Amazing Heroes Issue # 8 Pg. 13

Amazing Heroes Issue # 8 Pg. 13

Periodical
Comics Strips

Page 13 of Amazing Heroes’ 8th issue showed off its Comics Report, the title of their brief page of comics-related news coverage. The top third of the page is occupied by an illustrated banner featuring a variety of comic characters from superhero books to newspapers, most of whom are engaging in friendly conversation. The front row of this menagerie includes Albert Alligator and Pogo Possum (from the newspaper strip Pogo), having a friendly chat with Mickey Mouse, while his own duck friend (very likely Donald Duck) is looking off to the right. Also in the front row is a surly Dick Tracy, mimicking his traditional pose with gun in hand, a ditzy woman with a large hairstyle and a surprised expression, and Hägar the Horrible, the cartoon Viking from his eponymous newspaper strip, staring happily at nothing in particular. In the row behind them, from right to left, are the head and creepily extended neck of a bespectacled hero, the grim visage and torso of Tor the savage, a distant Spider-Man with his web firing far above the page, a stoic and cheerful Superman, a distant flying hero enveloped in flames, and a very grumpy duo of Batman and the Hulk refusing to acknowledge the presence of a detailed, enormous, and hideous creature with a piggish face and an absurdly long snout resting his hands on their shoulders. Written on the left side is the caption, “Illustration by Gary Kwapisz,” and this group is huddled behind the large rectangle bearing the name, “Comics Report”.

Below this heading are three columns of text, but only two headlines. The first, “Tarzan and Magnus Artist Russ Manning Dead at 52,” describes the life of Russ Manning, born in 1929, exploring a 15-plus year career as an artist for Dell, and dead from cancer on December 1, 1981. His most well-remembered work is as the co-creator of Magnus, Robot Fighter along with editor Chase Craig, and as the artist for the Tarzan comics after 1965, replacing Jesse Marsh. Below these two columns of writing are two panels from Manning’s run of Tarzan, showing the lithe jungle dweller leaping in the first panel and running in the next, thinking to himself, “Too long have I adventured in strange lands! It is time I returned to the best land of all—home!...The Yeld! It never changes, no matter how long I have been away!” In the top left of the first panel is the credit “By Edgar Rice Burroughs,” and the bottom right of the second panel reads the barely legible, “Reg. U. S. Pat. Off. –All rights reserved ©1967 by United Feature Syndicate, Inc.”

The second article, written in the third and final column, is “Dr. Wertham Dead at 86,” a familiar name to veterans of the comics world. The article discusses his campaigning against the “often shockingly gruesome” comics of the era with his 1954 book Seduction of the Innocent, coupled with his stranger claims of homosexuality in Batman and comparison of Superman and Lee Harvey Oswald, which eventually led to the formation of the Comics Code Authority. Rather than demonizing him, though, the article ends with his statements rejecting the Comics Code and even the formation of viable relationships with members of the comics fandom.

Editor: Kim Thompson
Assistant Editor: J. Collier
Contributing Writers: Dwight R. Decker, Gail Freeman, Rich Morrissey, Gene Reed, David Singer
Consulting Editor: Dwight R. Decker
Art Director: Peppy White
Contributing Artists: Paul Abrams, Bill Anderson, Willie Blyberg, Rudi Franke, Dennis Fujitake, Mark Heike, Gary Kwapisz, Kurt Lichte, Kevin Nowlan, Mike O'Neal, Charles Treadwell

MSU Special Collection Comic Art, PN6725.A47

Redbeard, Inc.

1981-02

Colin Corcoran

Rights Restrictions Apply

8 3/8" x 10 7/8"

English

Periodical

1981-1992

Comic Book

8 3/8" x 10 7/8"