Whatever Happened To Starhawk?

Back in the late 60's Marvel used Marvel Super-Heroes (formerly Fantasy Masterpieces) as a Showcase-style tryout book. New characters like Phantom Eagle and The Guardians of the Galaxy debuted in those pages, and others like Ka-Zar and Medusa were given solo stories to test the waters. But it all ended abruptly with a new Doc Doom story in issue twenty, but not before a tantalizing one-page ad heralding the coming of a new hero by the name of "Starhawk" appeared. 

This was a new sci-fi hero by Roy Thomas and Dan Adkins. The ad showed immense promise, but the Marvel Super-Heroes turned to reprints of The Avengers and The X-Men with the next issue, and Starhawk alas never appeared. (Let me add that my disappointment was somewhat moderated by the truly excellent stories in that MSH issue.)

It would be several years later when the cover art graced the issue #3 of Marvelmania Magazine. (See above.)

Later the pages already produced by Thomas and Adkins were published in Marvelmania Magazine #6 under an unrelated Neal Adams cover. The story is incomplete, literally a cliffhanger, but I for one was exceedingly happy after nearly forty years to at long last get a closer look at the hero who ignited my imagination so long before. Here are those pages.

Here is another Starhawk image from The Comic Buyer's Guide where some Adkins art was adapted.

  This is a fun image. 

The "Mandroid" name was dusted off and used again in an issue of Captain Marvel, ironically enough an issue written by Roy Thomas and inked by Dan Adkins over some Gil Kane and John Buscema pencil art.

 

And believe it or not, the "Mandroid" name gets used yet again by Roy in an issue of The Avengers during the famous Kree-Skrull War. This time the Mandroids are SHIELD agents in armor. I've lost track of such things, but it's possible these "Mandroids" are still extant in the Marvel Universe.

The name "Starhawk" of course was revived and given to a totally new character who hooked up with The Guardians of the Galaxy (who as noted debuted in Marvel Super-Heroes) and is still around as far as I know. So alas the original Starhawk is lost to ages, but some of us remember. 

NOTE: This is a Dojo Revised Classic Post. 

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Covering Starhawk!

Here is a charming imaginary cover someone developed for the failed project Starhawk. Starhawk was a sci-fi character advertised in Marvel Super-Heroes #20 for the next issue but never appeared when that title converted to all reprints. I took a closer look at the character in this updated post from a few years back.

What might've been! Sigh.

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Marvelmania Magazine!

Here to go along with the F.O.O.M. covers I posted yesterday are the Marvelmania Magazine covers. I have all of these save for the debut issues of both the regular run and the catalog. These aren't as lovely necessarily as the F.O.O.M. books, but they do offer up some real treats such as the Starhawk story in issue three. I posted about that here some time ago.


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Who Is... Starhawk?

Back in the 60's Marvel used Marvel Super-Heroes (formerly Fantasy Masterpieces) as a Showcase-style tryout book. New characters like Phantom Eagle and The Guardians of the Galaxy debuted in those pages, and others like Ka-Zar and Medusa were given solo stories to test the waters. But it all ended abruptly with a new Doc Doom story in issue #20, but not before a one page ad heralded the coming of a new hero by the name of "Starhawk". This was a new sci-fi hero by Roy Thomas and Dan Adkins. The ad showed promise but the title turned to reprints of The Avengers and The X-Men and Starhawk alas never appeared.


Until several years later when the cover art graced the issue #3 of Marvelmania Magazine.


Later the pages already produced by Thomas and Adkins were published in Marvelmania Magazine #6 under an unrelated Neal Adams cover.


The story is incomplete, literally a cliffhanger, but I for one was exceedingly happy after nearly forty years to at long last get a closer look at the hero who ignited my imagination so long before. Here are those pages.








Here are some other Starhawk images from The Comic Buyer's Guide where some Adkins art was adapted and a new image of Starhawk was produced by a fan artist named Bob Conway.



These are fun images.


The "Mandroid" name was dusted off and used again in an issue of Captain Marvel, ironically enough an issue written by Roy Thomas and inked by Dan Adkins.


And believe it or not, the "Mandroid" name gets used yet again by Roy in an issue of The Avengers during the famous Kree-Skrull War. This time the Mandroids are SHIELD agents in armor. I've lost track of such things, but it's possible these "Mandroids" are still extant in the Marvel Universe.


The name "Starhawk" of course was revived and given to a totally new character who hooked up with The Guardians of the Galaxy (who as noted debuted in Marvel Super-Heroes) and is still around as far as I know.

So alas the original Starhawk is lost to ages, but some remember.

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