Destroyer Duck Day!

Steve Gerber was born on tomorrow's date in 1947. Gerber made his fame with his creation of Howard the Duck in the pages of Man-Thing for Marvel. Howard was a sensation in the mid-70's, even putting forth a satirical run for President. (I prefer him to the mope currently malingering in the office.) Gerber famously sued Marvel for some financial considerations for Howard's success when the company attempted to get into the movies. This effort was supported by other professionals, lead among them Jack "King" Kirby who was having his own battles with the House of (Mostly His) Ideas. 

One of the grand comic books of the 80's was the totally in-your-face satire named Destroyer Duck. The comic started out as a method by which like-minded talents (Jack Kirby, Alfredo Alcala, Mark Evanier, Joe Staton, Sergio Aragones, among others) donated their time and talents to produce a story written by Steve Gerber who at that point in time was in a legal dispute with the Marvel machine over the ownership of Howard the Duck.

The debut story is about that struggle directly and hilariously as we meet Duke Duck, an ally of the "Little Guy", a small duck who gets sucked into a distant dimension where he is exploited and killed by Godcorp. Duke ends up going to this other world and kicks Godcorp butt. After this one-shot though it was deemed smart to do more Destroyer Duck stories and Gerber and Kirby and Alcala kicked out four more issues before seven issue series was taken over by Buzz Dixon and Gary Kato. Duke has showed up  a few times since, in the pages of Total Eclipse in the late 80's and the Image one-shot guest-starring with Savage Dragon in the late 90's. Surely there's an audience for these bizarre tales of the "Marauding Mallard of Vengeance".

But that's not all. 


Above is the envelope featuring the great artwork of Jack Kirby and Alfredo Alcala. This holds some dandy artwork. Here's a description from the website The Gerber Curse:

"In 1982, Dave and Deni Sim published a portfolio called "F.O.O.G.", which stood for "Friends Of Old Gerber," to help raise funds for Gerber's legal battle. The project, which was initiated without Gerber's knowledge (he says he hadn't even met Dave and Deni Sim), featured 10 black and white plates (11" x 14") by Bernie Wrightson, Mike Kaluta, Charles Vess, Wendi Pini, Jeff Jones, Barry Smith, Marshall Rogers, Frank Thorne, Gene Colan, and Dave Sim, which came in a Duke "Destroyer" Duck envelope illustrated by Kirby and Alcala."

Below are some scans of that artwork. I am lucky to have one of these portfolios. It's a real bit of comics history. Note that the scans are pretty much as is, and do not expand much when you click on them. Sorry about that.

Dave Sim
Barry Windsor-Smith
Mike Kaluta
Gene Colan
Berni Wrightson
Marshall Rogers
Jeff Jones
Wendy Pini
Charles Vess
Frank Thorne
Hubba Hubba!

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Groo The Wanderer!

(Groo can only dream of being Frazetta's Conan.)

And then there's Groo the Wanderer! He debuted in (of all places) Destroyer Duck #1, the original comic dedicated to raising funds for the legal case of one Steve Gerber as he battled Marvel for the rights to Howard the Duck. A few pages in the back and we had on our hands one of the most successful and durable comic book characters of all time.

Created by MAD man Sergio Aragones, the wildly talented humor artist, Groo tapped into the then-popular sword and sorcery lore which permeated comics like the seminal Conan the Barbarian among a multitude of others such as Warlord, Red Sonja, Arak, and many others would-be barbaric contenders.

(First Groo Story!)

Mark Evanier is the Groo-whisperer, a longtime writer for TV and comics who adds words to the stories that Aragones develops and draws. This team along with letterer Stan Sakai and colorist the late Tom Luth have been at the wanderings of the boobish Groo for a great many moons now. Generations have come and while Destroyer Duck and other shiny objects of the Indie wave have diminished into the West, still the moronic Groo abides. He was the "Dude" before the Dude. 

Before awarding Groo his own comic the mavens at Pacific Comics previewed him in Starslayer (another of those straight barbarian types). After getting his own title, Groo plugged along for a cool eight issues before Pacific fell victim to financial woes. Groo though, stronger than the company that nourished him found a momentary footing at Eclipse (where he'd debuted) before finding a rather permanent home at Epic Comics, the Indie brand of sorts for mighty Marvel. There Groo out-lasted nearly everyone and went to bounce around at Image and Dark Horse and all over even down into our modern day. 

I keep an eye out for Groo projects which pique my interest such as his team-ups with Conan the Barbarian and Tarzan of the Apes. Both projects brought in the talent of Tom Yeates to handle the illustration of Groo's partners. 

Here are the covers from Groo's very excellent original 1980's run from Pacific Comics. 

It seems there's no killing this doughty barbarian, as much as we might want that. He's the Energizer Bunny of comics, he just keeps running. I don't have many regrets when it comes to my comic book reading, but not including more Groo might be one of the few. Good stuff!

