanna grieved over the losses.

I think you know what became of the child.

While Peter David didn’t name a favorite character in the run, according to Esteban Maroto, “My favorite character in the series is Orin, although all the characters are very well constructed. Peter was already an experienced screenwriter at that time. I like these kinds of adventures more than the world of superheroes that moves within enormous special effects and that requires a technique that at this time I do not master in; I am almost a ‘technological illiterate.’ ”

Jittery Bride Cora shields a painful secret on this gripping page from Atlantis Chronicles #3.

TM & © DC Comics.

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WHO WAS PROFESSOR R. K. SIMPSON?

From Scholarly “Roots” (right) A DC “memo” about the origin of the Chronicles. (bottom) The first page of R. K. Simpson’s “series-inspiring” treatise, from issue #3.

TM & © DC Comics.

72 • BACK ISSUE • Aquaman Issue

One element that set the series apart was its text pieces, ostensibly scholarly articles by R. K. Simpson, a man who purportedly discovered the “real” Atlantis Chronicles and brought them to DC Comics for adaptation. Apparently, people were taken in by these faux-facts.

Peter David explains in detail: “Cliff Biggers, a retailer in the Atlanta area, called me up one day and said, ‘There’s a debate happening here at my store. There are people who believe that a Professor R. K. Simpson came to DC with a set of Atlantis Chronicles books. And I’m telling you that’s not true.’ And I said, ‘No, it’s true.’ And he said, ‘I don’t believe it.’ I said, ‘Well, I can’t help if you don’t believe,’ and he said, ‘Fine, if there’s a Professor R. K. Simpson, I want to do an interview.’ And I said, ‘Okay.’ We set up a time that he would call.

“And what Cliff did was, he did research. He went to various scholars and got really scholarly-type questions to ask, because he was convinced it was going to be me calling up with a German accent. On the appointed day and time, his phone rings. The voice he absolutely does not recognize identifies itself as Professor R. K. Simpson. First, he knows it’s not me. He proceeds to ask questions, and not only does the professor answer them flawlessly, he builds upon them so it’s clear that this guy is a scholar and he knows this stuff.

“After the interview ended, Cliff calls me and he says, ‘Who. The hell. Was that?’ I said, ‘That was Professor R. K. Simpson.’ We wound up running the interview in an issue of Atlantis Chronicles, without Cliff’s intro where he said, ‘I don’t think this is really this R. K. Simpson, whoever it is.’

“I will now tell you that, in point of fact, Professor R. K. Simpson was my then-brother-in-law Robert Kazmin.

Robert Simpson Kazmin. The R. K. was Robert Kazmin and Simpson was his last name. Robert was a rabbi and was very helpful to me as I was planning Atlantis Chronicles in terms of suggesting things that would reflect on Atlantis and religion. He was also very useful to me in telling me things that I used to write the backup articles.

Those articles were tremendously fun because what I would do is I would have footnotes and three of the four footnotes would be actual journals or books or magazines.

And one out of the four, which happened to be the thing that the article mainly hinged on, was completely fictional; but I figured that it wouldn’t occur to people that if three out of four of them were legit that one out of four would be fabricated. That’s great. And I tell you, it worked.

“In the first book we had a letter on the back page that was written on Dick Giordano’s stationery and it was a letter to you [series editor Bob Greenberger].

It was a memo written to you in which you said that Professor R. K. Simpson had brought in these books and that we thought it would really make a great comic book. And he listed a whole bunch of writers that you should speak to and you had wrote on the bottom none of them available. ‘How about Peter David?’ And Dick handwrote at the bottom, because I stood and watched him right there, ‘All right. If he’s the best you can do.’

A friend came up to me at a convention and told me that she was insulted on my behalf that all these other writers were considered before me as she didn’t like that Dick said, ‘If that’s the best you can do,’ and I sat there and I thought, ‘Oh, my freaking God, she bought it.’

Yep, and she was not the only one. Quite a few people absolutely believed that Professor R. K. Simpson had written those pieces.

“I was in college reading [author William Goldman’s] The Princess Bride, and The Princess Bride said that it was actually a book by S. Morgenstern that had been published,

like, 80 years earlier, and that this book was an abridged version of the Morgenstern book. And I absolutely believed that, up until the battle where Vizinni [played by actor Wallace Shawn] says, ‘Ha ha! You fool!

You fell victim to one of the classic blunders—the most famous of which is, Never get involved in a land war in Asia—but only slightly less well-known is this: Never go in against a Sicilian when death is on the line! Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha!

Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha!’ I thought to myself, ‘That’s a Vietnam reference.’

“Then I said, ‘Oh, my God, he made this up.’ I got so pissed off I threw the book and then went back picked it up to finish reading it. I thought to myself, ‘Some day as a writer I wanted to come up with a backstory for a work that totally fools people into believing that there is more to it than it’s just me coming up with a story.’

“Atlantis Chronicles is where I wound up doing exactly that. Some people knew it was a setup, but other people 100% believed that Professor R. K. Simpson was a real scholar with a real set of Atlantis books.”

