The Great Disaster!

The Great Disaster is the rather stupendous Showcase volume from DC which attempts to gather together the sundry tales which relate the retro-continuity saga of how the Earth fell victim to a rather surprising atomic war in October of 1986 and how human society dealt with that.

The book is divided into discrete sections. The first titled "Pre-Disaster Warnings" contains stories from the back of Weird War Tales concerning the "Emperor of Weehauken" by Sheldon Mayer and Alfredo Alcala, a man who travels from the future to our present day, and a Superman yarn which lays out the potential future as hinted at in pages of Kamandi the Last Boy on Earth by Jack Kirby.

The next section called "The Day After Doomsday" offers up over a dozen tiny vignettes from the back pages of Weird War Tales, The Unexpected, and The House of Mystery which give glimpses of life after society has crumbled. There's a distinct Twilight Zone tone to these brief yarns by Len Wein, Steve Skeates and others. My favorite is a trilogy of stories about the last man and woman on Earth named "Adam and Gertrude", with delightful artwork by Jack Sparling.

The third section is titled "Tales of the Atomic Knights" and reaches back to the masterfully crafted vintage stories from Strange Adventures by John Broome and Murphy Anderson. To my knowledge, all the Atomic Knight stories are here and that alone is worth the price of admission to this book. You'll believe that a profoundly average man dressed in an atomically-altered Medieval suit of armor can ride a gigantic mutated Dalmation across a surprisingly benign atomic wasteland -- you really will.

The next section titled "The Gods Return" begins with Jack Kirby's Atlas one-shot for the debut of 1st Issue Special and then offers up all twelve issues of Hercules Unbound.  The first six issues by Gerry Conway, Jose Luis Garcia-Lopez and Wally Wood are lush and vibrant, then the series takes a turn as writer David Michelinie and later Cary Bates finish up the saga with artwork by Walt Simonson under sundry inkers, his own to great effect in the last two issue. It is with these stories that the Atomic Knights return to DC lore, though in ways very surprising.

The penultimate section is titled "More Tales of the Post-Apocalyptic World" and offers up a quartet of stories from the back pages of Kamandi the Last Boy on Earth written by Gerry Conway, Paul Levitz, and David Anthony Kraft with artwork by Pablo Marcos and Mike Nasser. These tales feature a young ape named Urgall who teams up with a scheming rat named Otis and comely ape wench called Myra. And that is followed by "The Day After Doomsday" by Robin Snyder and Vic Catan which shows some poor misguided humans with a wild plot to repopulate the Earth. 

The volume closes out with "Alternate Endings" offering a post-Crisis view of the Atomic Knights from the pages of DC Comics Presents when Superman uncovers the "real secret" of the Gardner Grayle. How this one fits into the overall storyline is anyone's guess these days, but it's a snazzy story on its own as written by Dan Mishkin and Gary Cohn and drawn by Alex Saviuk and Frank McLaughlin. 

All in all this is a utterly fabulous book,  a truly sprawling collection of disparate stories by some talented writers and artists from the Silver and Bronze Ages of DC. The story of "The Great Disaster" is not all here, there's more revealed in the pages of Kamandi and OMAC and elsewhere, but the thread is here for those who wish to find out more about one of DC's most clever conceits.

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The Last Boy On Earth - Part Four!

The thirty-first issue of Kamandi, The Last Boy on Earth picks up with the odyssey of Kamandi and Ben Boxer after their encounter with a U.F.O. The explosive discharge of the Alien resulted in Ben becoming a giant in his mutant metallic form. He appears to be overcome by the will of the Alien creature and wanders off leaving Kamandi and Professor Canus who are picked up by a belligerent Prince Tuftan aboard his ship.

Eventually Canus and Kamandi re-enter the U.F.O. and encounter the Alien in its pure energy form. While the Tigers battle the "Brobdingnagian" Boxer in a brutal sea battle Kamandi and Canus work to convince the Alien to change Ben back which eventually happens.

