Back Issue #95 Preview

MOENCH & SIENKIEWICZ Moon Knight Pro2Pro Interview!

April 2

017

Moon Knight TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc. All Rights Reserved.

N$o8..9955

™

CREATURES OF THE NIGHT! Ghost Rider • Night Nurse Eclipso in the Bronze Age • I…Vampire Mike W. Barr Batman Interview • featuring Budiansky, DeMatteis, Pasko, Ploog, Sutton, Thomas & Marvel’s Nightcat, Jacqueline Tavarez

Volume 1, Number 95 April 2017 EDITOR-IN-CHIEF Michael Eury PUBLISHER John Morrow

Comics’ Bronze Age and Beyond!

DESIGNER Rich Fowlks COVER ARTISTS Bill Sienkiewicz and Klaus Janson (Originally the splash page to Moon Knight #6, Apr. 1981. Original art scan courtesy of Heritage Comics Auctions.)

COVER COLORIST Glenn Whitmore COVER DESIGNER Michael Kronenberg PROOFREADER Rob Smentek SPECIAL THANKS Mike W. Barr Don Kessler Andrew Bennett Paul Kupperberg Jerry Boyd Christopher Michael Browning Larochelle Bob Budiansky Marvel Comics Dewey Cassell Dan Mishkin Gary Cohn Doug Moench Gerry Conway Luigi Novi Denys Cowan Adam Palance Paris Cullins Maritn Pasko J. M. DeMatteis Shannon E. Riley Barry Dutter Bill Sienkiewicz Fayetteville Anthony Snyder Comic-Con Jacqueline Tavarez Linda Fite Jean Thomas Peter B. Gillis Roy Thomas Grand Comics Steven Thompson Database David Torsiello Steven Grant Don Vaughan Nikki Gregoroff Len Wein Larry Hama Steven Wilber Karl Heitmueller, Jr. Marv Wolfman Heritage Comics Michael Zeno Auctions Tony Isabella

If you’re viewing a Digital Edition of this publication,

PLEASE READ THIS: This is copyrighted material, NOT intended for downloading anywhere except our website or Apps. If you downloaded it from another website or torrent, go ahead and read it, and if you decide to keep it, DO THE RIGHT THING and buy a legal download, or a printed copy. Otherwise, DELETE IT FROM YOUR DEVICE and DO NOT SHARE IT WITH FRIENDS OR POST IT ANYWHERE. If you enjoy our publications enough to download them, please pay for them so we can keep producing ones like this. Our digital editions should ONLY be downloaded within our Apps and at

www.twomorrows.com

PRO2PRO: Moon Knight: The Doug Moench/Bill Sienkiewicz Era . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2 An intimate dialogue with the superstar creative team that put Marvel’s midnight man on the map FLASHBACK: The Ghost Rider’s First Ride . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13 A super-charged history of Johnny Blaze’s Bronze Age adventures BEYOND CAPES: Enter the World of Danger, Drama, and Death… Night Nurse!. . . . . 31 Oh, nurse! This obscure 1970s book helped populate Marvel’s current cinematic universe BRING ON THE BAD GUYS: Devil Inside: Eclipso. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 36 The Bronze Age battles between Bruce Gordon and his sinister alter ego BEYOND CAPES: A Different Kind of Bat Man: I… Vampire. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 45 This bloodsucking protagonist took a bite out of 1980s’ issues of House of Mystery INTERVIEW: The Mike W. Barr/Batman Interview. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 55 One of our favorite writers chats about the controversial birth of Damian Wayne, Batman: Year Two, Jim Aparo, and other topics PRINCE STREET NEWS: “Of Cape and Cowl”. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 66 Karl Heitmueller, Jr.’s latest toon takes on Batman’s wardrobe ROUGH STUFF. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 68 A pencil-art showcase starring THE creature of the night, Batman ONE-HIT WONDERS: Nightcat: She Sings, She Fights, She’s Dynamite!. . . . . . . . . . . . . 73 Nightcat herself, Jacqueline Tavarez, and a star-studded lineup of creative folk relive the tale of Marvel’s musical crimefighter BACK TALK . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 77 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: $73 Economy US, $88 Expedited US, $116 International. Please send subscription orders and funds to TwoMorrows, NOT to the editorial office. Cover art by Bill Sienkiewicz and Klaus Janson. Moon Knight TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc. All Rights Reserved. All characters are © their respective companies. All material © their creators unless otherwise noted. All editorial matter © 2017 Michael Eury and TwoMorrows Publishing except Prince Street News, © 2017 Karl Heitmueller, Jr. ISSN 1932-6904. Printed in China. FIRST PRINTING.

Creatures of the Night Issue • BACK ISSUE • 1

TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.

In 1975, a mysterious new character started to find his way into the pages of several Marvel Comics titles. Moon Knight was a villain, then a hero, and often a character who was never expected to be seen again… but eventually a steady home in the back pages of the Hulk black-andwhite magazine brought together two creators who had a lengthy run that remains the definitive take on the character, writer Doug Moench and artist Bill Sienkiewicz.

– Christopher Larochelle CHRISTOPHER LAROCHELLE: While the intention here is to discuss Moon Knight by Doug Moench and Bill Sienkiewicz, I want to ask you, Doug, to explain a little bit about your work on the character before Bill came on board. How did Moon Knight get started as a character at Marvel Comics?

DOUG MOENCH: Well, I had needed to do the next plot for Werewolf by Night, and I decided to create a new villain. But when the protagonist is a werewolf, the character fighting the werewolf is kind of a hero, so I decided that he would be some kind of anti-hero. This character became a mercenary, and an organization called the Committee had hired him to go after the Werewolf.

I came up with a character whose every design and gimmick was related to the Werewolf. The first thing that I thought of was the Moon, because after all, the Moon triggers the transformation into a werewolf. So this new character would be themed around the Moon. That made me think of the black-and-white costume… when it’s a crescent moon, most of it is black but part of it is white, and so on. I thought that would be cool, and it was the first time that I had ever heard of in which there would be a costume with no color on it… and man, that was a hard time, getting colorists to not put color on that! He also had a glove with silver spikes, called a cestus, which is something that gladiators had in Ancient Rome. And silver hurts werewolves, right? So this character had crescentshaped darts, and the darts were made out of silver. Everything about him was designed to go up against the Werewolf.

LAROCHELLE: Makes sense.

MOENCH: I came up with a list of something like 15 different names, and Moon Knight was just one of them. Len Wein, who was the editor at the time, called me and asked what I had coming up in Werewolf by Night. I told him that I was creating this new villain who was also a hero, and I had a bunch of possible names. “Read them to me!” Len said.

So I read him all the names and I think that Moon Knight was maybe the fourth name, and he stopped me. He said, “Oh, I really like Moon Knight!

Moon Knight… that’s a good one.”

2 • BACK ISSUE • Creatures of the Night Issue

TM

by

Christopher Larochelle conducted July 2016

© Luigi Novi / Wikimedia Commons.