REACTION TO THE SERIES, THEN AND NOW

The book was certainly distinct, from subject matter to packaging, and it garnered good reviews in the fan press. Even though we didn’t run fan mail, we got some and it was just about unanimously positive.

What the book didn’t do was create Watchmenlevel buzz or grow in sales.

I worked hard to convince marketing that miniseries and new launches needed more than launch support, but also needed support several months later, as retailers were beginning to see how the books were selling. After all, they were ordering in January for a book not coming out until March or April, so here they were in May, ordering book five and getting a sense of how their customers were reacting to it. A little marketing nudge, a show of love from company, might make a difference, I argued. In most cases I was ignored, but somehow I prevailed here.

Atlantis Chronicles got a house ad in DC titles between issues #4 and 5. It boasted raves from people Peter and/or I knew. To me, the big “get” was science-fiction master Roger Zelazny, whom I had befriended not long before. I sent him the first few issues and he wrote a nice quote: “Atlantis Chronicles—the graphic epic by the mordant Peter David, illustrated in the grand manner by Esteban Maroto—tells the tale of the lost realm as I’d often hoped it might be told. Good show, gentlemen.”

Audio Book Gather ’round, young ones, as wise, old Regin reads the Chronicles. The opening page from issue #5.

TM & © DC Comics.

David had been doing Dreadstar with Jim Starlin, whom I also worked with on Heroes Against Hunger, so Jim offered us this quote: “An inventive retelling on a classic tale, full of intrigue, sibling deviltry, disasters, beasties, and good oldfashioned heroics, aided and abetted by Esteban Maroto’s beautiful art.

Terrific stuff.”

Then there was Todd McFarlane, who had worked with Peter David on Marvel’s Incredible Hulk (this was before their infamous falling out and classic debate), who proclaimed: “Peter has done some of his best work to date… Esteban has the ability to convey grace and beauty. My hat is off to Mr. Maroto.”

We also were granted two pages in issue #5 for a recap, in case the ad push brought in new readers. Combined, this was an unprecedented push from marketing for a project that was halfway completed.

It helped, but it certainly wasn’t a silver bullet. And it was small potatoes compared with what David was led to believe was coming.

“DC intended to do right by the project,” he recalls. “I was at the 1988 DC Christmas party with Jenette Kahn. She told me how much she loved Atlantis Chronicles and stated that she was going to give it, quote, ‘The Watchmen treatment,’ unquote. That it was going to be collected and kept in print. And all these kinds of things. And 30 years later, long after Jenette was gone, DC finally came out with it as a hardcover collection, which I very much suspect has nothing to do with the material and everything to do with the fact that in December the Aquaman movie is going to be coming out. It’s causing DC to collect all my stuff.

Supergirl lay uncollected for 20 years and the Melissa Benoist [TV] series came on. Suddenly my Supergirl is being collected. Young Justice remained uncollected for years, and the popularity of the TV show rose and suddenly, they’re collecting my Young Justice. Same thing with Aquaman: with the Aquaman movie coming out, suddenly Atlantis Chronicles is being collected, and my Aquaman is being collected.”

Aquaman Issue • BACK ISSUE • 73

Aquaman, Day One (left) Aquaman is conceived in this provocative page from the final issue. (right) This family tree was published in Atlantis Chronicles #7.

TM & © DC Comics.

Atlantis Chronicles concluded in 1990 and Maroto moved on to other projects. But first, he brought his wife and daughters to New York. DC arranged a luncheon for the team, presided over by Dick Giordano. According to Maroto, “That trip to New York was one of the most fun experiences of my life! How I laughed when Ruthie Thomas, the [DC Comics] receptionist, announced us and said, ‘The Marotos are here!’ as we arrived loaded with packages.”

Esteban generously offered Peter and me our pick of covers as a thank-you gift, and I cherish the cover for issue #3 that I chose.

David doesn’t believe the miniseries directly led to any assignments with the exception of Aquaman. In the wake of the Giffen-written Aquaman one-shot, David was offered the Aquaman: Time and Tide miniseries [see this issue’s post-Crisis Aquaman article—ed.], and he picked up where the Chronicles left off.

Throughout the 1990s, reprinting Atlantis Chronicles was constantly brought up at meetings

74 • BACK ISSUE • Aquaman Issue

determining the next six to 12 months’ worth of releases. It was repeatedly surveyed to retailers and every time, DC’s Bob Wayne reported that it didn’t register high enough for consideration. Since I was attending those meetings, Atlantis Chronicles was guaranteed to come up each time to the point where it became a running joke, with no one showing faith in it or taking it seriously. Even as bookstore sales proved that offbeat books could find audiences, the miniseries languished. For the longest time, I argued it should be pitched to the Science Fiction Book Club, selling it as a self-contained fantasy, but that, too, fell on deaf ears.

With the rise of the Internet and blogs, I have seen Atlantis Chronicles repeatedly revisited and lauded, keeping it in the public dialogue. For example, Corrina Lawson at Wired wrote in 2010: “This would be a great read for teenagers who are already interested in fantasy novels that create a fantastical world, along the lines of J. R. R. Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings.”

