Tuesday, March 19, 2024

Deadman Dies!


This past month I've been reading Deadman stories. Thanks to the too-small but still handsome trade reprints of the classic series by Arnold Drake, Jack Miller, Carmine Infantino, Bob Haney, and Neal Adams we have the ghostly series readily available for the modern fan. Without the involvement of superstar Neal Adams, this series would garner little attention, but that said, it was a solid story even before the great Adams put his hand to it.


Deadman is the tale of circus acrobat Boston Brand, a quixotic man who is murdered within the first several pages of the debut, but thanks to the handiwork of the mystical Rama Kushna is given a chance as a ghost to seek out his murderer, a mysterious man with a hook. (Shades of the The Fugitive.) His search for The Hook, leads him to lots of places where he chases many a red herring. Brand seems to have been a man with lots of folks in his past who might want to see him killed. Deadman does some good along the way as he relentlessly seeks his killer, and this is the basis for the series. 



As revealed in the very interesting forward, we learn how Deadman came to be. The death of longtime DC editor Larry Nadel, gave an opportunity for Jack Miller to take the reins of Strange Adventures. He immediately cast about for a new series to spark that waning title and sought out Arnold Drake, creator of the Doom Patrol, to help him out. Drake created Deadman and with the moral support of Carmine Infantino who tweaked the costume design the series was given life of sorts.

Drake wrote only the first two issues then gave way. Miller wrote a few issues himself before his own untimely death. By this time a relatively young Neal Adams had taken artistic control of the series, and his cache was such at the time that he apparently could strike a bargain to write too. He took control and Deadman became his pet project for the remainder of its run, as well as in tandem with Bob Haney on some issues of The Brave and the Bold which are actually pretty much in Deadman continuity. I should say too that Robert Kanigher wrote an issue too along the way. (More on those tomorrow.)

Below is a dazzling cover gallery of the issues with brief story descriptions. Enjoy!


In this blockbuster debut titled "Who Has Been Lying in My Grave?" by Arnold Drake and Carmine Infantino we meet our cast and witness the murder of Boston Brand. 


Under a Mike Sekowsky cover, Neal Adams steps in as artist for the story "An Eye for an Eye" written again by Drake. Deadman infiltrates a motorcycle gang in pursuit of his killer. Neal Adams is the reason these collections exist, so I can understand why he might want to fix something he sees as a problem. That resulted in one issue by him which he found to have gotten indifferent inking by George Roussos, to be re-drawn, or at least re-inked. It sadly seems out of place with the other artwork in the series as striking as it is. I personally wish they'd left well enough alone,


Under a blockbuster cover by Neal Adams who is the artist inside of course we get a story from Carmine Infantino and Jack Miller titled "What Makes a Corpse Cry?" in which Deadman checks out a mobster who once threatened to kill him for helping a young girl. 



"How Many Times Can a Guy Die?" is the story in which we meet Deadman's rival trapeeze artist The Eagle, another chap who Boston Brand irritated enough to issue a death threat to our hero when he was alive. Again, the script is by Infantino and Miller with Adams beginning to get his sea legs. This is four-part, two-issue saga. 


"Hide and Seek" by Miller and Adams puts Deadman back on the trail of the mysterious "Hook". Deadman inhabits the body of the cop assigned to his murder case who has since been discredited and suspended from the force. Deadman's search for a witness leads to tragedy. 


"How Close to Me My Killer?" by Miller and Adams introduces Cleveland Brand, the estranged twin brother of Boston Brand. Cleveland and his daughter live near the Mexican border and he is making money smuggling migrants into the United States. Deadman's search the Hook leads him into more danger for all around. 


Neal Adams takes over the writing as well as doing the art in the story "The Fatal Call of Vengeance". In this one Cleveland Brand and his daughter Lita join the circus and Cleveland seeks to at once take Boston's place and perhaps solve his killing. The Hook surfaces in a convoluted tale that ends up with Tiny's life in extreme danger. 


Under an outstanding cover Neal Adams is again doing both script and artwork as Deadman enters Tiny's mind to attempt to trigger his will to live. Then in the story "The Call from Beyond" our ghostly hero finds himself involved with a bizarre medium who seemingly can call up the dead.  A doctor and his son are in deadly danger, but Deadman is at their side. 

