Re-animated Skeletons and an Evil Wizard: Tragg and the Sky Gods #8

cover art by Jesse Santos

Though Tragg and the Sky Gods #7 did indeed bring the main story arc to a satisfying close, there was still one more issue to go before the series wrapped up. (I'm not counting a long-delayed 9th issue that reprinted Tragg #1.)

Tragg #8 (February 1977) is a self-contained story. Still written by Donald Glut and drawn by Dan Spiegle, it serves a slightly different purpose. Donald Glut had also been writing two other books for Gold Key that featured heroic characters: Dagar the Invincible (a sword-and-sorcery title) and The Occult Files of Dr. Spektor (starring a modern-day magic-based protagonist). All three titles were cancelled about the same time--with all three having their first issues reprinted about five years later. So, before these protagonists disappeared, Glut took the opportunity to tie them all together into a single shared universe.

I should say, by the way, that I haven't read Dagar or Dr. Spektor, so it's possible the idea of them sharing the same universe (though separated in time) might have already been introduced.  But in Tragg #8, we also learn that the three characters are actually related. Both Dagar and Spektor are descendants of Tragg and Lorn.

And since Tragg's descendants will all follow his footsteps and enter the Hero Business, the mysterious Dark Gods (who worship evil) try to set things up by making sure they are never actually born. That requires killing Tragg before he has any kids. And THAT requires bringing a dead evil wizard to Earth and returning him to life, then having him work as their hit man. He's given the power to reanimate skeletons and make those skeletons invulnerability.

Fortunately for Tragg's future children, the arrival of the wizard Ostellon is seen by Keera. She overhears the Dark Gods giving Ostellon his assignment. Keera flies off to warn Tragg, but her jet pack runs out of fuel and she ends up unconscious on the floor of the jungle, about to be a snack for a deinonychus.

Tragg saves her. She warns Tragg about Ostellon. Tragg isn't that concerned about the wizard at first, but when three invulnerable skeletons nearly kill him, he realizes that the threat is real.

Keera, by the way, saves Tragg. Her ray gun had been smashed in her duel with Lorn two issues ago, but it has been established earlier that she had repaired it sufficiently to get one more blast out of it.

Tragg and Lorn track down Ostellon. The ensuing battle is, I think, one of the few minor missteps the series had. Though Tragg has to outsmart a dinosaur skeleton by luring it off a cliff, his personal fight with Ostellon is settled with one swing of his ax. I think the required page count of the book obligated Glut and Spiegle to end the fight a little too abruptly to make it really satisfying.

So the series ends with Keera, who is now without any advanced technology, joining Tragg's tribe--though she is still feared and shunned by everyone except Tragg. Her gradual character growth from an arrogant invader who was willing to kill into someone Tragg can actually trust is one of the highlights of the series and it hits all the proper emotional notes.

And that makes the series' end at this point all the more disappointing. We don't get to see any more of their adventures and we don't see the rest of Keera's journey has she adjusts to the life of a primitive and tries to earn the trust of the rest of the tribe. We don't get to see if alien reinforcements ever show up and whether the now-insane Zorek keeps his leadership position among the other surviving invaders. We don't get to see if Tragg can cement his alliance with the dino-riders and eventually make friends with the ape men. Glut has done a magnificent job of world-building and there were many, many stories in that world that will now never be told.

That's if for now. Next week, it's off to North Africa in 1942 to jump over sand dunes in a jeep as we ride with the Rat Patrol.