LAROCHELLE: Near the end of the time that you spent with Moon Knight in the Hulk magazine, some layers of the character’s history finally get peeled back. I’m talking specifically about a story in which Marc Spector’s brother Randall appears.

MOENCH: Yeah. I thought those were pretty good.

I liked those.

LAROCHELLE: Did you know that Marc had a brother for a while?

MOENCH: Oh, no. I never knew it until I came up with that story. It suddenly hit me… wow, this whole thing with a serial killer, it would be even better with a brother!

LAROCHELLE: When the time came for Moon Knight to get promoted to being an ongoing solo series, was it something of a happy surprise for you guys or was it something that you almost expected, given the response that you were getting?

MOENCH: No, I didn’t expect it at all. Every time they asked me to do more of Moon Knight it was a surprise.

SIENKIEWICZ: I don’t think we really expected it, but it was certainly nice when they mentioned it. It was a little bit of “be careful what you wish for,” because again, I never expected to be working for Marvel and working on this character for so long.

LAROCHELLE: One change that took place in the handoff from the Hulk magazine to the ongoing series was that Ralph Macchio stepped out as editor and Dennis O’Neil came in. Any comparison between the two editors?

MOENCH: They were both totally hands-off, and I loved that. They both said similar things, that they just had to sit back and we made them look good!

That was a nice compliment, but even more important was the freedom. I just hate having someone looking over my shoulder.

SIENKIEWICZ: Yeah, they were both hands-off. I had so much respect for Denny, and Ralph and I became very good friends. Denny was doing so many other things and had so many calls on his attention, so maybe that was

part of the reason why he was so hands-off. I would sometimes do some things just to see if I could get a response of some kind from Denny. I came to realize that with him, a non-response was probably the best thing.

Because when there was a problem, Denny certainly let me know it. He did tell me, “You know, Bill, don’t have Moon Knight being beaten up on every cover. Have him win some. It has to look like it’s a fair fight.” I always had Moon Knight on the losing side of the fight in the covers, and I really think that it works because then somebody looking at the book at the store just has to wonder about how he’s going to make it out of the situation. I think that Denny wanted Moon Knight to be a little more formidable on the covers. So I had Moon Knight going crazy on the covers, or ripping up the costume.

But there is one cover, for issue #19, that I have to really go on the record for. It’s a cover with Moon Knight holding his shoulder and there is this big poster behind him. I vehemently say that I had nothing to do with that poster that is drawn in the background.

Instead of asking me, Denny had someone else, I don’t

Killer Covers While Doug’s dramas kept MK’s readers turning pages, Bill’s skills evolved to his ascendency as one of comics’ master cover (and interior) illustrators. Covers to issues #2, 5 (background), and 7.

TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.

Creatures of the Night Issue • BACK ISSUE • 7

Moon Knight in Graphite (top) Infusion of Egyptian mythology including the statue of Khonshu never slowed down the pace of Moon Knight’s exciting stories.

Cover to issue #10 (Aug. 1981). (bottom) An undated Moon Knight pencil illo by Bill Sienkiewicz, from the Heritage archives.

TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.

even know who, redo my version of it. Denny felt that having a fully rendered Moon Knight and a fully rendered villain in the poster would be confusing. So somebody in the Bullpen just went over the original art and made this absolute mess of it. When people look at that and see that horrible image, and they think that I did it… I just remember that when I saw it, when it came out, I was so, so upset. I just wish that Denny hadn’t done that without asking me.

LAROCHELLE: I wanted to ask about the creative process that you two utilized to make the Moon Knight comics. Was the Marvel Method something that you used, or were full scripts more your style, Doug?

MOENCH: I had my own version of the Marvel Method, which was actually pretty different from the Marvel Method. In fact, my version of it is probably longer than a lot of people’s full scripts. It still gives the artists a certain amount of freedom.

I would do things in a freeform kind of way in paragraphs, and if the artist wanted to, each paragraph could be one panel, just like a full script. But if he wanted to take a paragraph and split it into two panels, he could. Or if he wanted to combine two paragraphs into one panel, he could do that, too. As long as the storytelling worked, I was happy. Some dialogue was there, but it wasn’t always polished. I didn’t want it to be totally polished, because sometimes the art would surprise me, and I wanted to take advantage of that. So, yeah, Moon Knight was done in my version of Marvel Method, which is definitely very different from Stan Lee’s.

SIENKIEWICZ: I didn’t have anything to compare Doug’s style to and just assumed that what Doug gave me is what every writer gave to every artist. I felt like the plots were very in-depth. It was all there in what he gave me. It eventually turned out to be more information than I needed. I came to find out that I like to solve some problems on my own and feel like I am contributing a little more. Doug’s stuff was so well thought out that I felt like there was little more I could bring. Choreographing the fight scenes was about the extent of what I did.

MOENCH: But there were requests for certain things. Like when you wanted pages with four panels each because you wanted to try something out. I think I granted every request, but the requests weren’t about plots, they were about the mechanics or the design or the storytelling style.

LAROCHELLE: So it wasn’t like when Chris Claremont or John Byrne were working so well together on X-Men and as time went on, John started driving the plots of the stories themselves.

MOENCH: I’ve never had that with any artist. I feel like as the writer, I should be writing it. If not, what am I doing?

I’d be stealing, and not doing my job.

LAROCHELLE: What kind of communication was there between you two as you were working on the series?

MOENCH: We were on the phone a lot, maybe not as much as I was with some other artists, but things were working out well… piece of cake, really!

SIENKIEWICZ: We did speak pretty often and I visited him in Pennsylvania, so yeah, we were always able to be in touch about things.

LAROCHELLE: When Moon Knight #1 came out, it was really important because it allowed you to finally tell the story of how a guy like Marc Spector became Moon Knight. The space that wasn’t there as a backup feature was now available for you to flesh out the character some more.

MOENCH: Yeah, it tells the whole story: How he was in Egypt and found the statue of Khonshu, the moon god, and decided to turn himself into a Knight of the Moon.

8 • BACK ISSUE • Creatures of the Night Issue

TM

by

D a v i d To r s i e l l o

In the early 1970s, the comic-book business had become a war between two of its biggest publishers—a war for rack space.

After Marvel Comics’ onerous distribution arrangement with Independent News (DC’s distributor) had expired in 1969, Marvel then made the jump to Curtis Circulation and for the first time since 1958, the company was free to publish as many titles as it pleased. In short order, Marvel put out a slew of new horror titles, sci-fi anthologies, and (of course) several reprint series. They were also swiping from pop culture as much as possible for fresh concepts.

New characters took inspiration from blaxploitation films (Luke Cage), the kung-fu craze (Shang-Chi, Iron Fist), and the Women’s Lib movement (the Cat, Shanna the She-Devil, Night Nurse).

But perhaps the strangest of these new characters was the Ghost Rider. Drawing from the horror genre, motorcycle clubs, and Evel Knievel (to go along with some standard superhero tropes), the concept was such a hodgepodge of disparate elements that it should have collapsed under the sheer weight of all its influences.

