Ol' Groove's Request Line: Carson of Venus

Greetings, Groove-ophiles! It's time for another radical request from a far-out fan! This time around, Groove-ophile Mike Boley writes, "How about putting up some Carson of Venus? My friends say this was a back-up in a DC title in the 1970s. Love your site. Look at it every day." Well, Mighty Mike, to reward both your good taste and loyalty, Ol' Groove is gonna grant your request for some 1970s DC Carson Napier! Dig on this, baby! The first two chapters of Len Wein and Mike Kaluta's adaptation of ERB's Pirates of Venus!


Your friends were right-on about Carson appearing as a back-up in a 1970s DC title. In fact, Edgar Rice Burroughs' space-faring adventurer appeared as a back-up feature in DC's Korak, Son of Tarzan from issues 46-56 (March 1972-December 1973), Tarzan #230 (January 1974), and Tarzan Family (actually Korak under a new title) issues 60-65 (August 1975-July 1976), In Korak #s 46-51, writer Len Wein and artist Mike Kaluta adapted the very first novel, Pirates of Venus. Kaluta took over the writing of the series with Korak #52, finishing Pirates and then adapting Lost on Venus for the remainder of the Korak run, as well as in Tarzan #230. The stories in Tarzan Family were reprints from the Korak series.

Mining for Gold(en): "The Eternity Book"

When DC decided to bring Jack Kirby's Demon back in the pages of Detective Comics #482 (November 1979) the duties were handed over to writer Len Wein and artist Michael Golden. T'was a thing of beauty, Groove-ophiles. A true thing of beauty...


But alas, t'was Golden's only Demon story. Steve Ditko would complete the storyline...but that is a tale for another day.

Our Pal Sal: "And Six Shall Crush the Hulk!"

It's about time Ol' Groove's first fave Marvel artist, Our Pal Sal Buscema got his own semi-regular feature, don'tcha think? And what better way to kick it off than with this sci-fi romp from Incredible Hulk Annual #5 (1976)? Yeah, that's right, besides drawing the monthly adventures of the Hulk, the Defenders, Skull the Slayer, Marvel Team-Up, and Odin knows what else, Sal also found the time to pencil this 35 page spectacular plotted by Len Wein and dialogued by Chris Claremont. While Jack Abel wasn't my fave inker over Sal's pencils (he wasn't bad, and there were far, far worse), the sheer force and power of Sal's layouts come smashing through here. What really turns Ol' Groove on about Sal's work on "And Six Shall Crush the Hulk!" is how he manages to totally capture the look and feel of Kirby's Atlas-era monsters without ever ripping off the King's style. Sal "got" Kirby like few artists ever have--and here's 35 pages to prove it!


Speaking of Jack Kirby--dig that cover, baby!