Gardner Fox was a genius. He wrote everything from comics to romance novels. Sci-fi, sword & sorcery too. I love Joe Kubert & his sons. All three are all amazing artists. You mentioned his war art. You should do a retrospective on some of your favorite war comics & artists.
You raise a good point about DC super-heroines. Hawk gir is a partner of Hawkman and a team mate and can handle herself in any situation. The same can be said about a number of DC women- Saturn girl, Wonder Babe, Super babe, Black Canary, Carol Ferris and others. Even Lois Lane is an ace reporter. This seems to be a company policy. I cannot attribute any writer or editor that would be responsible for this.
Wow, I've never seen that colour Hawkman collection, 1989 .. outrageous. Shame on you DC. I have the two Showcase Presents black & white collections, wonderful books. The Hawks were favourites of mine, great characters, they like archaeology .. neat, the antique weapons, those cool costumes, such fun. The creepy birds with human face masks were weird, way creepy. There was a great story in issue 19 of The New Teen Titans featuring Hawkman and the museum, mayhem ensues, those poor artefacts on display.
I think Showcase put out a second volume - I do not have either but I have the smaller color voulume you presented Yes those two 500 Page Showcases could be printed as one Thick Omnibus!!
I just finished the four Gardner Fox Kyric series. Kyric is billed as a warlock warrior, but I don't really remember him doing anything but sword fighting.
I always liked Hawkman. If you have DC Universe Infinite you can read the old stories online. Which is what that service is good for. (Though they seemed to stop uploading the old ones.) Gardner Fox should be better known. He was to DC what the Lee/Kirby team was to Marvel. He created half the universe. It's true that a lot of old Silver Age comics were plot based rather than characters base stories. But that could be okay. One thing I realize is that you can have a deep, complex character that is really contemptible. This is a problem with "literary" novels actually. Sometimes a simple but heroic character is better. The Strong Woman protagonist is older than a lot of people think. Wonder Woman has been around since the 30s. Robert E. Howard had Red Sonja and Dark Agnes. A lot of people complain about it nowadays though. Admittedly, it is done badly in a lot of Hollywood movies, but a lot of things are done badly in Hollywood movies.
I am reading the Showcase book now! Wonderful stuff. Don't badmouth yhat version. It gave us an affordable means of reading older material. The BW art allows the artwork to shine more without the distracting color.
You just woke up some brain cells that've been sleeping for most of my life. I must of liked it or I wouldn't have gotten into it. Looking into it: The '67/'68 series appearances on The Superman/Aquaman Hour of Adventure on TV.
Hawkman and Hawkgirl/Hawkwoman have to have the most confusing backstory in DC Comics history! I blame it all on Timothy Truman (who I generally liked a lot) and HAWKWORLD. But the Hawks' early Silver Age stories are my second favorite run of characters in comics, topped only by various Batman runs. The art by Kubert, and later Murphy Anderson in a rare role as penciller, simply beat everything else being published at the time. And as Michael said, the writing was good, too. I really liked the (essentially) co-equal partnership the two Hawks had, along with the fact that they were married. I was an impressionable lad at the time, and I'm sure those comics did a lot to shape my views on sexual equality. And, I'll be honest, the fact that Ms. Hol was a redhead probably didn't harm my feelings for the stories. If DC ever does a total reboot of its line, similar to what it did with the original CRISIS, Hawkman and Hawkwoman should find themselves in the same setting these books were in.
Good video on Hawkman Michael. Of DC's characters, Hawkman was always one of my favorites. Did you happen to catch the Black Adam movie with Hawkman? I actually thought DC did a decent job with him.
Hawkman was one of my favorites. I started collecting the comic book in 1964 with Hawkman number 3. I also have that 1989 collection you are holding up. Both Joe Kubert and Murphy Anderson were great on the feature, even though their art styles were so very different. And that first Hawkman story has one of my favorite comic panels, the last panel on page 4 (12:18), “They press a doorbell like this…” It tickles me to no end.
I was lucky enough to buy the Hawkman DC Archives Volume 1 hardback at a sale at my LCS some years ago, beautiful art on quality paper. I consider the Showcases Presents releases as "good for now" books until something better comes along (but with the glacial pace of DC's reprint programme that could be a long time in the future). Gardner Fox turned his hand (or typewriter) to lots of genres and contributed fun stories to every one of them.