It ought to have been a creative mess and a commercial disaster— but it wasn’t. Instead, Ghost Rider wound up proving himself one of the most enduring original characters to come out of the Bronze Age. Why did the concept prove successful? There are a number of likely explanations, but to put it in the plainest terms: the image of a guy riding a motorcycle with a head that’s a flaming skull is totally badass. It stokes the imagination. It’s an image that pops off the comic page and most certainly pops off a comic cover.

Ghost Rider TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.

ORIGINS

The original comic-book Ghost Rider did not ride a motorcycle, however, but a horse. He was a Western character created by Ray Krank and Dick Ayers for Magazine Enterprises in 1949. Taking inspiration from the Headless Horseman (of “Sleepy Hollow” fame), as well as the Vaughn Monroe song “Ghost Riders in the Sky,” he was a cowboy vigilante that dressed in an all-white, full-body costume and rode a white horse. The character appeared regularly up until 1954.

More than a dozen years later, after the trademark lapsed, Marvel jumped on the character and began publishing a new series of his adventures in 1967. But this only lasted seven issues, followed by a very brief revival of the character for the anthology title Western Gunfighters in 1970.

Just a short time later, writer Gary Friedrich approached editor Roy Thomas with an idea for a motorcycle-riding villain called “Ghost Rider” that he wanted to use in the pages of Daredevil. Thomas liked the idea so much that he suggested launching the character in a series of his own.

When Mike Ploog drew the art assignment, he assumed they were taking another shot at the Western character.

“In my mind,” Ploog told BACK ISSUE in 2005, “the first image that came to me was the Frazetta Ghost Rider on Creatures of the Night Issue • BACK ISSUE • 13

horseback.” (Frank Frazetta illustrated a couple of gorgeous covers for the original Magazine Enterprises series in the 1950s.) Though Ploog may have been disappointed to learn he was doing an all-new character with the same name, he clearly adjusted quickly.

Knowing Roy Thomas’ affection for the Golden Age, it would be reasonable to assume that the design of the modern Ghost Rider was inspired by ’40s superhero the Blazing Skull, but this was not the case. Depending upon whom you ask, either Friedrich came up with the fiery skull design or Ploog did. But regardless of its origins, all can agree that the design was an eye-catcher.

THE DEVIL INSIDE

The new Ghost Rider first appeared in Marvel Spotlight #5 (Aug. 1972). Again, he jumped off the cover, surrounded by blurbs declaring, “The Most Supernatural Superhero of All!” and “A Legend Is Born!” A third blurb posed the ominous question, “Is He Alive—Or Dead?”

The character’s origin story is pretty straightforward. After being orphaned at a young age, Johnny Blaze is taken in by the owners of a traveling cycle show, the Simpson family: “Crash” Simpson, his wife, Mona, and their daughter, Roxanne. Several years down the road, when Crash is diagnosed with a fatal disease, Johnny makes a deal with the devil—literally Satan himself—to save Crash’s life. After Crash ends up dying in a show stunt, Satan comes to collect Johnny’s soul, correctly noting that Crash did not die of his disease, as per the letter of their bargain. He then informs Johnny that he will “walk the Earth” as his “emissary” at night, while spending his daylight hours trapped in “Hades.” But Roxanne returns just in time to interrupt this process, repeating the magical phrases necessary to drive the devil away and, seemingly, save Johnny. Alone together and safe, Rocky reveals that she had been reading Johnny’s books on Satan in secret, which is how she knew the way to save him.

But the next night, Johnny Blaze finds himself transformed into the Ghost Rider for the first time.

The transformations continue every evening at sundown thereafter, with a transformation back to human form with each dawn.

HERO OR HORROR?

Ghost Rider Unplooged Artist Mike Ploog burned rubber as Ghost Rider’s original artist. (right) GR’s debut, in Marvel Spotlight #5 (Aug. 1972). (above) An undated Ploog preliminary sketch of our hot-headed hellion, courtesy of Heritage Comics Auctions (www.ha.com).

Ghost Rider TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.

Like his Spotlight predecessor, Werewolf by Night, Ghost Rider had an unusual narrative style (unusual for a comic book, that is), as it was narrated in second person.

(Werewolf was done in first person.) Also like Werewolf, this premiere story begins in medias res, as we start with Johnny Blaze already the Ghost Rider, with his origins then revealed to us via flashback afterward. And finally, the two features also shared the same artist kicking off their strip: Mike Ploog (who would also have long stints on Frankenstein and Man-Thing). Taking all this in, the strip felt very much of a piece with the other new horror titles Marvel was beginning to publish.

Many specifics of the character were only vaguely defined at this point. Although Johnny could not control his transformations (they occurred at sundown whether he willed it or not), he was still fully conscious and in control as the Ghost Rider, even though he would often speak as if he were an infernal creature—threatening “mortals” with his power as a “servant of Satan.” (Johnny, as well as some of his later confidants and allies, would come to refer to this as his “spook routine.”)

The finer aspects of his powers were also unclear. He speaks of commanding “hell-fire,” for example, but his flame does not appear to have any properties that would distinguish it from conventional fire. It would be quite some time before the Ghost Rider’s powers, or even his demonic nature, would be properly detailed.

EARLY ADVENTURES

In his second appearance, in Spotlight #6 (Oct. 1972), Ghost Rider runs afoul of “Satan’s Servants” (a Hell’s Angels-style motorcycle gang) in Greenwich Village. After a display of his powers, GR is invited by the group’s leader, Curly, to join. Curly then betrays GR, revealing

14 • BACK ISSUE • Creatures of the Night Issue

to fight on. Then the Angel reappears, wondering if Johnny/the Ghost Rider has a death wish. “I have a theory about you,” he says. “I think that the more bitter and unhappy you are as Johnny Blaze, the more ruthless and savage the Ghost Rider is when he emerges.”

Angel then challenges the demon to kill him, at which point Johnny Blaze takes back control. As Johnny Blaze has committed no crime himself—and won’t accept aid or help from anyone—the heroes simply leave him.

As mentioned, this story marks the Ghost Rider’s heroic nadir. At one point Johnny transforms in order to save a child dangling from a water tower, but the Ghost Rider decides that if the kid “should die by his own hand, what should the Ghost Rider care? What is there to avenge?”

Luckily, Iron Man is there to catch the child when he falls.

WHAT IF?

It should be mentioned that the Ghost Rider made appearances in three issues of What If? during this period.

The first, What If? #17 (Oct. 1979), written by Steven Grant and illustrated by Frank Springer, shows us an alternate reality where Crash Simpson successfully completes the stunt that took his life in our reality—only to wind up killed by the Ghost Rider just a short time afterward instead.

Roxanne then pursues the demon as a result and he kills her as well. Ultimately, the Ghost Rider has to be put down

by Daimon Hellstrom, who ends the story lamenting the tragic bargain Blaze made with his father.