The handsome hardcover reprinting the series, titled Aquaman: The Atlantis Chronicles Deluxe Edition (inset), came out in late 2017.

Peter David adds, “When they finally solicited it, everyone went, ‘Thank God,’ because they remember reading it or couldn’t track down the issues. There are also people on Facebook talking about this being some of the best reading. I’m very flattered by that, and actually, to be honest, I tend to agree.”

Once the Deluxe Edition was released, “I actually sat down and read the entire thing, which I hadn’t a number of years, and I’m still pleased with it,” David confesses.

Maroto is also pleased to see the book back in print, delighting over its Spanish edition. “All the letters I received were flattering,” he says, “and many people asked me if they were going to reissue it, as they have done now. I hope that the new generations appreciate the love that we all put into this project. I also want to thank [fans for] all the attention that has always been given to me and my family. An affectionate greeting to everyone… and I’m still going!! Fortunately, I’m still drawing with the same enthusiasm I had when I was so young. I believed that I could change the world with my stories and drawings instead of with weapons and hate, and thank you very much for making me feel that my professional life has had a useful meaning for some of you.”

It’s lovely seeing Atlantis Chronicles back and garnering a new set of positive reviews. Will there be a hint of

the Chronicles in the Aquaman film? Heck, I don’t know. I can’t even tell how much of the Chronicles lore made it to DC’s recent Rebirth universe. What I can tell you, though, is that in the late-1980s, a team of dedicated craftsmen came together to tell an epic. We accomplished that and all agree it still holds up. That’s certainly something to be proud of.

A Sea King Shall Rise Maroto’s stunning covers for Atlantis Chronicles #2–7.

TM & © DC Comics.

Follow writer/editor/educator R O B E RT G R E E N B E R G E R a t bobgreenberger.com.

Aquaman Issue • BACK ISSUE • 75

TM

by M

Not Playing At a Theater Near You WB animation producer Tim Hauser calls the ’70s Jim Aparo Aquaman the “classic” interpretation of the Sea King. This Aparo-drawn image originally appeared as the month of June in the 1977 Super DC Calendar.

TM & © DC Comics.

Just four issues ago, in BACK ISSUE #104, I shared with you the story of an animated New Gods movie that almost happened. It was in development by Warner Bros. Pictures’ Feature Animation, a division of the entertainment giant separate from the Television Animation group and started in 1994, in response to the box-office success of Disney’s The Lion King.

Warner Bros. Pictures’ Feature Animation remained in operation until the mid-2000s, producing films including Space Jam, Quest for Camelot, The Iron Giant, and Osmosis Jones.

Animation producer, writer, and author Tim Hauser was, at the time, an in-house Producer in Development at Warner Bros. Feature Animation and brought to the company a love of the DC Comics library of stories and characters. As he related in BI #104, The New Gods was one of two DC properties under development for an animated motion picture, the other being the star of this edition of BACK ISSUE, Aquaman.

Hauser graciously dusts off his memories and dons his scuba gear for a return to Atlantis for BI’s curious editor-in-chief in this special Q&A edition of “The Greatest Stories Never Told.”

MICHAEL EURY: With you being a longtime DC Comics reader, what’s your favorite era of Aquaman comics, and why?

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ichael Eury

TIM HAUSER: I always loved the character from childhood forward. The Filmation animated series of the late ’60s was a favorite and my introduction to the character. I liked the undersea-fantasy aspects of the concept as much as the superheroics. To me, there was nothing odd, corny, or silly about Aquaman and Aqualad riding giant seahorses and leading armies of fish—that was awesome!

The mid-’70s Paul Levitz/Jim Aparo comics in Adventure and Aquaman really captured that fun feel yet added thrills, excitement, heroic drama, and engrossing tragedy to the mix. And the imaginative, visual storytelling splendor of Aparo’s art reached off the page. That’s the classic Aquaman run in my heart and mind.

EURY: What qualities of the Aquaman mythos made the property attractive to Warner Bros. Feature Animation?

HAUSER: Well, it was simply one of the titles available to us that no one had plans for at the time (mid-1990s).

And it was on my own short list. This was before the WB considered a live-action series and the character appeared in Smallville, and before the jokey Entourage references— though I think Cartoon Network may have already begun their satirical bumpers. To be honest, even the top executives of the studio at the time felt “Aquaman is the joke member of the Super Friends.” But the character had a solid Cartoon Q rating—the general public knew who he was and didn’t dislike him. He was a valuable unused asset to DC/WB, so worthy of consideration.

Animated Aquaman The four most widely seen animated versions of the Sea King— Filmation’s Aquaman, Hanna-Barbera’s Super Friends, and Cartoon Network’s Justice League and Batman: The Brave and the Bold—plus a 2018 cameo in the Teen Titans Go! to the Movies trailer (which was accompanied by the line, “because if Aquaman can get a movie… anyone can”).

Aquaman TM & © DC Comics.

