Countdown to Halloween 2016: ORIGINAL GHOST RIDER "Devil Deals in Death!"

Last week we brought you a "Tale of the Ghost Rider"...

...set in the same fictional universe.

This week, the title character himself takes the reins...

As in most cases, there's no actual supernatural element in the tale, just bad guys (and the Ghost Rider) using the technology of the time to simulate magical events!

This particular tale from Magazine Enterprises' Ghost Rider #12 (1953) is one of several to feature Satan/Devil/Lucifer impersonators, but the only one to feature a one-eyed Devil!

It's an extremely-impractical disguise for anyone to use, since the "eye" in the mask itself isn't useable to see out of, nor is it likely to look realistic enough to fool anyone!

Did artists Dick Ayers and Ernie Bache or the unknown writer just do it to make this impersonator visually-distinctive?

We'll never know...

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Countdown to Halloween 2016: GHOST RIDER "Tales of the Ghost Rider: Tortures of the Damned"

Welcome to our weekly contribution to Countdown to Halloween 2016...

...a never-reprinted tale from Magazine Enterprises' Ghost Rider #11 (1953)!

Penciled by Ghost Rider co-creator Dick Ayers and inked by his cousin, Ernie Bache, this story plays with the "is it only a dream?" trope to good effect.
Sadly, the writer is unknown...
Ironically, most of these "Tales of the Ghost Rider", relating non-Rider Western ghost stories, had actual supernatural elements, while only a few of the Ghost Rider stories did!
They tended to feature criminals pretending to be supernatural beings...just like the Ghost Rider himself!
Note: the first version of the Rider's origin had no mystical aspects as shown HERE.
But the revised version from the premiere issue of his own book did introduce supernatural elements as shown HERE!

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WESTERN TALES: DAVY CROCKETT "King Ram!"

Our final Davy Crockett story doesn't feature a "bad guy"...

...but there's still action aplenty and it even has a lesson at the end!

Would this make Davy Crockett one of the first enviromentalists?
This never-reprinted story from Harvey's Western Tales #32 (1955) was penciled and inked by Jack Kirby, a rarity since he usually didn't have time to ink his own work!
The writer is unknown, but could be either Kirby or partner Joe Simon.
We hope you've enjoyed our re-presentation of these long-unseen tales, and promise wel'' be back on a monthly (if not more frequent) schedule starting in September.

Happy Trails to you, until we meet again!

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WESTERN TALES: DAVY CROCKETT "Running Fight"

While comics have shown us numerous meetings of legendary characters...

...it's not often they show us a meeting of real-life legends...even if the enounter is entirely fictional!

Andrew Jackson and Davy Crockett did meet in real life, when then-Congressman Crockett helped foil an assassination plot against then-President Jackson!
You can read about it HERE!
This never-reprinted story from Harvey's Western Tales #32 (1955) was penciled and inked by Jack Kirby, a rarity since he usually didn't have time to ink his own work!

The writer is unknown, but could be either Kirby or partner Joe Simon.

Be here tomorrow for the final chapter of Simon & Kirby's version of "the West's Greatest Hero"!

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WESTERN TALES: DAVY CROCKETT "Missing Bullet Hole"

Many are the stories of the "Hero of the Wild Frontier"...

...but we bet you've never seen this one, unless you were alive in 1955!

This never-reprinted tall tale from Harvey's Western Tales #31 (1955) was penciled and inked by Jack Kirby, a rarity since he usually didn't have time to ink his own work!

The writer is unknown, but could be either Kirby or partner Joe Simon.

Here's a preview of what you'll see tomorrow...

Be here tomorrow for more action with "the West's Greatest Hero"!

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WESTERN TALES: DAVY CROCKETT "Devil Rapids"

Let's leap into the adventures of the "Hero of the Wild Frontier"...

...(note: not "King of the Wild Frontier"!
Disney had that trademarked!

The cover-featured story from Harvey Comics' Western Tales #31 (1955)...

...was penciled and inked by Jack Kirby, a rarity since he usually didn't have time to ink his own work!
The writer is unknown, but could be either Kirby or partner Joe Simon.
BTW, you may wonder why Harvey didn't just name a comic "Davy Crockett".
It's because Charlton Comics beat them to it, putting out a Davy Crockett #1 several months earlier!
Who says comics aren't educational?

Be here tomorrow for more action with "the West's Greatest Hero"!

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WESTERN TALES: DAVY CROCKETT Mini-Marathon!

In the mid-1950s, thanks to Walt Disney, Davy Crockett became a pop-culture phenomenon...

...and, because he was a folk hero in the public domain, almost everybody jumped on the Crockett bandwagon with their own version (as long as it didn't use any of the unique characters or story elements created for the Disney version)!

Harvey Comics turned over one of their Western titles to him, using the Simon & Kirby Studios to produce the stories!

If you're going to portray someone in larger-than-life style, you couldn't do better than Jack Kirby, eh?

Oddly, these two issues have never been reprinted, so we're going to present these tales, unseen for over 60 years, to an audience that probably didn't even know they existed!

(Splash page from Western Tales #31 penciled and inked by Jack Kirby)

You might ask, is Daniel, the kid sidekick, Daniel Boone?

We don't know if Joe Simon and/or Jack Kirby had that in mind.

But, in reality, Daniel Boone (1734-1820) was born well before Davy Crockett (1786-1836)!

Here's a taste of what you'll see the rest of the week...

(From Western Tales #31, penciled by Jack Kirby, writer and inker are unknown)

Be here tomorrow for more action with "the West's Greatest Hero"!

(Disney trademarked "King of the Wild Frontier"!)

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50 Years Ago: LOBO, the FIRST Black Character to Star in His Own Comic!

In 1966, the year the Black Panther debuted in Marvel's Fantastic Four...

...Dell Comics went them one better, introducing the first Black hero to get his own comic!

Other Black characters had their own series in anthology titles, but Lobo was the first to have his name AS the comic's title!Lobo combined a couple of popular plot concepts...
Man on the Run for a Crime He Did NOT Commit
Exemplified by then-hit tv series The Fugitive, Lobo was framed, but couldn't prove his innocence.
Lone Western Hero
A loner wandering the Old West, righting wrongs was an especially popular genre in tv Westerns.
Variations on the theme included gamblers (Maverick) and martial-arts experts (Kung Fu)
Note: the tv series Branded also combined both the Loner and Man Framed themes!
...as well as a new concept:
Prominent Black character
Black characters (except for sterotypes like Amos 'n Andy) were few and far between on tv until the mid-1960s, and even then only as supporting characters (usually servants).
1960s urban dramas like Naked City and East Side, West Side, which dealt with current social themes had Black guest stars including James Earl Jones and Diana Sands, but no Black regulars.
Star Trek (1966) had both a Black regular character (Lt. Nyota Uhura) and Black actors in prominent roles as scientists and high-placed officers (admirals, etc,).
But, at that point, there were no tv series with a Black lead or Black title character!
(Diahann Carroll's groundbreaking series Julia didn't debut until 1968, two years later!)
So, Lobo was, to say the least, a daring experiment, albeit one with as many popular themes as possible to maximize sales potential!
Dell writer/editor Don (DJ) Arneson and artist Tony Tallarico felt the time was right, and managed to convince their publisher to take a chance.
You can read Arneson's tale of Lobo's creation HERE.
Unfortunately, it didn't work.
Many vendors refused to put a comic with a Black hero on their racks, and the book had an almost 90% return rate.
Lobo the comic only ran two issues.
It's rumored that a script and unfinished art exist for a third issue, but that's never been confirmed.
You can read both issues of Lobo HERE and HERE.