More tomorrow as we look at Book Two of Deadman's strange adventures. 

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Monday, March 18, 2024

The Adventures Of The Other Deadman!


Before we get too deeply entrenched in Deadman lore, I want to take a moment and mention the other Deadman drawn by Neal Adams, this time in partnership with Dick Giordano. 


The duo produced this oddball gem for National Lampoon working from a script by Henry Beard. To read this singular "Deadman" adventure check out this link. 

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The Day Of The Deadman!








Just wanted to showcase these delightful reprints of the Deadman saga from the 1980's in those halcyon days before trade collections were a commonplace. These pricey (at the time anyway) volumes featured the art of Neal Adams on bright white paper for the first time. The Independent market was blooming and both DC and Marvel flooded the field with upgraded reprints in efforts to soak up newsstand space. That's the bad news. The good news is that fans got quality stories in quality condition for the first time. 

More Deadman (of a sort) later today. 

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The Spectre Of Death!


Before Deadman, DC Comics gave the world The Spectre. The Spectre was created by Jerry Siegel and Bernard Bailey for More Fun Comics way back in the Golden Age of Comics. The Spectre was an original if oddball member of the Justice Society of America. When DC started to revive those characters with the creation of Earth-2, the Spectre was given a try-out and apparently warranted a series of his own. After the try-outs and the debut issue were drawn by the great Murphy Anderson, DC handed the art chores over to Neal Adams, who at that same time was taking over Deadman from Carmine Infantino in the pages of Strange Adventures. 


The actual first-published image of the Spectre rendered by Neal Adams was the cover of The Brave and the Bold #75. He didn't do the interiors, yet his ghastly presentation is pretty memorable. 


In the second issue of The Spectre, Adams illustrates a story by Gardner Fox about a hood who gets so scared his magical self is separated from him and uses its magical powers to commit crimes while his real self performs magic in public. It takes both the strength and ingenuity of Jim Corrigan and the Spectre to defeat this double menace. 


In a story which is as much about Wildcat and his alter-ego Ted Grant as the Spectre, the duo find themselves fighting against a small-time hood who is suddenly gifted with great powers thanks to some stray magic which escaped from a battle between to other-dimensional magicians. Mike Friedrich wrote this one. 


Neal Adams writes and draws the next issue. Once again, a mere human gets great powers, powers which challenge that of the mighty Spectre. This time it's an evil force which travels from world to world, inflicting anger and destruction in its wake. It inhabits a young boy and after fighting to stop the menace, the Spectre is given a dilemma of killing the host or saving the world. 


Neal Adams wraps up his Spectre run with issue five. This one is a particular fave of mine since I got hold of it when I was a tyro. The art in this issue blew me away and firmly rooted my utter appreciation for Adams. The story starts with a mysterious stranger who kills to get a mystical device he uses to created a rampaging giant. The Spectre responds but finds the crowds are more terrified of him than the actual menace. Ultimately the Spectre uncovers the identity of his foe and the giant as well. Both are dandy revelations I won't spoil here. 


But there is a fantastic double-page spread which still lingers in my memory. 

The Spectre's book was taken over by Jerry Grandenetti, a fine artist in his own way. Neal Adams apparently was shifted over to The Brave and the Bold where he took on Batman full-time for the first time. I'll have more on that next month. Later today, I shift gears slightly to look at the other ghostly hero drawn by Adams for DC -- Deadman.

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Sunday, March 17, 2024

The Ghost Who Is Green?



Happy St. Patrick's Day! 

The Phantom was created by Lee Falk specifically for the black and white pages of daily newspapers. Falk said that the color of his distinctive outfit was to be grey, but that information was not apparently widely disseminated because when the character's popularity grew worldwide, and eventual color presentations were needed there is a wide array of hues used. In some places the Phantom is red, in some he is blue. I grew up with a purple Phantom. But once upon a time when the strips were reprinted form the pages of The Australian Woman's Mirror, the figure on the cover was a bright green on the first and third issues. 


But that wasn't a conscious decision so much it seems merely convenience because the Phantom is red on the second issue. 



And not much of any color at all on the other two covers in the run of the 1939 reprint. 

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The Phantom - The Mysterious Ambassador!