My feeling was that Aquaman had a potentially emotionally resonant three-act story to tell in an animated feature, a sort-of superhero Cinderella/Little Mermaid tale of the freaky kid who suffers the bullying of his half-brother to discover his true destiny as the king of Atlantis and all the Seven Seas. So that pitch (and with the “toyetic” aspects of the concept to interest consumer products for action figures, etc.) provided enough interest to allow us to explore development of the property for a time, though I don’t think it ever really had much of a chance of getting made back then—New Gods, with its Star Wars similarities, had way more push behind it.

EURY: Would this have featured the traditional orange-and-green-suited Aquaman, the 1980s’ blue-suited Aquaman, the King Arthur-inspired hook-handed Aquaman, or a different interpretation of the character?

HAUSER: We went our own way. In developing inspirational art purely for pitching purposes, we quickly discovered we had to break with tradition just to get people past their Super Friends preconceptions. So there was quite a bit of experimentation with a surfer-punk sensibility (young Arthur even had a shaved head in a series of inspirational sketches!) that focused pitch-ees on the story and characters rather than past media interpretations.

At this early stage of development, getting to move forward is everything—but I’ll admit that it was intended to be a bait-and-switch where we would eventually reveal him in all his blond, orange, and green glory at the climax of the film riding a seahorse and leading an army of fish!

I never cared for the angry, salty sea captain Aquaman with a beard or the hook. I think Jan Michael Vincent beach boy with the classic costume. Alan Ritchson on Smallville was close to that!

EURY: What was the main storyline of the treatment, and which characters were involved?

HAUSER: It was the classic Silver Age origin with some tweaks. This is my memory of it: A beautiful woman who can’t speak is rescued from the sea by a lighthouse keeper. She dies in childbirth. The boy, Arthur, is a total misfit and learns to communicate with fish before he talks to people. He’s a freak, outcast, loner, but sensitive and perceptive, eventually becoming a rebel of sorts after years of bullying by his jealous half-brother Orm. Eventually he is drawn to explore his mysterious background and led to the domed city of Atlantis, where he discovers he is the lost heir to the throne and King of the Seven Seas. There was certainly more to the mechanics of the villain plot that escapes me 20 years later.

Mera, with her hard-water powers, was the captain of the guard. Vulko and Garth were supporting players. Since the Black Manta suit and name were more known to the public and inherently cooler than “Ocean Master,” we combined characters and made Orm become Black Manta as he tries to stop Arthur from achieving his rightful destiny.

EURY: Were any comic-book artists involved with Aquaman character designs, like Mike Mignola was for the aborted New Gods animated movie, or was that handled by WB’s animation artists?

HAUSER: We never reached that level of investment and used mostly staff artists to develop a package of visuals for pitch purposes only, not production art. Caroline Hu in particular did a lot of memorable work reinventing the Aquaman cast with some really wild and appealing costumes and attitudes in a surfer/punk mode. But no comics professionals were hired on this one.

EURY: How far along in production did Aquaman make it before the Feature Animation division was closed?

HAUSER: We did well enough with the extended treatment that Laura Harkcom (a fellow WBFA development exec) and I wrote that the project was green lit for a full screenplay and rewrite by the team of Rick Copp and David Goodman. I truly enjoyed their drafts, which had a fun, over-the-top quality while hitting all the right emotional beats and visual possibilities like the old-school DC Comics and Disney animated features. But it never got beyond that stage, as New Gods moved much faster forward for the DC slot in the hot WBFA competition to get a movie (any movie) made. But the studio folded before anything happened beyond that script.

What little developmental artwork connected to WBFA’s Aquaman is, unfortunately, unavailable to BACK ISSUE, unlike the deluge of New Gods images swarming the Internet last year.

Speaking of Jack “King” Kirby’s Fourth World, in mid-March of this year, Warner Bros. announced a surprise entry in its DC Extended Universe live-action film franchise: The New Gods, to be helmed

by Ava DuVernay, director of A Wrinkle in Time and Selma. The announcement torch-lit a firestorm of fantasy-casting posts.

With elements of Kirby’s Fourth World epic cribbed for use in Warner Bros.’ Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice and its course-correcting follow-up Justice League, it’s clear that the studio values the King’s bottomless pit of ideas. And with Aquaman being the next entry (at this writing) in the DCEU releases, it’s proof positive that Tim Hauser and the WB Feature Animation division had an eye for the next big thing.

Aquaman Issue • BACK ISSUE • 77

by M i c h a e l

Eury

AQUAMAN: A CELEBRATION OF 75 YEARS DC Comics, 2016 400 pages $39.99 US

The Golden Age Aquaman has long been a curiosity of mine. Like many of you, I learned about Golden Age characters from reprints in giantsized comics of the late Silver Age and the Bronze Age, and as a child was exposed to earlier incarnations of Batman, Superman, and Captain America that seemed crude when compared to the versions I knew from modern comics and TV. But the Golden Age Aquaman was an enigma: He wasn’t one of the retired superheroes fetched out of mothballs each summer for a Justice League/ Justice Society team-up, and when an Aquaman reprint did see print, it was from the late 1950s—the early Silver Age Aquaman stories.