Kamandi and Prince Tuftan encounter Doctor Canus and the Alien which calls itself merely "Me", though when it divides its energy form it calls itself "Us". Their close encounter though is interrupted by attacking by a flotilla of attacking Apes and a battle between the Tigers and the Apes erupts.

The Ape leader named Ramjam successfully assaults the landing force of the Tigers while Kamandi and Canus take refuge once again in the U.F.O. The Alien becomes bonded with the sand itself to create a creature who can move against the Ape forces and pushes them back.

As a battle rages between the naval forces of the Tigers and the Apes with Ben Boxer's assistance, Doctor Canus and Kamandi stay aboard the U.F.O. and attempt to help the Alien to assume a form more useful on Earth. While Prince Tuftan and his forces prove to have some success and take Ramjam prisoner, Canus and Kamandi use the equipment aboard the spaceship to midwife a brand new form of life.

That form of life is called "Pyra" as the alien takes the form of a beautiful red-skinned fire-haired silver-suited woman. Pyra is still quite powerful as she reveals when she works with Kamandi and Canus to help stop an Ape secret military weapon, a deadly ship with remarkable ramming capabilities.

Meanwhile on the Tiger ship Boxer runs into some trouble with Tuftan when he releases the prisoner Ramjam because he could not see him tortured.  The story ends with Canus, Kamandi, and Pyra heading into space.

In orbit, Kamandi, Doctor Canus and Pyra encounter a Soyuz spaceship left over from the time before the Great Disaster.

Aboard this ship they find what appears to be a cosmonaut still alive in a lotus position. As they explore the ship, the Cosmonaut escapes his space suit and reveals he has transformed into a boneless mutant and attacks the trio who fend him off before realizing he is just trying to finish his last mission, but which will never be accomplished since the equipment is long destroyed. The trio re-board the U.F.O. and head back down to Earth.

In these issues we see the beginning of the end of the Kirby era on Kamandi. The adventures seem to veer off the exploration of the Earth of Kamandi and become intoxicated with the new character of Pyra. I don't know who dreamed up Pyra, Kirby no doubt, but she seems out of place in this adventure to me, part of some other kind of story. With the thirty-fourth issue Kirby steps down as editor on the series to be replaced by Gerry Conway, who himself had just migrated from Marvel. Soon Conway will take over the scripting chores on the book as well, but that's for next time. The use of the great Joe Kubert on covers for the series was a real blow to all Kirby fans. Kubert is great but his covers while dripping with drama lack the power of Kirby's mind-blowers at their best.

The wild inventiveness of the series seems to wane in these stories which drag on a bit despite what appears to be a quick pace. That illusion of drag is lack of focus on Kamandi and the shift over to the larger cast, I think. We are never given enough story on any one element, but the story itself does seem to be over quickly. I'm reminded of a soap opera or a daily comic strip. Also, the artwork is not nearly so amazing and full of wonder as it had been. The great Kirby two-page splashes seem to have gone away. Kirby himself appears to lose interest a bit in these final months at DC and his work is rather lackluster in many respects, likely because he's responding no longer to his own mandates but must meet the whims of others for the first time in several years.

I conclude my look at Jack Kirby's Kamandi, The Last Boy on Earth with this final set of five issues. Two issues previously Gerry Conway had been installed as the editor of the series and Joe Kubert had taken over the chores as cover artist, two clear signs that Jack Kirby's time at DC was quickly coming to an end.

In this thirty-fifth issue of the series we find Kamandi along with his pal Doctor Canus returning to Earth with Pyra aboard her spacecraft. They find themselves in Mexico at what was once a resort hotel in Acapulco. But quickly Kamandi finds that the rules are starkly different in this brave new world. The pool is lorded over by Crocodiles who view Kamandi as vermin clogging up the pool. They turn him over to a Jaguar and Kamandi learns that the Jaguars are in charge of the resort which follows the simple but brutal rules of "The customer is always right." and "Survival of the fittest." as different species battle it out for control of different floors of the resort. Kamandi has a disdain for Wolves and lays claim to the second floor they occupy and uses a noxious glue to drive them out and when they jump in the pool a brutal battle with the Crocs ensues. 

