Zomba Fights The Jungle

The force of farce that was Great Comics Publications had a real original in their other jungle character that ran in the first two issues of Choice Comics. Zomba: Jungle Fighter was your standard white man with a white savior complex who thinks that only a white man's perspective can bring order to the African grasslands. He's even called a "dynamic fearless white man" in the opening narration. The big dumb caucasian gets word from his partner Dr. Henderson that a feud between the Huda and Wazi tribes has been heating up, so he works out a treaty where he will teach the best warrior from each tribe the art of boxing to settle the fight in a match. A week later, Zomba is training Buono of the Huda who dies from a poisoned Wazi dart, leaving Zomba to take Buono's place in the match. The Wazi try every cheap trick in the book to rub out Zomba before the fight by siccing snakes on him, leaving a loose noose for him to walk into, and random arrow barrages, all of which fail. Zomba's fights his large WazI opponent who uses loaded boxing gloves and kicking to cheat, although our brave white boy ultimately defeats him. The Wazi chief gets fed up and jumps into the ring that Zomba tosses him out of. The Hudas praise Zomba as their champion while the Wazi are damming their shared river. Zomba and the Huda quickly talk the Wazi into peace, which makes you wonder why they didn't just do that to begin with instead of a senseless training montage. In his second adventure, Zomba has transitioned from local boxing coach to a full-time Tarzan wearing animal skins for clothing and swinging on vines. Zomba now has three monkeys helping him out as he stops a pair of French traitors who shoot down a British army plane in the middle of the jungle. The villains set loose their trained gorilla after Zomba, but he manages to punch him off a cliff as an attractive British agent arrests the traitors. Zomba went from being a visiting jungle fighter to resident jungle lord within the span of a single issue, as if there was some entire story arc that the reader was left out of. The racist concept of a white guy civilizing primitive Africans and then stepping in as their new messiah when he's not tracking down rogue Axis agents is just another attempt to make white people feel less guilty of their sketchy history.