I got a brief glimpse of the original character in the reprinting of his first adventure in 1974’s Secret Origins #7, but, like many of the mysteries of the sunken realm of Atlantis, the Golden Age Aquaman appeared to be lost at sea.

So with great enthusiasm I ripped the shrinkwrap off my copy of DC Comics’ Aquaman: A Celebration of 75 Years to discover the first Sea King, one of the few costumed mystery men and women to weather the collapse of the original superhero boom and stay in print as the Golden Age gave way to the Silver Age. Four Golden Age Aquaman stories, which were originally published between 1941 to 1952, lead off the volume and are, like those aforementioned Golden Age Batman, et al. tales, rather primitive when juxtaposed against the sophisticated story and art styles that would evolve in later decades… yet they’re a wonderful window into the roots of the seafaring superhero we are celebrating in this issue.

This was the first of DC’s Celebration series I acquired, and since I’ve started to amass a collection of the entire line. The publisher launched this collection-edition imprint a few years ago to commemorate the 75th (or 50th) birthdays of many of their long-running characters: Superman, Batman, the Justice Society, Lois Lane, Lex Luthor, the Joker, the Flash, etc. It’s a beautifully conceived and executed line, but let’s make a closer inspection of the series via the Aquaman edition.

Aquaman: A Celebration of 75 Years presents a “drive by” view of the character’s evolution through chronological reprints gathered within a 78 • BACK ISSUE • Aquaman Issue

four-chapter structure: Part I: Making a Splash (1941–1961), Part II: The Sovereign of the Sea (1962–1984), Part III: The Return of the King (1986–2010), and Part IV: Twenty-First Century Aquaman (2011–2015).

(Interestingly, 1985 isn’t included in those designations… I guess the Sea King took the year off during the Crisis on Infinite Earths.) Each chapter’s introduction sets the pace for what you’re about to read through concise histories of the character’s development during that era. Here, the interstitial text is by Steve Korté, who smoothly brings the reader up to speed on the Sea King’s evolution from ocean adventurer to Sea King and beyond.

(A friendly correction to Part II’s text is warranted: While Ted Knight did narrate the Aquaman cartoons of the late 1960s and provide some character voices, he did not voice Aquaman; Marvin Miller did.)

The selection of stories is, as you might hope, “Aquaman’s Greatest Hits,” beginning with Mort Weisinger and Paul Norris’ premier installment from 1941’s More Fun Comics #73. Fans of artist Ramona Fradon will be pleased to see five shorts drawn by her, including an early 1952 tale produced before she had developed her distinctive style. Silver Age reprints include Aquaman #1, the marriage of Aquaman and Mera from Aquaman #18, and—attention, Rob Kelly!— 1968’s Aquaman #40, the first chapter of the “Search for Mera” storyline (see Rob’s “Off My Chest” guest editorial in this issue). Jim Aparo boosters can view his art improve from that issue #40 tale to his more refined ’70s style through two of Aquaman’s Adventure Comics yarns including the heartbreaking death of Aquababy. A third Adventure Aqua-tale, nicely rendered by Dick Giordano, is also on hand. Of interest to fans of the larger DC Universe is the volume’s re-presentation of 1984’s Justice League of America Annual #2 by Gerry Conway and Chuck Patton, where Aquaman disbands the JLA and forms a new iteration of the team in what would become known as (Vibe alert!

Vibe alert!) Justice League Detroit.

Also, issue #3 of Neal Pozner and Craig Hamilton’s four-issue Aquaman miniseries of 1986 is included, as of this writing the first-ever issue of that innovative limited series to be reprinted.

For those of you who blissfully keep your heads buried in the sands of the Bronze Age, the volume’s remaining stories may be new to you, as they represent a gruffer version of the Sea King, one disinclined to ever call a sidekick “Tadpole.” Yet they are smartly chosen to convey the changes in the character in more recent decades, from Peter David and Martin Egeland’s TM & © DC Comics. shocker featuring Aquaman’s loss of his hand, to Geoff Johns and Ivan Reis’ delightful portrayal of the Sea King coming to terms with his superhero public persona, and more.

Lastly, the design of the books themselves is gorgeous, thanks to Publication Designer Randall Dahlk and Design Director – Books Steve Cook. Colors complementary to Aquaman’s (and other characters’, in their Celebration volumes) costumes are used in front and back matter and interstitial pages, and while the Jim Lee slipcase cover art spotlights the Aquaman of today, throughout the book the hero is visible in his various stages, favoring no single era.

Aquaman: A Celebration of 75 Years is highly recommended for the diehard Aquaman fan and for the general reader interested in the Marine Marvel’s most important moments.

Find BACK ISSUE on

TM & © DC Comics.

LOOKING FOR MORE APARO?