The next issue is the last written by Kirby and finds Kamandi leaving Canus and Pyra as he investigates a herd of humans who seem to be migrating to some unknown destination. They are being driven by music hidden in rocks (rock music...get it) and are compelled to to find its source.

Kamandi finds that vicious riders are actually rounding up these humans as they appear for reasons which are unknown. The Red Raiders turn out to be mutant humans, the result of genetic testing, who have a life span of only five years and are desperately searching for DNA which will reinvigorate them. Kamandi is introduced to a girl named Arna. Meanwhile Pyra and Canus are shot down.

Gerry Conway takes on the writing chores and Mike Royer returns to ink Kirby on what prove to be his last three issues of Kamandi. Kamandi is taken captive by the Crater People so that they may extract his DNA. Meanwhile Doctor Canus and Pyra pull themselves out of the wreckage of her spacecraft and Canus learns that Pyra is from a planet called Zirandius and her mission was to search the whole of space to find new energy sources for her people who had depleted theirs. She is attracted to the Earth by the Great Disaster explosion and has since been gathering up relics from the ruins of the planet. Kamandi discovers that the Crater People are an experiment to solve overpopulation by giving humans a tiny five-year lifespan and now Arna wants more from him. He escapes and Arna follows him knowing she will be killed if she is blamed for his loss. The Crater People go mad with rage and chase the pair out of their territory but the duo are attacked by a giant Lobster.

The Lobster takes Kamandi and Arna to a vast undersea "Airquarium" where the two are added to the ranks of many humans that the Lobster, a giant Snail, and a giant Clam operate as an experimental station. We get a glimpse of what has been happening with Tuftan and Ben Boxer when we see the great sea battle they waged against the Apes is won but Boxer is held captive by Tuftan for his treasonous act during the battle when he freed a prisoner.

Kamandi rejects being the subject of an experiment and organizes the humans to work together to break out of their undersea prison. A human named Smasher holds the Lobsters at bay while the humans and Kamandi and Arna escape. Sadly his sacrifice is not understood or appreciated by his fellow humans who wander off into the wildnerness.

In the final Kirby-drawn issue of Kamandi we find Kamandi and Arna assaulted by a giant Parrot in what was once Mexico. The fend it off but the scene shifts to Doctor Canus and Pyra who have been taken captive by Lizards.

They learn that the Lizards rely on heat to keep active and with the summer sun leaving they need the heat supplied by an unknown source on a distant mountaintop. The Lizards employ Donkeys as slaves which angers Pyra. Meanwhile Kamandi and Arna are tricked by Donkeys and captured and taken to the city of the Lizards. Kamandi is given the mission to go up the mountain and bring back the heat source. He does but discovers it is a nuclear reactor and when it is brought to the town it destabilizes and explodes. Kamandi, Arna, and Doctor Canus escape and wander into the wildnerness to their next adventure, the fate of Pyra is unknown.

And that's it. Kamandi will go on when Dick Ayers is brought aboard to do the pencil art chores. Kirby completes his obligations to DC and will make his return to Marvel.

Jack Kirby's run on Kamandi, The Last Boy on Earth was arguably his most financially successful during his third run at DC Comics, lasting over three times longer than nearly every one of his other efforts. The man who had helped create the Newsboy Legion, the Boy Commandos, and revamped Sandman and Manhunter with his partner Joe Simon was one of the talents who had made the company great in the war years. A decade later in the Cold War era he returned and gave birth to the Challengers of the Unknown. This third go at the company had begun with huge anticipation as the venerable company experienced its first really major shake up since the birth of the genre. Thanks to Kirby's work in tandem with Stan Lee,  DC lost its place as the leader in the field (though technically that would not happen in terms of sales until after Kirby was already at DC). The dramatic replacement of longtime writers and editors with a thrust toward using artists to fill the gaps and point the way forward was a departure and a gamble which looms large in retrospect and was seen as such at the time.