The Mysterious Ambassador is actually written by the Phantom's creator Lee Falk. This is one of a few of the Avon novels I actually got hold of and read way back in the day when they were landing on newsstands. But it's been a long time and reading it this time was like reading fresh. George Wilson's covers for these books are uniformly fine, but this one is a particular standout. This Hermes Press reprint is a very handsome little tome.


This novel was first published in 1973 and it's difficult not to imagine that the brutal dictator in the story was not inspired by the outrageous and sadistic Idi Amin who ascended to power in Uganda in 1971. In Falk's story a military leader named General Bababu seizes power in the country of Bangalla after losing a fair election. The real winner was a Dr. Luaga who at the time of the election was busy helping in a remote village with a plague. He was assisted by a full United Nations team, which happened to include the lovely Diana Palmer, the girlfriend of a certain Ghost Who Walks. 


Bababu who is described in the book as "half gorilla, half rhino, and all monster" seeks nothing less than the head of Luaga to prove that his opponent is well and truly dead. His forces shoot down a U.N. helicopter sent to rescue the team, but at this point the Phantom intercedes. He sends Bandar warriors to lead the displaced team to relative safety in the Deep Woods. We are treated to a small tour of the area and see some of the odd features already introduced by Falk in his comic strip. It was neat indeed to see the passion with which the Phantom greeted Diana when the party at last arrives safe and sound. 


This book is filled with some outstanding Phantom action. Falk emphasizes the power of the Phantom's punch and many a soldier loyal to the despot is laid out with a single blow. The struggle to get the medical team to safety is a harrowing one and not without mishap. But eventually they safe and then the Phantom's mission is transformed. He becomes "the mysterious ambassador" of the title, but the Ghost Who Walks practices his diplomacy with a distinctive hands-on approach likely not practiced by those formally trained in the profession. 


I found this to be an exciting installment, with a feeling of some greater gravity. There is death and sordid mayhem in the background of the story. People die, but many are saved due to the heroism of the Phantom, and that's the whole point. This one is highly recommended. 



Next up is The Mystery of the Sea Horse. 

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Saturday, March 16, 2024

The Phantom - The Charlton Years Volume Three!


The Phantom - The Charlton Years Volume Three offers up more vintage Pat Boyette artwork. For all the glory that other artists get (from me and others) for their work on the Charlton Phantom run, it was 
Boyette who was the workhorse, cranking out a total of twenty-one issues for two and a half years. 


The majority of the Boyette issues contained multiple stories, but issue forty-eight's "The Man of Destiny" likely written by Joe Gill was a yarn that took up the whole issue. We meet a young man named Hokana who leaves the jungle to get an education in the outside world and there he comes into contact with people who want to use him to undermine the traditional culture of his people with talk of politics and such. There's a suggestion they are Commies, but it's kind of vague. But Hokana is resistant and with the help of the Phantom is able to fend off this foreign threat to his people. 


"The Hostage" kicks off the next issue as the book returns to its regular three-stories an issue format. The hostage is of course Diana Palmer, drawn again a bit off model who is taken by dimwits who don't realize what they've brought down on themselves.  "A Better Way" showcases a young lad named Jelrami who is saved by the Phantom but injured. He's sent to the outside world where he falls victim to evil influences and returning to Deep Woods seeks to undermine the Phantom's authority.  "The Intruders" is the tale of an earlier Phantom who found himself battling strange creatures from another world. They are overly confident when it comes to Earthlings and the Ghost Who Walks takes advantage. 


"The Fire Gods" kicks off the fiftieth issue of The Phantom and features astronauts returning from a Moon mission who accidently land in the middle of the jungle and a hostile tribe. The Phantom though has the right stuff and is able to save the day. "No Gratitude" has the Phantom pursuing a small-time thief into the deadly jungle and it's a real test of a true nature of the man when the Phantom require help in a mortal situation. "The Lost Legion" is a story right out of the pages of an Edgar Rice Burroughs' novel, as the Phantom finds a forgotten valley and a forgotten society straight out of Roman times. For the record, this is the last issue of The Phantom produced under the auspices of Sal Gentile. 