It was a bleak tale, and when asked if he possibly foresaw the darker direction the Ghost Rider title would eventually take, Grant tells BI, “The dark elements were always there; he was a Marvel Horror Hero, after all.

I suspect the relatively lukewarm response the audience had toward much of his initial series was due to Marvel’s failure to exploit that, or, rather, their determination not to, when the smart thing to do with pretty much any character is go for broke.”

What If? #28 (Aug. 1981) gives us an alternate ending to the storyline from Ghost Rider #43–44. Here, Johnny fails to break Azaziah’s mystic globe and the evil mage completes his plan to merge with the Ghost Rider.

He then proceeds to the Vatican, with plans to kill the Pope in a sorcerous ritual that will make him “master of the entire civilized world!” Johnny foils this plan by killing Azaziah/Ghost Rider with a magical scimitar, though he forfeits his own life in the process.

This tale was written by Fleisher and drawn by Tom Sutton— returning to draw the character for the first time since his debut issue eight years earlier.

Finally, there’s What If? #34 (Aug. 1982), a comedy issue. One segment asks, “What If Ghost Rider Had Possessed Someone Else?” as readers are offered readers glimpses of Ghost Grandpa, Ghost Skater, and Ghost Baby. Another segment imagines Ghost Rider as owner of a fast-food franchise called Burger Hell, ordering his patrons, “Have it my way… or else!”

overdue.) Johnny catches on with the Quentin Carnival here, introducing us to owner Ralph Quentin, Corky the clown, beautiful (and nosy) girl reporter Cynthia Randolph, and former head cycle-jock Red Fowler— who’s rather livid that Johnny has basically stolen his spot. A couple issues later, however, Red learns that Johnny is the Ghost Rider (though Johnny doesn’t immediately realize he knows) and goes from being an enemy to one of Johnny’s most loyal friends.

In Fleisher’s final issue, Ghost Rider battles an undead sorceress called the Wind-Witch. Between fight scenes, Fleisher will introduce another new carny character— Madam Olga, a psychic and medium—and begin a subplot with Corky’s son that will be picked up by the next regular writer.

But before that writer gets started, we have a fill-in by J. M. DeMatteis and a returning Don Perlin in issue #67 (Apr. 1982). It’s a sort-of ghost story that has the Ghost Rider serve as a dark mirror for a woman who’s let her thirst for vengeance consume her. It’s a tale that serves as another mile marker on the highway to the strip’s creative zenith.

The Original Ghost Rider (inset) In the Bronze Age, Marvel rebranded the Western hero Ghost Rider as Night Rider. (below) Both Riders met in the 50th issue of Ghost Rider (Nov. 1980).

Original Bob Budiansky/ Joe Rubinstein art courtesy of Heritage.

TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.

FLEISHER EXITS

Fleisher’s tenure may be rapidly drawing to a close at this point, but he’s hardly coasting. In Ghost Rider #63 (Dec. 1981), in addition to bringing back the Orb (with some eye-popping new weaponry), Fleisher beefs up the supporting cast in a major way. (And after so many years/issues of Johnny playing lone wolf, this was probably Creatures of the Night Issue • BACK ISSUE • 23

by

Dewey Cassell

I don’t like romance comics.

Well, that’s not entirely true. I have an appreciation for the artwork of romance comics, but it seems like most of the stories in the old romance comics revolved around pining for someone’s attention or playing hard to get or jealousy over a friend or rival. It was not exactly the stuff of legend.

Romance comics rose in popularity in the late 1940s and 1950s, in the wake of World War II. Unlike horror and crime comics, romance comics had no problem passing the Comics Code. But with changing times and the re-emergence of superhero comics, by the late 1960s romance comics were, for all intents and purposes, dead.

Naomi Scott, editor of the 1979 Fireside book, Heart Throbs: The Best of DC Romance Comics, put it this way: “Romance comics were popular for almost thirty years because they showed a simpler life. In the late fifties and early sixties, television was stealing a large share of the comic market—action adventure comics, as well as romance. But the changing morality of the sixties and seventies killed romance comics forever.” [Editor’s note: See BACK ISSUE #81 for more about Heart Throbs— plus the revelation of Naomi Scott’s true identity!]

NIGHT SHIFT

In an interview with Jim Amash in Alter Ego #70 (July 2007), former Marvel writer and editor-in-chief Roy Thomas explained the origin of Night Nurse: “[Stan] wanted to do some books that would have special appeal to girls.

We were always looking for ways to expand our franchise.

We had a lot of superhero books. You can’t just go on putting out more and more books that are in exactly the same genre, but if you could find ways to nibble around the edges… you can maybe cover a little more territory. So maybe a couple of women characters might bring back a few of the female readers who’d been lost to comics over the years with the decline of humor and romance comics.” This motivation served as the genesis for several comics Marvel introduced in the early 1970s, including The Cat, Shanna the She-Devil… and Night Nurse.

But Scott noted the challenge they faced: “Interestingly enough, romance comics were written and drawn primarily by men. Even the advice columns, with bylines attributed to Jane Ford and Julia Roberts, were written by men. Over the years there were women artists and story editors, but until recently the comic industry was dominated by men.”

This dichotomy was something Marvel intended to change with the new titles, as Roy Thomas tells BACK © Luigi Novi / ISSUE: “My idea—this was not part Wikimedia Commons. of Stan’s initial idea—was to try to get women to write them. And, of course, if we could get a woman to draw them, too, that was great.” It was an

Hello, Nurse!

Excitement, romance, and sensible shoes were hallmarks of Marvel’s Night Nurse #1 (Nov. 1972). Cover by Win Mortimer.

TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.

Creatures of the Night Issue • BACK ISSUE • 31

DC Comics has a long history of vile villains who have plagued our favorite heroes over the years, but none are quite like Eclipso. While the Joker, Lex Luthor, and Black Manta often come face-to-face with Batman, Superman, and Aquaman, Eclipso breaks the mold in that he lives within protagonist Bruce Gordon!

DARK ORIGINS

The cover of House of Secrets #61 (Aug. 1963) touts the introduction of “Fantastic Eclipso… Hero and Villain in One Man!” Written by Bob Haney with art by Lee Elias, the feature tells the tale of Dr. Bruce Gordon, a premier solar-power scientist who travels to Diablo Island to view an eclipse. While waiting for the eclipse, Gordon encounters Mophir, a tribal sorcerer. The two scuffle and Gordon is scratched by a seemingly magical black diamond possessed by the sorcerer. The eclipse begins and Mophir becomes confused, stepping backward and plummeting off the edge of a cliff. Mophir perishes, but Gordon appears to be unscathed. Appearances can be deceiving, though, as Gordon soon learns that he is now host for the villainous Eclipso.

Whenever in the vicinity of a solar eclipse, Gordon loses his will and Eclipso is unleashed. It’s discovered that solar energy and natural light will vanquish Eclipso, and throughout the Silver Age, Bruce’s girlfriend, Mona, and her father, Dr. Bennett, seek to help Gordon rid himself of Eclipso through a seemingly endless series of solar experiments. While somewhat of a C-level villain, Eclipso was apparently compelling enough of a character to make 18 appearances in House of Mystery, culminating with issue #80 (Oct. 1966).