But it was over by the time the fortieth issue of Kamandi hit the stands in 1976 and with it both Kirby and Infantino, the man who brought him over would be gone from DC. Kirby would return to Marvel with great fanfare, though there too he would meet weirdly a great deal of disrespect. Ironically Infantino himself would venture over to Marvel where he worked on several series as an artist during the late Bronze Age. DC would look for new ways to sell comics, experimenting with Dollar Books and other formats. Kamndi would go on, but it was just one more book among many without the distinctive hand of the King of Comics to guide it.

No more to come. Unless you count The Great Disaster itself. See you tomorrow. 

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The Last Boy On Earth - Part Three!

With the twenty-first issue of Kamandi The Last Boy on Earth the series enters into its second half under the control of its creator Jack "King" Kirby. By the end of this second score of issues Kirby will be gone and before that his influence on the series will be diminished. But more on that as we progress.

The story picks up on the shores of what is called "Monster Lake" which had during the Great Disaster absorbed much of what was once Chicago and the lands around. Kamandi comes upon a battle between a creature called Ahab and a weird mob of soldiers apparently from the sea. Kamandi assists the lone warrior and discovers he is the trained guard human for an intelligent Dolphin named Inspector Zeel. He and Ahab are heading to a place called Seaway and Kamandi joins up with them. Along they way they battle a giant crab, encounter giant frogs fleeing ferocious packs of wild humans. The humans break the water-bearing container Zeel depended on and the trio press on but are on their last legs when they finally find Seaway.

Seaway is in fact a community of Dolphins who use humans as labor and press some into battle as squires. Kamandi is delighted to find Ben Boxer, Renzi, and Steve living and working in Seaway, the trio having been rescued by the Dolphins when the team was forced into the ocean off the shore of Florida.

Boxer informs Kamandi that the Dolphin society is under threat from their arch-foes the equally intelligent but more ferocious Killer Whales. The most deadly agent of the Whales is mysterious human named "Red Baron". As the story closes Kamandi joins Ben and the others as they rush out into the water to fend off the attack of the Red Baron.

The Red Baron is confronted and rebuffed but not defeated. Ben rescues Kamandi who had been struck by the Red Baron and then they lick their wounds.

Soon Boxer and his comrades decide they must use their mutant might to fend off the Red Baron's attacks and use their atomic powers to transform themselves into metal and rush to battle where a great explosion appears to end the fighting for all. Kamandi then encounters one of the Killer Whales and is attacked and left to drift in the great lake.

Coming ashore Kamandi is startled to find a massive mansion on a small island.

In that massive house he encounters a Monkey named Flim-Flam and three humans named Jukie, Lukie, and Dukie. It turns out the mansion in which they are all stranded is "haunted" and the power in the place takes possession of first one then another of the mute humans. Finally Kamandi is able to discover the secret of the power and determines it is not supernatural but the residue of long-ago experiments in mind control.

Kamandi and his new allies look for a way to leave their remote island but before they begin three metallic figures walk out of the sea.

Once again Kamandi is reunited with his friends Ben Boxer, Renzie, and Steve. The trio have had a hard go walking along the forests of the sea bottom after defeating the Red Baron. Now this new group of allies look for a way to get back to Seaway and find a hovercraft, but a deadly sea creature blocks their way. They get it operational only to find that after they start the come under attack by deadly flying Sharks. This forces them to enter the fog-enshrouded barrier to a new weird and deadly zone.

The Kamandi adventures have a slam-bang pacing which keeps the reader breathless. Kamandi himself jumps headlong into danger and uses his wits and sheer bravado often to survive. He is also blessed with a great deal of good luck. In this sequence he is reunited with the Ben Boxer team and already this feels more akin to destiny than mere good fortune. These characters find one another across the broad landscape of the ruined Earth and always greet each other with good cheer and comradeship. In fact it's evident that at this point Kamandi is finding as many friends as enemies in this apocalyptic world.

The artwork takes a hit sadly as D. Bruce Berry is simply not as adept at adding the drama to Kirby's pencils that Mike Royer had done. The closest analog to Berry that I can think of is Chic Stone who was a key Kirby inker at Marvel for a few years. Both Stone and Berry offer an open style, but Stone was able to give the work more energy than Berry accomplishes. Perhaps that is also reflective of how loose Kirby's pencils have become in the intervening decade.