This post is dedicated to the late Tom Luth. 

This Post is a Revised Dojo Classic. 

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Destroyer Duck - Graphite Edition!

As it did with Captain Victory and Silver Star, Twomorrows Publishing has created a "Graphite Edition" of one of Jack Kirby's oddest 80's comics. In conjunction with Steve Gerber who first created Destroyer Duck, Kirby and Alfredo Alcala produced the pages in the original comic to help Gerber defray his legal expenses. 

He needed the money to continue his lawsuit against Marvel Comics for a piece of Howard the Duck. The lawsuit had been percolating for a time and Gerber was going to have to abandon it for lack of funds until some of his colleagues got together created a "Special Lawsuit Benefit Edition". 

And so, we get one of the grand comic books of the 80's, the totally in-your-face satire named Destroyer Duck. The comic started out as a method by which like-minded talents (Jack Kirby, Alfredo Alcala, Mark Evanier, Joe Staton, Sergio Aragones, among others) donated their time and talents to produce a comic with various features, but headed by Gerber's and Kirby's Destroyer Duck. Goo the Wanderer by Mark Evanier and Sergio Aragones debuted in this little Eclipse comic too.

The debut story is about that struggle directly and hilariously as we meet Duke Duck, an ally of the "Little Guy", a small duck who gets sucked into a distant dimension where he is exploited and killed by Godcorp Ltd., a soulless organization which lives up to its credo of "Grab it all! Own it all! Drain it all!" (Remind you of anyone we know?) Duke ends up going to this other world and kicks some Godcorp butt. 

(Kirby with Neal Adams embellishment.)

After this one-shot though it was deemed smart to do more Destroyer Duck stories and Gerber and Kirby and Alcala kicked out four more issues before seven issue series was taken over by Buzz Dixon and Gary Kato. Duke has showed up a few times since, in the pages of Total Eclipse in the late 80's and the Image one-shot guest-starring with Savage Dragon in the late 90's. Surely there's an audience for these bizarre tales of the "Marauding Mallard of Vengeance".

 (Frank Miller)

Destroyer Duck is far from prime Kirby comics, but even his worst have charm. Tomorrow, something different. 

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In The Year Of The King!

Anyone who has followed this blog for any length of time, knows my admiration for the "King of Comics", the late great Jack Kirby. (Only Charlton Comics rivals the King for posts dedicated to them.) His work at Timely, Marvel, DC, Mainline, and beyond have all been mentioned if not explored at some length here. But 2017 which marks a cool one hundred years since the birth of Jacob "Jack Kirby" Kurtzberg (who sadly passed away far too early in 1994) is an opportunity to give even more attention to arguably the most influential talent in American comics.

One thing which will be happening for certain is that the regular "Favorite Cover" feature will host only Kirby covers this entire year. I've been working to gather up some of Kirby's most exciting images (and there are hundreds to select from) into some thematic galleries which will grace the Dojo all through 2017. We start things off with a gathering of Kirby's Number One covers, of which he had many in a long career. There might be enough for two months worth.

My favorite work of the King's is his fantastic "Fourth World" material. I've looked at those magnificent DC magazines before here, but if all goes well I hope to do another reading and a review of the entire canon including the unofficial prequel (Marvel's Tales of Asgard) and often forgotten sequel of sorts (Pacific's Captain Victory and The Galactic Rangers).  And there's of course the third IDW Artist's Edition featuring the Forever People this time which is due later in the spring. This time out maybe I'll read the saga using those reproduced original pages, as close to the original intent as possible.

And I'd also love to be able finally at long last read all of Kirby's momentous and highly influential Fantastic Four run. These comics are simply stellar achievements of modern storytelling, at once personal and epic and worthy of a careful reading, one hundred and two (plus annuals) sumptuous issues. There's lots of Kirby though to choose from. I see a good reading of The Black Panther and Machine Man in the near future as well. I even have a special tentative plan for Captain America for the summer (if we all live that long God willing).

I'll start off this weekend with a good close look at Kirby's earliest Hulk stories recently reprinted in The Incredible Hulk - Man or Monster an Epic Collection. These are some truly weird tales, as Marvel cast about trying to find a direction for this most unusual character. Look for the first installment this weekend and more each weekend after that.  I've  been collecting up a bunch of these vintage color collections of Kirby's earliest Marvel work, look for it to show up here from time to time.

I'm sure I'll think of other things to do and I might change my mind about some of the above (no need to be too confidant about what the future will bring as this past year's election has surely proven to one and all) but I'm sure all of that and the other nonsense which fills up this internet attic will be worth at least a meager moment of your time. I hope as 2017 spreads before us that all of you will hang loose and hang around.

The King is dead. Long live the King!

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