Not only was Jim Aparo one of the greatest Aquaman artists of all time, he was also one of comicdom’s most legendary Batman artists— and for many fans, THE Batman artist of the Bronze Age. Last year, DC Comics released the third volume of its deluxe, chronological reprinting of Aparo’s Batman work in the full-color hardcover Legends of the Dark Knight: Jim Aparo vol. 3 (2017, 552 pages, $49.99 US). This edition picks up where volume 2 left off, with the artist at his prime in 1974. Leading off are three Batman solo tales from Detective Comics, all penned by Len Wein. Following is a rarity known to fewer fans, a Gerry Conway-scripted Batman/Robin team-up from 1978’s Batman Family #17, as well as the three-issue miniseries The Untold Legend of the Batman, the first issue featuring the unorthodox pairing of John Byrne, penciler, and Jim Aparo, inker. Also included are Brave and the Bold Batman team-ups drawn by the amazing artist, a mostly uninterrupted run spanning from B&B #152 (Batman and the Atom) through B&B #182, the lauded Alan Brennertauthored stunner teaming Batman with the Earth-Two Robin and Batwoman. Peppering the volume are chronological reprints of Bat-covers illo’ed by Aparo.

While its production values are crisp, I do have two minor quibbles: the interior page gutters are narrow, cutting off art and text that falls on the inside of pages, and after numerous editions in this deluxe Batman reprint line, the trade dress has inexplicably changed; its dust jacket no longer mirrors the previous volumes, even the two preceding Aparo ones. Still, given the caliber of the stories and artwork housed between its covers, Legends of the Dark Knight: Jim Aparo vol. 3 is recommended for fans of the artist, Batman, and Brave and Bold.

WANTED: AN EVANIER/SPIEGLE BLACKHAWK OMNIBUS

Now that there is buzz on a Blackhawk movie

by Spielberg (shades of the ’80s!), I had a great idea for one of those Omnibus editions DC keeps putting out. One of the best books Superman TM & © DC Comics. Superman: The Movie © Warner Bros. BACK ISSUE TM & © TwoMorrows. All Rights Reserved.

TM & © DC Comics.

Send your comments to: Email: euryman@gmail.com (subject: BACK ISSUE) Postal mail: Michael Eury, Editor-in-Chief • BACK ISSUE 118 Edgewood Ave. NE * Concord, NC 28025

of the 1980s—along with The New Teen Titans, Swamp Thing, X-Men, All-Star Squadron, and Bob Kanigher’s war books—was the hardly publicized Blackhawk run. I was never a Blackhawk fan until I started reading this series.

A Blackhawk Omnibus can contain the entire incredible run with Mark Evanier and the late, great Dan Spiegle (the best run on Blackhawk ever).

It can also include Brave and Bold #167 with Batman teaming up with the World War II era Blackhawks, as well as DC Comics Presents #69, teaming Superman and the Blackhawks.

Plus Batman Confidential #36–39, “Blackhawk Down,” which was a follow-up to the new recruit story.

To make it really special, they can finish off the never-completed Blackhawk miniseries by Bill DuBay and Carmine Infantino, or at the very least include all the completed artwork. How about including Dan’s commissioned painted artwork and the rarely seen Spiegle cover to The Comic Reader #209, as well as any other unpublished artwork he may have done? How great would it be to see Dan Spiegle’s art on quality paper and perhaps recolored with today’s technology? To round it all off, Evanier can write an intro and dedicate the book to Dan. Who at DC would fans need to contact to petition for this?

Shazam!: With a motion picture in the works, DC, how about reprinting all the Don Newton Shazam! from the late ’70s and ’80s in a format similar to the high-quality hardcovers that has been going on with the Batman Legends?

Aquaman: Was there ever a reprinting of the Skeates/Aparo run?

Keep up the great work on BI. I am really enjoying it much more than most of the comics of today.

– Yaakov Gerber Some folks at DC are reading this issue, so your recommendations are on their radars.

Earlier in this issue you read that Aquaman: The Search of Mera, which includes most, but not all, of the Skeates/ Aparo run, is forthcoming. And I suspect that next year, as the Shazam! movie nears its release, DC will follow suit with a variety of Shazam! reprint editions. Those Don Newton tales (starting with the Weiss and Nasser ones that preceded them) should be collected, I agree!

Next issue: You’ll believe a mag can fly as BACK ISSUE #109 celebrates the 40th Anniversary of the groundbreaking Superman: The Movie, exploring the Superman movies’ effects on comic books, media, and collectibles with commentary from many of their creators.

Plus: CARY BATES discloses his plans for the un-produced Superman V, ELLIOT S. MAGGIN’s Superman novels, Superman Movie Contest winner ED FINNERAN’s recollections, and exclusive interviews with ILYA SALKIND, JACK O’HALLORAN (Non), AARON SMOLINSKI (baby Clark), JEFF EAST (young Clark), and DIANE SHERRY CASE (teenage Lana Lang).

10% of the proceeds from this issue’s comic shop orders will be donated to the Christopher and Dana Reeve Foundation. Christopher Reeve Superman cover by GARY FRANK (from Superman: Secret Origin #4), with cover design

by MICHAEL KRONENBERG. Don’t ask—just BI it! See you in sixty!

