Star Pirate In Space

Referred to as the Robin Hood of the Spaceways, Star Pirate was a regular in the pages of Fiction House's Planet Comics. First created by Al Gabriele, the unnamed space buccaneer did a minimal amount of actual pirating but went on to have big time artists like George Tsuka, Joe Kubert, and Maurice Whitman during his run which went on for several years. Len Dodson and Murphy Anderson collaborated on one of the hero's more mirthful adventures after he had teamed up with an actual space pirate serendipitously called Blackbeard who was a burly man that sometimes used an invisibility helmet. In Issue #37, Star and Blackie wander into an auction house selling a new crop of slaves. A slender robot interrupts to bid twice the amount of the entire lot for its owner. The loud droid pays for them with hard space cash and tells the auctioneer where to drop the merchandise off, after which it explodes to cover its tracks. Star Pirate and Blackbeard decide to find out who the mystery buyer is and blend into the group of people that were purchased, even though Star was wearing an outfit that made him look like a space cadet version of the Punisher. Star discovers the mastermind is the evil Dr. Cicor who took his human stock and transformed them into half-animal monsters like mermen, hawkmen, and lizard men to adapt to any environment and take over the universe. Despite having an army of robots at his beck and call, Cicor didn't plan on Star's special flying boots which allowed him to Mario Jump over the formidable forces and bonk the mad doctor out. This causes all the robots to shut down as they were programmed to operate only when their creator was conscious, which is idiotic if Cicor just wanted to take a nap he would be vulnerable. Star rescues Blackbeard and the other captives then blows up Cicor's base along with the entire planetoid which is just a waste of potential space real estate. Mr. Pirate was an everyday space hero that you could imagine rubbing elbows with Flash Gordon, even though his trials were downright idiosyncratic.

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