ECLIPSO VS. THE JLA… AND METAL MEN?

Eclipso made his first Bronze Age appearance in Justice League of America #109 (Feb. 1974). “The Doom of the Divided Man” starts off with a shocker as Hawkman announces his resignation from the Justice League. Katar explains that he and wife Shayera have been called back to Thanagar, their tour of duty on Earth complete. The team is in the midst of expressing their dismay when Bruce Gordon arrives via teleporter carrying a worse-forwear Red Tornado. Explains the solar scientist to the slack-jawed JLA, “I’m Doctor Bruce Gordon—and to some extent, I am responsible for the harm done to your colleague!” The Red Tornado steps in and recounts that he had gotten a job as Gordon’s lab assistant and was helping the scientist with his controlled light transmission experiments. The android continues, “I don’t know how it happened—perhaps I was responsible—perhaps not— but, two-thirds of the way through the operation, vital circuits began to overload—and there was nothing I could do to stop them!” In a flashback sequence, Gordon is thrown to the floor from the force of the explosion and the Red Tornado witnesses three spectral figures emerging from the scientist’s body, “their identical faces all contorted into the same evil mask.” A trio of Eclipsos attacks the Red Tornado and the hero proves to be no match. Gordon

Bad Moon Rising The evil Eclipso returns, in Metal Men #48 (Oct.–Nov. 1976). Cover art by Walter Simonson.

TM & © DC Comics.

36 • BACK ISSUE • Creatures of the Night Issue

TM

by

Shannon E. Riley

Threeclipso!

The JLA vs. the triple-threat Eclipso, in Justice League of America #109 (Feb. 1974). By Wein, Dillin, and Giordano.

TM & © DC Comics.

goes on to explain that it is he who is Eclipso and that his latest experiment was meant to imprison the villain within him permanently.

Instead, a flaw led to the release of three Eclipsos hellbent on menacing the Earth. Batman deduces that a greater threat lies in the release of Eclipso from Gordon. Says the Darknight Detective to the scientist, “It’s the law of conservation of matter and energy! Nothing can be created from… nothing! The real Eclipso comes from latent energies the black diamond imbued within you—but those two extras your accident conjured up—according to the computers, they are drawing their energies from Earth itself! Unless we find them and destroy them within six hours—the stresses will tear this planet apart!”

Writer Len Wein and stalwart artists Dick Dillin and Dick Giordano deliver a crisp tale in which the League divides and conquers to take down the three split-faced devils. Black Canary, the Atom, and Aquaman face off against an Eclipso in the dark waters of the Atlantic, while Batman and the Flash vanquish an Eclipso in sweltering Death Valley as Hawkman, Green Arrow, and the Elongated Man take down the Dictator of Darkness aboard an aircraft. The entire JLA reconvenes aboard their satellite headquarters with the trio of Eclipsos and recovered black diamonds that threatened the very stability of the planet. Suddenly, the three clones merge into a giant Eclipso and the beast swats the Justice Leaguers away like flies. Eclipso then fires a bolt through his diamonds, fully anticipating to atomize the JLA—but one of the diamonds had been rigged by Batman and Eclipso returns to his human host. Reveals the Caped Crusader, “I secretly coated his black diamond with special chemicals and left the gem where I was sure he’d make a play for it! As soon as he started to fire one of his energy blasts through the diamond, he triggered the reaction that sent him back into Dr. Gordon’s body!” With Eclipso back within Bruce Gordon, the team bids farewell to the departing Hawkman.

After his defeat at the hands of the Justice League, Eclipso disappeared for a few years. He would turn up again in Metal Men, of all places.

The series had earlier returned from its cancellation at the tail end of the Silver Age, picking up the previous numbering with issue #42 in late 1972 and resuming a bimonthly publishing schedule as a reprint series for a three-issue run. Metal Men was later revived again, with new stories, starting in issue #45 in 1976. “Who is Bruce Gordon and Why is He Doing Those Terrible Things to Himself?” brought our shadowy villain back to the DC Universe in Metal Men #48 (Oct.–Nov. 1976), pitting him against Doc Magnus’ team of element-based robots.

The tale begins with Mona Bennett bursting into Magnus’ lab, desperately begging for his assistance.

She recounts Bruce Gordon’s ordeals with the Master of Darkness, from the destruction of Solar City to Gordon’s efforts to rid himself of the devil with a variety of high-intensity light experiments; his most recent trials had gone awry and unleashed Eclipso once again. Freed, but with Gordon’s persona still submerged within, the beast immediately retrieves his black diamond from the scientist’s study and discovers data in his files that will put the wheels in motion for a return to Diablo Island, where Gordon first received his wound from the black diamond. Magnus, Bennett, and the Metal Men track Eclipso to the Peruvian Andes, where Metal Man Tin fashions a white-hot torch that temporarily severs the connection between Eclipso and Gordon. Gordon quickly explains to the team that they’ve returned to the location where he fought Mophir and his sun cult, and where Eclipso was first unleashed. Within Mophir’s cave, they discover a tablet inscribed with an eclipsed sun. As Iron retrieves it, an earthquake is triggered and the entire group scrambles for safety. Magnus directs Iron to move the Metal Men’s flying transport and in doing so, it blocks the sun and Eclipso is freed yet again.

Eclipso absconds with the tablet and speaks aloud the hieroglyphs, conjuring the ancient god Umbra. Umbra utters, “Soon… the others shall awaken... to join me! And soon... the Earth shall be ours!”

It’s announced in the letters column of Metal Men #48 that Martin Pasko had come on board to script the issue in place of the departing Gerry Conway (who plotted the story with Walt Simonson). Pasko and I have communicated frequently over the years and I reached out via email to see if he recalled how he got the assignment. Says Pasko, “At this time, Gerry was writing and editing a lot of first issues—‘pilots,’ so to speak—and then handing them off to other writers with the second issues. I’d become one of his go-to guys for that; I took over two titles that Gerry had started, so he knew I was able to pick up where he’d left off without too jarring a change in style or approach to story. Steve Gerber was supposed to be the new regular [Metal Men] writer, taking over from Gerry, but had to bow out after one issue due to other commitments, so Gerry co-plotted #48 with Walt [Simonson] and started looking for someone to dialogue it. Since Gerry, Walt, and I had already worked together happily, and I knew how to interpret Walt’s very loose breakdowns, I guess I was the logical choice.”

The concluding chapter, “The Dark God Cometh,” appears in Metal Men #49 (Dec. 1976–Jan. 1977). Umbra rewards Eclipso for summoning him by increasing his power a thousand-fold, and he uses it to promptly mop up the floor with the Metal Men. Eclipso then abducts Mona and is set to sacrifice her to Umbra—but the Metal Men regroup and swiftly form a giant magnifying glass, transforming Eclipso back into Bruce Gordon and saving Mona from certain death. With Mona now safe and Umbra temporarily immobile while he recharges for another battle, the group returns to the cave and Gordon recounts the history of Diablo Island and ultimately his dark origins as the host for Eclipso. He explains that the island dwellers worshipped a sun god, but in reality Umbra was a god of darkness.