In the twenty-fifth issue of Kamandi, The Last Boy on Earth Jack Kirby sends his blonde-haired hero on arguably his weirdest adventure yet. In the course of the preceding issues  Kamandi has bounded all across the North American continent and beyond but always in the upper reaches of that continent has been a territory mysteriously labeled "Dominion of the Devils". We met a "Devil" in some earlier stories, and it turned out to be an enormous grasshopper Kamandi bonded with.

Now in this story Kamandi and Ben Boxer prepare to leave Ben's comrades Renzi and Steve behind as well as the oddball cadre of Flim-Flam and his trained humans. The duo use a giant Eagle to fly over a great barrier into this unknown territory. The Eagle is injured and dies in the attempt but does get them into a new land filled with giant plants and giant insect life. Attributed to a Greenhouse Effect the land once known as Canada has become a wild jungle filled with teeming life of all kinds. Not least among these are the Leopards who work for Sackers Department Store. They are in this land to capture what they can and kill what they can't. Needless to say Kamandi and Boxer have other ideas.

Kamandi and Ben Boxer also find the offbeat Captain Pyper, a member of a European army of British Bulldogs who have affected the dress and style of the British Cavalry as seen in the classic poem "Charge of the Light Brigade" by Tennyson.

He and his capable ally an Aborigine which is in fact a giant mutated Ant, help Kamandi and Ben Boxer escape the rapacious Leopards working for Sackers and the two end up effectively conscripted into his foreign force, with Kamandi assuming a role akin to the famous Gunga Din.

Kamandi finds that three armies have used a land bridge to travel from what was once Europe into this area formerly known as Canada.

The three forces are part of the Nations of Atlantic Testament Orders (N.A.T.O.) and are comprised of the Bulldogs which affect a British feel, Wolves which speak French, and Apes which have a Prussian cast to their dress and style. They are battling the Leopards for control of the Dominion of the Devils, and the resources there. After a great battle among the forces both Kamandi and Ben move on.

Kamandi and Ben Boxer see a flying Ape. They then find the Tablet of Revelation which tells the story of "The Mighty One" who looks very familiar to regular DC readers. A cult of Apes worship this Mighty One and have devised tests which attempt to approximate the powers he was reputed to have in order to detect who might be a worthy to gain control of the mantle of "The Legend".

Ben and Kamandi get drawn into these tests competing with an Ape named Zuma. The tests are to be flung up, up and away into the air by catapult, lift a great stone dubbed "The Daily Planet", and survive a hail of gunfire by being faster than a speeding bullet. Kamandi finds a familiar red and blue suit and knowing who the owner was leaves it for his eventual return.

Finally begins one of the weirdest Kamandi adventures yet. Kamandi and Ben Boxer take refuge in what they believe to be a small bunker but which is in fact a legit U.F.O.They found by the Pilot who takes them in tow and they travel quickly and far.

When they escape the craft they find themselves a junk yard of time with artifacts from across the whole of human history sprawled in the sand. Apparently these things are being sent through a vast door in space. Boxer and Kamandi find themselves on an airplane of the dead headed into the maw of this door but the activation of a briefcase nuclear device causes the doorway to abruptly close stranding the Pilot wgi confronts Kamandi and Ben but loses cohesion since it is a creature of pure energy when his suits is torn apart. Kamandi recovers only to find that Ben has changed dramatically.

Clearly Kirby is redirecting the series now, having entered the Dominion of the Devils he has exhausted the parameters of his original map of the post-Great Disaster world and must reach beyond it for more. Cleaving off Kamandi and Ben Boxer is smart as it reduces the cast and makes the adventures quicken in pace and style. Now we have the two most interesting characters in the series entering some truly startling new landscapes. The inclusion directly Superman is in keeping with Kirby's work since coming to DC, but it does specifically link the world of Kamandi with the larger DCU. With the U.F.O. adventure Kirby seems to want to expand beyond the limits of the post-Apocalyptic setting and get into some other sci-fi tropes. I'm not sure how effective it is, but we'll discover more next time.

More to come.

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