This might be a long shot, but I would love to see a comic review of “Zen: Intergalactic Ninja.” A tad trashy, some would say, but very nostalgic for us 90’s kids, and I know trash gets its due love here.
I'm wracking my brain trying to remember the Hawk character from a series in the 1970s or 80s.There was a good-looking Hawk in that. I never watched any of the shows all the way through, but I stopped to see him, upon occasion. I have to do some research, but I assume this was not the same character. God, I love your descriptions! The whole thing is preposterous, which is wonderful in a comic book!
Hawkman is a great character that really is underused. He's been in character limbo for the last few years. The last really good Hawkman run was done by Robert Vendetti, which I highly recommend. But there have been so many reboots of his history and different versions that I think DC is scared of even trying to touch him s lot of the time. But the Sci-fi aspects of the Silver Age version combined with the reincarnation aspect from the Golden Age makes the character ripe for many great story ideas. I've had a hard time tracking down the original Fox/Kubert issues. But I do love Kubert Art! If DC would reprint it I would definitely buy it! I've also been working to complete the Hawkworld and 90s Hawkman runs too.
Enjoyed the video! Hawkman & Hawkgirl (silver age through the 80's) are my favorite characters and DC has perpetually done them dirty, lots of editorial mistakes. The funny thing is that their stable, married relationship was one of the elements that made them favorites of mine. (DC did produce Archive Editions of these stories but have been very bad about reprinting or even recognizing major anniversaries for the characters.)
Kubert and Kirby, kings of the monsters at their respective publishing houses. I think Kirby had the edge in drawing monsters, but Kubert was pretty good at it too.
I thought that the character of Sif was quite strong really, at least she was a warrior. I think she's comparable to the Valkyries. I don't think the Fantastic Four would have been the same without Ben Grimm the Thing, and or that Reed Richard's had any stronger personality than Sue Storm, although the Inhuman Medusa was quite a strong character. The Wasp seemed to have a subservient role to Giant Man, although Jean Grey/Marvel Girl probably came close to matching her teammates. I like characterisation as much as good plots or ideas. Marvel had very good or excellent plots and ideas in the 1960s, but I don't think they would have been the same though without the incisive characterisation and dialogue. From what I read of Jack Kirby's "New Gods", it had strong plots and ideas, but his characterisation was weak. I'm not sure how much that effected the strength of his concepts. "Swamp Thing" is one of DC's best comic books, and the characterisation was excellent.
Does anyone remember the HAWKMAN AND THE ATOM comic from the late 1960s? The distribution of American comics was far from perfect in the UK at that time, so it could be pretty hit and miss as to what was available in the local shops. That being the case, and also the limited amount of money I had as a child, meant that I couldn't buy everything I wanted, but I do remember seeing the covers of this one, perhaps in the adverts they used to have inside the comics. I'm not sure if they acted as a team, or whether the comic was split into separate stories like Marvel did with Iron Man and Captain America. Two great heroes for the price of one though.
I love Hawkman too. But the SA version was a conceptual mess. A space cop wants to stay on primitive Earth to study our police methods (that aren’t as advanced as Thanagar’s), so he adopts the secret identity of…. seriously… a museum CURATOR. Yes, it was more important to get close to ancient melee weapons than any actual police force. Ugh. But if you can get past that, the early stories are pure Silver Age goodness.
Speaking of great DC artists, I just went crazy and bought a TON of Batman omnibuses by fan-favorite artists featuring:: Neal Adams, Norm Breyfogle, Jim Aparo, Kelley Jones, Greg Capullo, Alan Davis, Jose Luis Garcia Lopez, Marshall Rodgers - so many great artists. Batman is the best - the grimdark superhero! Who is your favorite Batman artist?
I liked how they were aliens from space, but I had a hard time with the cop angle... not with Green Lantern doing it better. Thanagar is just fun to say. Their helmets and wings were great. Rest of it could've been reworked IMO. So, when's that Adam Strange review coming? Jk. Happy reading.
Hello my friend. Hello. I had a question, has nothing to do with this video. I'm currently collecting Micheal moorcock paperbacks and I'm aware of the saw books but I've also seen Grafton books. I was just looking for more information on the Grafton books (publishing). Thank you. Your a gentleman and a scholar
I've read comics my whole life including reprints and graphic novels. Rarely if ever has the SA Hawk man been available for reading. They keep reprinting the same material over and over. Their back catalog is a sunk cost. Why they never take advantage of it is beyond me. If they think the stories are too simplistic, then market it towards kids.