Your friendly neighborhood Euryman, Michael Eury, editor-in-chief

Aquaman Issue • BACK ISSUE • 79

All characters TM & © their respe

ctive owners. RetroFan is TM TwoM

orrows Inc.

The Ultimate Look at a Bronze Age Legend!

From a seminal turn on Superboy and the Legion of Super-Heroes and creating the lost world of the Warlord, to his work on Green Arrow—first relaunching the Green Lantern/ Green Arrow series with DENNY O’NEIL, and later redefining the character in Green Arrow: The Longbow Hunters—MIKE GRELL made an indelible mark at DC Comics in the 1970s and ’80s.

But his greatest contribution to the comics industry was in pioneering creator-owned properties like Jon Sable, Starslayer, and Shaman’s Tears. Grell even tried his hand at legendary literary characters like Tarzan and James Bond, adding to his remarkable tenure in comics.

This career-spanning tribute to the master storyteller is told in Grell’s own words, full of candor, optimism, and humor. Lending insights are colleagues PAUL LEVITZ, DAN JURGENS, DENNY O’NEIL, MIKE GOLD, and MARK RYAN. Full of illustrations from every facet of his long career, with a Foreword by CHAD HARDIN, it also includes a checklist of his work and an examination of “the Mike Grell method.” It is a fitting tribute to the artist, writer, and storyteller who has made the most of every opportunity set before him, living up to his own mantra, “Life is Drawing Without an Eraser.”

By DEWEY CASSELL, with JEFF MESSER.

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MICHAEL EURY! RETROFAN #1 cover-features an all-new interview with TV’s Incredible Hulk, LOU FERRIGNO, and introduces a quartet of columns by our regular celebrity columnists: MARTIN PASKO’s Pesky Perspective (this issue: The Phantom in Hollywood), ANDY MANGELS’ Retro Saturday Mornings (Filmation’s Star Trek cartoon), ERNEST FARINO’s Retro Fantasmagoria (How I Met the Wolf Man—Lon Chaney, Jr.), and The Oddball World of SCOTT SHAW (the goofy comic book Zody the Mod Rob). Also: Mego’s rare Elastic Hulk toy; RetroTravel to Mount Airy, NC, the real-life Mayberry; an interview with BETTY LYNN, “Thelma Lou” of The Andy Griffith Show; the scarcity of Andy Griffith Show collectibles; a trip inside TOM STEWART’s eclectic House of Collectibles; RetroFan’s Too Much TV Quiz; and a RetroFad shout-out to Mr. Microphone. Edited by Back Issue magazine’s MICHAEL EURY! (84-page FULL-COLOR magazine) $8.95 • (Digital Edition) $4.95 • FIRST ISSUE NOW SHIPPING!

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ALLEN BELLMAN (1940s Timely artist) interviewed by DR. MICHAEL J. VASSALLO, with art by SHORES, BURGOS, BRODSKY, SEKOWSKY, EVERETT, & JAFFEE. Plus Marvel’s ’70s heroines: LINDA FITE & PATY COCKRUM on The Cat, CAROLE SEULING on Shanna the She-Devil, & ROY THOMAS on Night Nurse—with art by SEVERIN, FRADON, ANDRU, and more! With FCA, MR. MONSTER, BILL SCHELLY, and more!

Golden Age artist/writer/editor NORMAN MAURER remembered by his wife JOAN, recalling BIRO’s Crime Does Not Pay, Boy Comics, Daredevil, St. John’s 3-D & THREE STOOGES comics with KUBERT, his THREE STOOGES movies (MOE was his father-inlaw!), and work for Marvel, DC, and others!

Plus LARRY IVIE’s 1959 plans for a JUSTICE SOCIETY revival, JOHN BROOME, FCA, MR. MONSTER, BILL SCHELLY and more!

All Time Classic Con continued from #148!

Panels on Golden Age (CUIDERA, HASEN, SCHWARTZ [LEW & ALVIN], BOLTINOFF, LAMPERT, GILL, FLESSEL) & Silver Age Marvel, DC, & Gold Key (SEVERIN, SINNOTT, AYERS, DRAKE, ANDERSON, FRADON, SIMONSON, GREEN, BOLLE, THOMAS), plus JOHN BROOME, FCA, MR. MONSTER, & BILL SCHELLY! Unused RON WILSON/CHRIS IVY cover!

Interview with JOYE MURCHISON, assistant to Wonder Woman co-creator DR. WILLIAM MARSTON, and WW’s female scriptwriter from 1945-1948! Rare art by H.G. PETER, 1960s DC love comics writer BARBARA FRIEDLANDER, art & anecdotes by ROMITA, COLAN, JAY SCOTT PIKE, INFANTINO, WEISINGER, JULIUS SCHWARTZ, and others! Extra: FCA, JOHN BROOME, MR. MONSTER, & more!

