Jungle Lords and Armored Despots, Part 1

I wish the economics of modern comics still allowed for anthology books like Astonishing Tales. The first issue, cover-dated August 1970, featured two 10-page stories, each starring a very different character, with their individual stories told in a serial format. The book (along with Amazing Adventures, which premiered the same month) called back to the books of the 1960s that did the same thing.

At the time, comics were still priced low enough to be impulse buys and there was a good chance kids would buy one if at least one of the features captured their imagination. Besides, even when superhero comics once again became the dominant genre in comics, they still represented a lot of sub-genres--science fiction, fantasy, jungle adventures and so one were all mashed together. So I think you can argue that comic book fans have a wide range of interests in different genres. Maybe sometimes this is a little unconscious--we think "superheroes" and that's enough whether the story is set in an urban environment, a jungle or another planet. Heck, maybe a vibrant Comic Book Universe can build up our appreciation of different genres.

I think that Astonishing Tales and Amazing Adventures (which featured the Inhumans and the Black Widow) were the last gasps of the shared anthology book. But while they were around, they gave us some fun stories. Today, we'll take a look at the first three issues of Astonishing Tales, then next week we'll finish up this journey with the fourth and fifth issues.

Ka-Zar, the Lord of the Savage Land, headlines one of the features. The first two issues, written by Stan Lee (#1) & Roy Thomas (#2) and drawn by Jack Kirby, is a straight-forward tale. Kraven the Hunter decides that Zabu, the last sabertooth tiger in the world, would be a worthy prey. He travels to the Savage Land and manages to capture Zabu, escaping from Ka-Zar's wrath with the judicious use of knock-out gas. But Ka-Zar trails Kraven to New York City and another fight, this one in and outside a swank hotel, ensues. Kraven is injured and opts to run away.

The second issue ends with Ka-Zar confronted by a guy called (with good reason) the Petrified Man. In the third issue (with Gerry Conway now writing and Barry Smith providing some wonderful art), we discover that this guy was a sailor shipwrecked on the Savage Land who ended up drinking an elixar produced by a culture that worships a sun god. He became immortal, with his skin slowly turning to stone.


He warns Ka-Zar that the Sun People has gone on a rampage of destruction, fueled by religious fanaticism. Their queen, Zaladane, is leading an army riding pterodactyls and armed with weapons that are essentially tiny flamethrowers. Ka-Zar and his new ally return to the Savage Land to put a stop to this, but they appear to be too late.

So we have two issues that establish Ka-Zar's prime character traits (loyalty, responsibility to his homeland, kickbutt fighter) and give us several typically awesome Jack Kirby fight scenes. Then an issue that sets up the next story arc, but is expertly paced to still provide us with action and cool imagery.

But what is Dr. Doom doing all this time? Fighting off an attempted coup in Latvaria that involves robots, aliens and rayguns. Which I'm pretty sure is an average Tuesday for the good Doctor.

The first issue is written by Roy Thomas, with Larry Lieber taking over after that. Wally Wood draws all three issues (making Astonishing Tales extremely blessed in the quality of its art). The story is too convoluted to effectively summarize, so I'll be brief. Prince Rudolfo, the former ruler of Latvaria before Doom took over, is leading a rebellion. He plants a mole in Doom's castle--a lady who is the physical double of Doom's gypsy girlfriend from his youth. He also has an ally called the Faceless One, who turns out to be a small alien in a globe using a robot body.

Shenanigans ensue, in which Doom's latest creation--a robot with Doom's own brain patterns called the Doomsman--breaks loose. Alternately rampaging on its own or controlled again by Doom on brief occasions, he turns out to be a wild card that upsets everyone's plans. The Rudolfo leading the rebellion turns out to be a robot double which gets destroyed, the Faceless One is forced to fly off in a space ship and Doom destroys his own castle to also destroy the rebels.

It's a great story told very effectively over the course of the three issues, with the plot twists coming at a fast and furious pace. The one weak point is the Faceless One, whose exact identity and motivation are never explained. But he'll turn up again about three years later in an issue of Luke Cage and we'll eventually learn more about him.

So next week, we'll continue looking at the ongoing Ka-Zar story while also learning what Dr. Doom does when he decides to take a vacation.