Creatures of the Night Issue • BACK ISSUE • 37

by

D o n Va u g h a n

The adoption of the Comics Code by the Comics Magazine Association of America in October 1954 sent a seismic shift throughout the comic-book industry. Used to doing pretty much whatever they wanted within the pages of their magazines, publishers suddenly found themselves facing significant restrictions regarding content— including a ban on almost all elements of the supernatural.

Warned the Code: “Scenes dealing with, or instruments associated with walking dead, torture, vampires and vampirism, ghouls, cannibalism, and werewolfism are prohibited.”

Such were the rules for more than 15 years.

Then came the 1970s, and the realization that many provisions within the Code had become obsolete. In 1971, the CMAA announced a TM new Code that loosened restrictions in several areas—including horror. Suddenly, vampires, werewolves, and their otherworldly brethren were fair game once again.

Marvel Comics was one of the first major publishers to jump at the opportunities presented by the new Comics Code. DC, however, moved a bit more slowly.

Though various creatures of the night appeared occasionally in DC’s mystery titles, it wasn’t until 1981— a decade after the new Comics Code debuted—that DC offered up a suitable rival to Marvel’s wildly successful Tomb of Dracula: “I… Vampire,” which premiered in House of Mystery #290 (cover-dated Mar. 1981).

I... Vampire was developed by writer J. M. DeMatteis, with a bit of guidance from Len Wein. “Len was editing House of Mystery and Weird War Tales and he wanted to launch ongoing series in both titles,” DeMatteis tells BACK ISSUE. “I pitched Len an idea I had on hand— Creature Commandos—for Weird War Tales, and for House of Mystery, he provided me with a title—I... Vampire– and sent me off to develop something. I came back with another idea I’d had cooking for a while, Greenberg the Vampire. Len didn’t think the tale of a Woody Allen-ish, New York vampire fit the bill (I later sold the idea to Marvel), but he liked the fact that there was a love story between two vampires at Greenberg’s core. Len told me to play with that concept. I thought it over and came back with Andrew Bennett and Mary, Queen of Blood. And we were off!”

DeMatteis was paired with artist Tom Sutton, a veteran cartoonist with a flair for the macabre. Together, they developed the look and feel of I...

Vampire, quickly pushing it to the forefront of the book. By issue #310 (Nov. 1982), I... Vampire was featured in larger type on the cover than House of Mystery. “Tom Sutton was Len’s call,” DeMatteis notes, “but I thought he was perfect for the series. His work dripped with mood and mystery.

And he was a rock-solid storyteller.”

Dead Man Walking The first appearance of Andrew Bennett— star of “I… Vampire”—in House of Mystery #290 (Mar. 1981). Cover by Joe Kubert.

TM & © DC Comics.

Creatures of the Night Issue • BACK ISSUE • 45

Who’s Who, Version 1 Courtesy of Heritage, original art to the I… Vampire entry from Who’s Who: The Definitive Directory of the DC Universe #11 (Jan. 1986). Pencils

by Tom Sutton, inks

by Dick Giordano.

TM & © DC Comics.

through time via the rings of Kur-Alet, an ancient Egyptian king. Bennett believes they can use the rings to return to a time when they were still human, and agrees to help Mary find them, only to be doublecrossed when Mary uses one of the rings to go back without him. Bennett takes a second ring off Kur-Alet’s mummified remains, which brings the long-dead king back to life. They battle, and Bennett bashes the mummy’s head with a rock. He then utters the chant that activates the ring, disappearing in time just as Deborah and Dmitri arrive on the scene. The episode concludes with Andrew arriving in 1888 England, where he finds a woman dead—an apparent victim of Jack the Ripper—and hears Mary’s deranged laughter in the distance.

SUTTON SWINGS BACK

Tom Sutton returns in HoM #306 (July 1982), where we find Bennett being pursued by a mob that believes he’s Jack the Ripper. He turns into a bat and escapes, but a lack of food has weakened him and he falls from the sky.

Bennett awakens in the care of Dr. Jonathan Kelsey and

48 • BACK ISSUE • Creatures of the Night Issue

his assistant, Penny Bower. Kelsey explains that he had given Bennett a life-saving blood transfusion and offers him a position as his assistant once he’s feeling better, which Bennett accepts.

Bennett ponders why Mary would want to go back to Victorian England, then remembers that Dr. Barr, the elderly scientist who invented the cancer vaccine that made human blood so deadly to vampires, was the son of a woman who narrowly escaped Jack the Ripper’s murderous onslaught. Mary, he realizes, wants to kill the woman and ensure Barr is never born. Bennett enlists Penny Bower’s assistance in finding Mary, and they catch her immediately after Mary has murdered Penny’s sister, a streetwalker—and the apparent mother of Barr. Mary readies herself for a return trip to the present, where the vaccine theoretically no longer exists, but is stopped at the last minute by Dr. Kelsey, who makes mention of a third Bower sister before admitting that he’s the real Jack the Ripper. Mary finishes the time-travel incantation as Dr. Kelsey prepares to kill her, allowing Bennett to throw himself atop the demented serial killer. Dr. Kelsey attempts to stab Bennett in the back with a large blade but

conducted by M i c h a e l E u r y ic-Con on Oct. 17, 2015 at the Fayetteville Com transcribed by Steven Thompson

MICHAEL EURY: I’m Michael Eury, editor of BACK ISSUE magazine, and some years back I was the editor of a comic book called The Maze Agency, which we’ll talk about in a moment or two. But the creator and writer of that comic, and many other comics, is here to my right.

Would you please say hello to Mr. Mike W. Barr! [applause] We’re going to start by talking about Batman, though. I have a photocopy here of an inscription [Barr laughs] that Mike made on my personal copy of the graphic novel Batman: Son of the Demon, published in 1987, but signed by Mike in 1989.

MIKE W. BARR: What was the occasion of that? Do you remember?

EURY: Let’s see... Were you visiting the Comico office for The Maze Agency?

BARR: Maybe.

EURY: Okay, ’89. April 26th, ’89. Son of the Demon was roughly a year and a half, two years old at that point. [to audience] Has anybody read this graphic novel?

Okay. You remember Son of the Demon. There is something that happens at the end of Son of the Demon, a little “present” left behind. You know what I’m talking about? What was it? A new person. A baby? [to Mike] So, do you say “ROSH” al Ghul or “RAYSH” al Ghul?

BARR: I say “RAYSH” al Ghul. That was how Denny O’Neil it should be pronounced.

EURY: And that’s what Julie Schwartz said, too.

BARR: Yeah.

EURY: Although almost everybody in the world says “ROSH” al Ghul because of the movies. If you look at some of the earlier comics featuring Ra’s al Ghul, you’ll actually notice his first name is lettered with a macron over the “a” to signify a long “a.”

