Glow-In-The-Dark Gladiator

Dead center in the middle of Bat-Mania, Harvey Comics camps it up with this character that seems like it was intended to be the vehicle for an action figure. Aside from being designed by comics icon Jim Steranko, Harvey took a hint from Marvel by branding their new hero, The Glowing Gladiator. Harry Barker runs an independent treasure hunting service called Adventures Unlimited who is assigned by the mysterious client known as Destiny to find the Amulet of Hannibal. Tomb raiding comes easy to this freewheeling rich boy as he just happens to find the amulet immediately upon entering the ruins where Harry is visited by the spirit of the famous warrior. Hannibal gives Harry his shape-changing Sword of Achilles along with a headband, breastplate, and an armlong gauntlet to complete the ensemble, plus the Amulet itself so Harry could dial up Hannibal if he ever needed a pep talk. Destiny is in reality a supervillain with his own time machine that he uses to pluck people out of history to commit crimes including John Dillinger and the James Boys who rob a bank for him. Most conveniently, Harry happens to be nearby during this heist fully decked out in his new gear, labeling himself The Gladiator, and uses his magical weapons that give him enhanced strength to bash the outlaws. Seeing this from his headquarters, Destiny conjures up Rasputin to hypnotize Gladiator into locking himself in the bank vault. Glady uses his invulnerable sword to bust out just in time to stop Destiny's plan to use Atilla and his Hun army in raiding downtown. The magic sword also has the power to track down evil and allow its owner to fly to his true enemy as Gladiator goes up and away to Destiny's secret swinging bachelor pad. Destiny uses his TARDIS to escape capture but returns in the next issue to be split into good and evil halves of which his evil-self dies. Aside from the morphing sword that can change into any weapon, Gladiator also uses his amulet to turn invisible which makes it easy when he can't find a nearby phone booth to change clothes like Clark Kent. Nicknamed "The Glo-Glo Glad" by the square narrator, this He-Man prototype might have made for an interesting toy line, but the Silver Age just wasn't ready for the rampant consumerism of franchised products that 80's cartoons excelled at.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The Super-est American Hero

Image
When you need help defeating the Axis powers, you cut to the chase by building the Chronopticon to travel to the year 2350 and get a mutant super soldier. Lasting for only four issues of Fight Comics in 1941, Super-American was a fusion of Superman and Captain America. Allan Bruce is the world's first timelord and uses his new time machine to get help from Americans in the future where everyone has superpowers. They send back one of their unnamed citizens to assume the role of a stars and stripes sporting superhero. This reverse-Buck Rogers uses his powers of strength, speed, flight, and invulnerability to first take on some pesky fifth columnists assaulting Washington lead by the Nazi stooge Tyrannus. Their initial mission fails, so Tyrannus gets help from his commanding officer, the sneakily named Vultro, while Super-American flies all the way over to Europe to stop their plan to use brand new "air torpedoes" on the Allied Forces. Further installments show the original ...
Read more

Bingo The Racist Wonder Boy

Image
"Comics" McCormick could be viewed as being history's first fan fiction writer. Created by Ed Wheelan, the young boy named Comics is a member of the The Little Conquerors Social And Reading Club where they talk about comic book characters. Mr. McCormick would regularly have dreams where he had crossovers with the various fictional superheroes that run in the comics that "Comics" is a fan of. In Terrific Comics #5, "Comics" and his friends are fanboying about the latest character, Bingo, who was a parody of the original Captain Marvel(the Shazam one). In his own story, whenever Jerry Jones Jr. would say "Ka-bang", he changes into Bingo the Wonder Boy, which of course is a name out of a baker's dozen of young comic book characters with a similar moniker, including Batman's old chum. "Comics" tries out the magic word and summons up Yama Lama of Ka-Bang, a racist caricature of a Tibetan guru which here is a wish-granting genie. ...
Read more

The First Service Animal In Comics

Image
Rex is a common name for a dog, but Great Publication's Rex The Seeing-Eye Dog was a cut above the rest since he is also a service animal as well as a comic book canine companion. Starring only in Issues 2-3 of Choice Comics, Rex was drawn by Pagsilang "Rey" Isip who also provided art for Wings Bordon and Shangra, but the author is absent from getting any credit, possibly to remain anonymous, even though whoever it was clearly intended for the comic to draw attention to the visually impaired. Both stories ended with an epilogue urging readers to help anyone with a white stick by crossing the street or getting on a bus, a noble effort to establish in young minds. Our main human character is Dan Baxter, a veteran circus owner who is helped around by his seeing-eye dog Rex. His daughter Laura is a trapeze artist that keeps getting hit on by the aerialist Karl, of which Rex is usually there to scare off. Laura reads a letter from the circus' animal dealer Jeffries who wan...
Read more