God Gambits and Man-Eating Plants (The Hutec Trilogy, Part 3)

Cover art by George Wilson

As Turok Son of Stone #86 (September 1973) begins, Hutec is still risking his life to preserve his scrolls.

Unlike the last issue, though, Turok and Andar are no longer annoyed by this. It's unclear whether they have really grasped the concept of a written language, but they now realize that the scrolls do somehow contain useful knowledge.

The previous issue ended with a landmark identified by the scroll having been moved out of position, so the scrolls can no longer lead them out of the valley. But they still contain the history of Hutec's people, so it's understandable that he wants to keep them safe. In fact, the morning after the above tussle with a carnosaur, he hides them in a small cave, where they will be safe until he returns for them.

This actually comes across as a little abrupt in terms of storytelling. The story in the previous issue was driven by the existence of the scrolls. And this issue starts with a fight to the death against dinosaurs to keep the scrolls safe. But it seems that the unknown writer had suddenly realized the scrolls served no immediate purpose to the ongoing plot and simply decided to get rid of them.

Hutec decides to go his own way. His logic is actually pretty sound. If the group splits up, they can cover twice as much ground in their search for a way out of the valley. They have a way of signalling each other and agree to rendezvous every couple of months.

But Turok and Andar run into trouble not long after Hutec leaves. They are captured by a tribe that is convinced they must know a way out of the valley to a paradise where there are no dinosaurs.

Turok vainly tries to explain that they don't know the way out, but the tribe assumes he's lying. Turok is tied up and tossed outside the stockade, left to be eaten by the first dinosaur that passes by unless Andar tells them about the secret exit from the valley.

There's a dinosaur mistake here. The artist is Angelo R. Todaro, with the great Alberto Giolitti doing the inks. I'm assuming that Todaro was a member of Giolitti's studio in Italy. So perhaps there was a miscommunication between the Gold Key staff in the States and the artist in Europe. The end result is that Turok is attacked by an ankylosaurus, which is a plant eater. But Andar identifies it as a flesh eater and the narration refers to it as a gorgosaurus (a relative of T-Rex). Somewhere along the way, somebody goofed. (George Wilson painted an ankylosaur on the cover. I'm assuming he did the covers after the story was produced, so he was passing on someone else's mistake.)

Moving on with the story: I have read discussions of Turok in which Andar is referred to as The Load--a character who exists to simply get into trouble and often seems a liability to the hero. And it is true that Turok is the mentor/father figure to Andar--older and wiser and ready to get Andar out of trouble when necessary. There's also a few stories in which Andar does act like an idiot.

But it's unfair to characterize Andar as The Load. I've reviewed a few stories in the past in which he has to step up to the plate and come up with clever plans on his own. He does this now, signaling Hutec and getting his bow and arrows back long enough to kill the ankylosaur/gorgosaur. 

When Hutec show up, he uses a blowgun dart  to paralyze one of the tribesmen. (The drugged darts were introduced two issues earlier, so this is a perfectly fair plot development.) Andar picks up on this immediately and plays the God Gambit, threatening to call on his god Hutec to turn them all into stone. This works--Turok and Andar are both set free.

Of course, Andar then promptly gets swallowed by a giant man-eating plant, necessitating his being rescued by Turok and Hutec. So he does have his "Load" moments.

The book ends with Hutec once again going off on his own. As far as I know, he would have one more appearance in Turok nine issues later, then go off on his own again. It's really too bad the Gold Key Turok book wasn't given a final resolution when it ended in 1982. It would have been nice to learn what happened to Hutec as well as Turok and Andar.

Next week, some second-tier villains get an upgrade and become a real threat to the Avengers.