“R-R-RRAYSH” al Ghul. I don’t know if you have to roll the “r” like I just did, though.

The Son of the Demon was a great graphic novel drawn by Jerry Bingham and written by Mike, and it features the birth of the child of Batman and Talia at the end of the story. [Barr laughs] And it was very controversial because shortly after that, the Batman movie comes out.

BARR: Yeah, it was about two years after that.

EURY: Yes. And Batman was a merchandising icon again.

BARR: Mm-hm.

EURY: And so DC Comics was having some issues with the baby.

This is the inscription. “To Michael Eury. Read this book quickly! It might not exist much longer! Best, Mike W. Barr. 4–26–89. P.S. On second thought, SCREW continuity! Stories, like Tinkerbell, last as long as we want them to!”

I just love that, because some stories—well, they might not be greeted favorably at a certain time, but later on they become part of the canon. [Barr laughs] That baby, of course, was Damian Wayne, now a major character in DC’s Batman comics. So, Mike, what do you think about this—Damian, son of Batman, and all that’s been going on with the character in recent years?

Disavowed, Then Allowed Mike W. Barr’s Batman: Son of the Demon graphic novel (1987), illustrated by Jerry Bingham.

TM & © DC Comics.

Creatures of the Night Issue • BACK ISSUE • 55

The Parent Trap (top) Barr’s inscription to BI editor Michael Eury regarding Son of the Demon’s controversial ending. (bottom) A glimpse of Jerry Bingham’s artistry in original art form.

Page 68 of Son of the Demon, courtesy of Heritage Comics Auctions (www.ha.com).

TM & © DC Comics.

56 • BACK ISSUE • Creatures of the Night Issue

BARR: Well, it’s all very strange, because at the time you would have thought that I had taken—as they say—a pee in the punchbowl up at the DC offices. And the thing was that people sort of said to me, “How could you have done this?”

And I said, “Look, it was edited by Dick Giordano, who was the vice president of DC. He knew what was going on.”

Everybody talked about it as though Jerry Bingham and I had sort of put the story sheets together at night and snuck them into the printing plant and sent them out without anybody knowing about it! [Eury chuckles] But everybody at DC—well, a lot of people at DC—knew about it because there were a lot of black-and-white Xeroxes of the artwork sent out to some of the editors. So they acted like we were doing something incredibly subversive, and my attitude was simply to tell that that was the last thing that anybody would expect to happen in the story. At one point in the story, Talia tells Batman that she’s pregnant, and at that point, I know that every reader—’cause this is what I would think—every reader reading that book is gonna look up and say, “Okay. She’s gonna lose the baby by the end of the story, ’cause they can’t have this kind of thing stay at DC. It’s not gonna happen.” And sure enough, later in the story, Talia says to Batman, “I’ve lost the baby.” So at that point you think, “Okay, fine. The shoe’s dropped. Let’s just go back to normal.” Then at the end of the story, you find out that Talia’s lying, that she has had the baby and it has been given up for adoption. Which I think is a pretty good one-two punch. Because no one who’s ever read this story and told me about it has said they’ve [ever] been able to forget it.

So it was immediately a point of extreme contention among people at DC, and as I said, people sort of pointed at me and said, “Why did you do that?” [chuckles] And I sort of pointed at Dick and said, ‘Well, he let me do it!” [Eury laughs] And Dick, by that time… he took a few days off and was waiting for the furor to die down. I just sort of weathered the storm.

A couple years later there was a sequel called Bride of the Demon, and I was told that we were not allowed to even reference anything that happened in Son of the Demon. I said to DC, to Denny O’Neil, who edited Bride of the Demon, “Look, I can write this whole thing out of continuity, you know? I can do that.” And he said, “No, we can’t even refer to it. We’re not even allowed to.” [DC president] Jenette Kahn told me—after Son of the Demon came out—that she had been told by her higher-ups at Warner Brothers that if there was ever any reference made to this story again, she would be fired.

Nowwwww... I’m not sure that’s at all true. Anyway, but that’s what she said to me. So that just goes to show you how controversial this story was, and we didn’t set out to do anything controversial. We had just set out to do a good story.

EURY: When I read it, I remember going, “Wow!” But I wasn’t necessarily expecting you or any other writer to follow up on it.

I looked at it as a story—especially since it was a self-contained graphic novel and not in a regular comic, which is where you’d usually find continuity-linked material.

BARR: Uh-huh, uh-huh.

EURY: It’s interesting how what was in the ’80s considered a toxic concept has now become part of DC’s continuity— and they’re proud of it!

BARR: Yes. EURY: But, so as not to pick on DC… since then, the company and the culture have changed.

BARR: That’s true.

EURY: In 1989, the idea of an illegitimate child was still very shocking, and I think we have, just as a culture, become more accustomed to the reality of that happening.

BARR: Now, on some calendar of events DC published for the 75th anniversary of Batman, it says on the highlights, “1987,” which I think is when this came out, “Damian Wayne appears in Son of the Demon.” So I thought, “Okay. We’ve been acknowledged. We’ve been made legitimate. We’ve gone

World’s Finest Offspring (top) The then-shocking, now-canonical final page to Son of the Demon, revealing the infant who would grow up to become Damian Wayne. (bottom) Two decades later, few pitched a fit over Superman’s “illegitimate” son in Superman Returns.

TM & © DC Comics.

mainstream.” It was very odd, because not long after… When did Superman Returns come out?

EURY: Uh… ’96? No, that doesn’t sound right.

AUDIENCE MEMBER: 2006.

EURY: 2006! I was a decade off. Sorry.

BARR: Yeah, yeah. And when I saw it, Superman Returns, I thought, “Well, this is a story where Superman has an illegitimate child.”

And it’s acknowledged that this child that Lois Lane calls son is the illegitimate child of Superman… and Lois Lane. And I thought that if you think of an illegitimate child as bad—[to audience] and as Michael has said, society has changed greatly over that, which is good because there’s no reason that the child himself should bear that— EURY: Absolutely.

BARR: —because he or she had nothing to do with it. What would they do when Superman has an illegitimate child? I mean, obviously, Batman is an icon of virtue, but Superman is the icon of virtue. Superman is like Jesus almost, you know? So Superman has an illegitimate child.

He didn’t know it, but neither did Batman. It’s just funny to see how things changed in, say, 19 years or so.

EURY: Tell us how you got started in comics. What was your first job?

BARR: I don’t remember a time when I wasn’t reading comics. As a kid, my mother and I would go grocery shopping on Friday night—I would tag along—and we would stop at the drugstore and she’d give me a dime and I’d trot into the drugstore and buy a comic book. And that was our custom for, again, as long as I can pretty much remember. The comic book that I bought with that dime was invariably either a Batman title or one of Julie Schwartz’s superhero titles, because those were the comics that I liked. Then later on, as much as I loved comics, I realized I had no artistic talent. I can’t draw at all. But I began to realize, when you read comic books and you read the letters columns and all that and you read the credits of the stories—those few stories that had credits— that someone actually wrote the stories. The artists did not write the stories despite what all those Batman stories that said “by Bob Kane” would lead you to believe. So I thought, “Well, I can’t draw stories but I can write ’em. I can think of things for Batman to do.”