The next issue of The Phantom introduces us to Rex, the Phantom's nephew and his friend Tomm. In the story "A Broken Vow" the two young boys are kidnapped by a resentful native whom the Phantom has already run out of the area once. The Phantom has to battle a crocodile to save them. The boys attempt to help an elephant named King in the story "Captive King". The beast is trapped by the Wambesi who seek not only capture the elephant but the Rex and Tomm as well. "The Treasure Room" guest stars Diana Palmer who searches for the lost city of Lak and finds it. But she also finds villains who have located the remote place to plunder it. George Wildman takes over as editor of the Charlton line. And it seems to me that we get more robust credits with this change over. 


"Lost in the Land of the Lost" is credited to Joe Gill as is one other story in this issue. It's assumed that Gill wrote most if not all of these Phantom tales, though the credits are vague. Rex and Diana find a lost temple and once again encounter plunderers who kidnap them. But they are able to help themselves as the Ghost Who Walks arrives to assist. "A World Away" has the treasure of the Bandar stolen yet again, this time with the seeming assistance of Diana. The Phantom has to travel to civilization to find the crooks and his love to why she betrayed him.  "Revenge of the Singh Pirates" brings back the Phantom's original enemies, This time they want to steal ivory from a village, but the Phantom is one step ahead as usual. 


"The Looters" has the treasure of the Bandar stolen still another time. (This is getting a bit repetitive.) Once again, the Phantom travels to civilization, this time to France to find the looters, a man named Marcel and his girlfriend Jeanne. "The Do-Gooders" echoes an earlier story as well, as a social worker arrives to help the Shivi tribe and gives them modern appliances like washing machines and weapons as well. The Phantom is resistant and there is more than a whiff of a demeaning attitude for traditional ways on all sides. "The Outlaw's Herd" sees an elephant called Kaswili on the rampage. The Phantom has to get to the bottom of this and to do so has to consult the chronicles which document an earlier event in which the Phantom helped the creature. 


"Killers in the Mist" takes the Phantom to London to confront thieves who once again have plundered the Bandar treasure. (This is turning into the easiest treasure to steal I've come across.) The Phantom confronts pea-soup fog and a Brit named Lord Percy. There's also a dangerous Dragon Lady of sorts on hand. "The Angry Gods" is about a temple which is desecrated by a movie crew despite multiple warnings from the Phantom. He also gets distracted by a lovely actress named Regina Shaw. "Master of Evil" has the Phantom battling an evil native named Wazuli who is able to marshal the very animals of the jungle to his corrupt cause. 


"The Black Blight" has the Phantom on the desert where he is battling a vile oil tycoon named Tokulis, who is building oil wells with no regard to the water underground. The Phantom frees the tribal leaders who are being held captive and turns the tables on this rogue. "A Far-Off Drum" gets mystical when the Phantom gives Diana a small drum to signal him from great distances. When she is waylaid by villains seeking archeological treasure, she is able to send a message via the drum to bring the Phantom to her side. "A Thief in the Night" is about the Bandar treasure once again being stolen. This time the Bandar have taken charge of it, since I guess they got tired of it getting stolen from the Skull Cave time and time again. The thief though has pure motivations. 


The final issue in this collection, number fifty-six begins with "Jungle Madness" which has the animals of the jungle getting ferocious. The Phantom is attacked by an elephant, an ape, a hawk, and even Hero gets nasty. Turns out it's a chemical in the water put there by a scientist and a villain named Boonton. His plan, such as it is, is to run off all the animals and plunder the villages. "The Nazi Phantom" turns the clock back to World War II and another Phantom who pretends to sympathetic to the Nazi cause when a U-Boat turns up in the waters of Bengali. It's back to the present when in "The Chief Who Went Astray!" the Phantom has to rush home to contend with a villain who has seemingly corrupted an older chief is using heavy machinery slave labor to mine for Uranium. 

(Pat Boyette)

There is a sameness to the stories that is emphasized when you read them in quick succession as I've been doing. That the books were not intended to be consumed in that manner allows for some leniency on this, but nonetheless the crew at Charlton did seem to be cranking these out. Joe Gill famously writes quickly and Pat Boyette's artwork while remaining distinctive does show signs of wear from time to time. As has been noted before, the Phantom was one of Charlton's best-selling books, so I suppose this is why King Features was content, at least for a while, to leave things in the hands of the editors. That would change. More on that next time. 

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