Fantasy/sci-fi illustrator DONATO GIANCOLA (Game of Thrones) demos his artistic process, GEORGE PRATT (Enemy Ace: War Idyll, Batman: Harvest Breed) discusses his work as comic book artist, illustrator, fine artist, and teacher, Crusty Critic JAMAR NICHOLAS, JERRY ORDWAY’S regular column, and MIKE MANLEY and BRET BLEVINS’ “Comic Art Bootcamp.” Mature Readers Only.

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STANDARD-SIZE REPRINT OF SOLD-OUT #61! Covers every all-new ’70s tabloid, with checklist of reprint treasuries. Superman vs.

Spider-Man, The Bible, Cap’s Bicentennial Battles, Wizard of Oz, even the PAUL DINI/ALEX ROSS World’s Greatest SuperHeroes editions! With ADAMS, GARCIALOPEZ, GRELL, KIRBY, KUBERT, ROMITA SR., TOTH, and more. ALEX ROSS cover!

SUPERMAN: THE MOVIE 40th ANNIVERSARY! CARY BATES’ plans for unfilmed Superman V, ELLIOT S. MAGGIN’s Superman novels, 1975 CARMINE INFANTINO interview about the movie, plus interviews: JACK O’HALLORAN (Non), AARON SMOLINSKI (baby Clark), JEFF EAST (young Clark), DIANE SHERRY CASE (teenage Lana Lang), and Superman Movie Contest winner ED FINNERAN. Chris Reeve Superman cover by GARY FRANK!

MAKE MINE MARVEL! ENGLEHART’s “lost” issues of West Coast Avengers, O’NEIL and INFANTINO’s Marvel work, a WAID/ NOCENTI Daredevil Pro2Pro interview, British Bronze Age Marvel fandom, Pizzazz Magazine, Speedball, Marvel Comics Presents, and backstage at Marvel Comicon ’75 and ’76! With DeFALCO, EDELMAN, KAVANAGH, McDONNELL, WOLFMAN, and cover by MILGROM and MACHLAN.

ALTERNATE REALITIES! Cover-featuring the 20th anniversary of ALEX ROSS and JIM KRUEGER’s Marvel Earth X! Plus: What If?, Bronze Age DC Imaginary Stories, Elseworlds, Marvel 2099, and PETER DAVID and GEORGE PÉREZ’s senses-shattering Hulk: Future Imperfect. Featuring TOM DeFALCO, CHUCK DIXON, PETER B. GILLIS, PAT MILLS, ROY THOMAS, and many more!

With an Earth X cover by ALEX ROSS.

HALLOWEEN! Horror-hosts ZACHERLEY, VAMPIRA, SEYMOUR, MARVIN, and new interview with our cover-featured ELVIRA! THE GROOVIE GOOLIES, BEWITCHED, THE ADDAMS FAMILY, and THE MUNSTERS! The long-buried Dinosaur Land amusement park! History of BEN COOPER HALLOWEEN COSTUMES, character lunchboxes, superhero VIEW-MASTERS, SINDY (the British Barbie), and more!

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VIDEO GAME ISSUE! Get ready as LEGO designers TYLER CLITES and SEAN MAYO show you LEGO hacks to twink and juice your creations! Also, see big bad game-inspired models by BARON VON BRUNK, and Pokemon-inspired models by LI LI! Plus: Minifigure customizing from JARED K. BURKS, step-by-step “You Can Build It” instructions by CHRISTOPHER DECK, BrickNerd’s DIY Fan Art, & more!

Career-spanning discussion with STEVE “THE DUDE” RUDE, as he shares his reallife psychological struggles, the challenges of freelance subsistence, and his creative aspirations. Also: The jungle art of NEAL ADAMS, MARY FLEENER on her forthcoming graphic novel Billie the Bee and her comix career, RICH BUCKLER interview Part Three, Golden Age artist FRANK BORTH, HEMBECK and more!

Celebrating the greatest fantasy artist of all time, FRANK FRAZETTA! From THUN’DA and EC COMICS to CREEPY, EERIE, and VAMPIRELLA, STEVE RINGGENBERG and CBC’s editor present an historical retrospective, including insights by current creators and associates, and memories of the man himself. PLUS: Frazetta-inspired artists JOE JUSKO, and TOM GRINDBERG, who contributes our Death Dealer cover painting!

KIRBY & LEE: STUF’ SAID! The creators of the Marvel Universe’s own words, in chronological order, from fanzine, magazine, radio, and TV interviews, painting a picture of JACK KIRBY and STAN LEE’s relationship—why it succeeded, where it deteriorated, and when it eventually failed.

Includes a study of their solo careers after 1970, and recollections from STEVE DITKO, WALLACE WOOD, & JOHN ROMITA SR.

FATHERS & SONS! Odin/Thor, Zeus/ Hercules, Darkseid/Orion, Captain America/ Bucky, and other dysfunctional relationships, unpublished 1994 interview with GIL KANE eulogizing Kirby, tributes from Jack’s creative “sons” in comics (MUMY, PALMIOTTI, QUESADA, VALENTINO, McFARLANE, GAIMAN, & MILLER), MARK EVANIER, 2018 Kirby Tribute Panel, Kirby pencil art gallery, and more!

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