So I began toying around here and there with the idea of writing scripts.

I eventually submitted a script to Julius Schwartz for a character called the Elongated Man. This was, like, back in 1973 or something like that.

That was eventually published in Detective Comics #444. So I sold my first script to Julius Schwartz, which is pretty cool if you think about it. There are guys in this business who worked their entire careers and never worked for Julius Schwartz, but always wanted to. So that was my first story.

EURY: [to audience] For the benefit of people that are younger, Julie Schwartz was a man. He was an editor at DC Comics for many, many years.

1st AUDIENCE MEMBER: [to Barr] Are you a comic-book legend of some sort?

BARR: I’m sorry?

1st AUDIENCE MEMBER: Are you a comic-book legend?

BARR: I… well, I… EURY: He is a comic-book legend.

BARR: I… see. No one can really call himself a legend.

EURY: [laughs] Julie Schwartz called himself a legend.

BARR: Well, that’s true.

EURY: He said he was a living legend.

BARR: Well, Julie broke all the rules. I guess if you’re a legend, you can break all the rules.

EURY: [to audience] We’ll open the floor for some questions in a minute. [to Barr] Let’s continue our conversation now. So, your first sale was an Elongated Man story.

BARR: Yes. The Elongated Man was sort of amateur detective who could stretch like Plastic Man. I always felt a great deal of affection for the character because he wasn’t too serious in a day when comics were getting increasingly serious. Basically, he was independently wealthy and he had superpowers. He was a member of the Justice League and he traveled around the country with his beautiful wife, solving crimes.

To me that’s, like, the ideal existence. I had submitted an earlier story about him that never went anywhere. Then I thought of this other idea and submitted it, and that one got bought.

EURY: Refresh my memory. Who drew it?

BARR: That was drawn by the late Ernie Chua. Ernie Chan, who was called Ernie Chua in those days because he was an immigrant and apparently the American authorities somehow messed up his name and spelled it “Chua” instead of “Chan.” That’s the story I heard, anyway.

EURY: I heard that, too.

BARR: Yeah, so it took him several years to correct that. He did most of his work in his later years under the name Ernie Chan.

EURY: So, after that, what was next? You ended up on DC’s staff eventually as, what? A proofreader, originally?

Creatures of the Night Issue • BACK ISSUE • 57

BATMAN #226

by NEAL ADAMS

Batman—comics’ ultimate “Creature of the Night”—has been drawn by many of the medium’s finest illustrators throughout his history that now spans nearly 80 years. In this special Batman installment of Rough Stuff, we ooh and ahh over the pencil art of five masters who each left their indelible marks upon the Darknight Detective. (Unless otherwise noted, art scans are courtesy of Heritage Comics Auctions.) captions by

Michael Eury

ALTERNATE COVER

Neal Adams’ stark “Man with Ten Eyes” cover for Batman #226 (Nov. 1970) was one of many unforgettable Batman covers the talented Mr. Adams produced for editor Julius Schwartz during the early Bronze Age. As this stunner shows, Neal had an alternate take on this image, with the Caped Crusader appearing more disoriented than in the published version (see inset). While this is a gorgeous rendering, we think the decision to redraw Batman’s posture heightens the cover’s mystery and impact.

Batman TM & © DC Comics.

68 • BACK ISSUE • Creatures of the Night Issue

by

Steven Wilber

There was a time when Marvel Comics was known for producing multiple one-hit wonders. Failed characters and/or series became the norm, though some have survived with minor cult status, many of which have been covered in the pages of BACK ISSUE. But one character, we’ve been waiting for just the right moment to cover. As of the writing of this article, 1991’s one-shot from Marvel Comics, Nightcat, “America’s Hottest Singing Sensation and Marvel’s Newest Superhero!”, celebrates its 25th anniversary.

BI was lucky enough to speak to members of the creative team behind the comic book… and after some investigative journalism, BACK ISSUE located actress Jacqueline Tavarez, who portrayed the title character for promotional appearances, for whom Nightcat is loosely based upon.

BI also discovered the voice behind the album that coincided with the one-shot’s release and secured a tell-all interview!

IF YOU ENJOYED THIS PREVIEW, THE PREMISE CLICK THE LINK TO ORDER THIS As revealed in Nightcat #1, Nightcat ISSUE IN PRINT OR DIGITAL FORMAT!shares a backstory similar to Marvel Comics’ first “singing sensation,” the Dazzler (see BACK ISSUE #90). Nightcat is Jacqueline Tavarez, a hopeful singer with a disapproving policeman father who raised his daughter on his own when his wife died after her own singing career failed. “Jackie” creates the Nightcat disguise as a stage persona that hides her true identity from her father and friends. The winner of a recorddeal contest, Nightcat earns immediate success, but quickly uncovers a drug ring being operated out of the recording studio. Its owner, millionaire Amanda Gideon, and her own personal scientist, Dr. Ecstasy, are attempting to develop a marketable drug that gives users superhuman traits of animals. When Jackie is found snooping, she’s prisoner and injected with the new test formula.

BACK ISSUEtaken #95 Her father, as one of Gideon’s henchmen, “Creatures of the Night!” Moon Knight’s DOUG MOENCHundercover and BILL SIENKIEWICZ in a Pro2Pro interview, Ghostto Rider, Night Nurse, tries rescue Nightcat, but is shot in the process, and Eclipso in the Bronze Age, I…Vampire, interviews with Batman dies as he realizes the rock star is really his daughter. writer MIKE W. BARR and Marvel’s Nightcat, JACQUELINE The chemicals and adrenaline running through Jackie give TAVAREZ. Featuring work by BOB BUDIANSKY, J. M. DeMATTEIS, DAVE SIMONS, ROGER STERN, TOM her SUTTON, JEAN THOMAS, retractable claws, night vision, enhanced speed, and and more. SIENKIEWICZ and KLAUS JANSON cover! agility. While using her career as a recording artist as a (84 FULL-COLOR pages) $8.95 front, Nightcat dedicates herself to honing her skills, (Digital Edition) $3.95 mind, and fortune to crimefighting, working her way to http://twomorrows.com/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=98_54&products_id=1268 eradicating Amanda Gideon’s influence and empire.

THE MUSIC Lefrak-Moelis Records (LMR), a division of RCA, was a small record-producing company based in New York City that had a track record of successful freestyle-type artists like Stevie B. (“Party Your Body”) and Jaya (“If You Leave Me Now”). It was LMR that had a new record deal ready and was waiting for an original star. “The Nightcat album was already

Artful Elegance This painted cover for Nightcat #1 (Apr. 1991)

by Joe Jusko was also used on the cassette and CD cover of the nine-track album.

TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.

Creatures of the Night Issue • BACK ISSUE • 73