After a nine year hiatus, All-Star Western returns. It is an inauspicious start, reprinted two Pow-Wow Smith reprints, but DC house ads were already showing the Neal Adams cover for the next issue and it looked all new, so, hey, I bought this issue. That, plus the book was edited by Dick Giordano and I loved his books. Over the next 11 issues (before a title change to Weird Western Tales) this title would introduce us to two of my favorite DC western heroes of all time: El Diablo and Jonah Hex. Laissez les bon temps rouler!
In his original appearances, Pow-Wow Smith's adventures took place in the present day of the 1940s and '50s and featured technology such as cars and telephones. Starting with Western Comics #44, his stories were retconned to be set in the old west after the Civil War.
Native American Ohiyesa Smith left his home of Red Deer Valley to learn more about the white man's world. His tracking and expert gun skills won him employment as a deputy sheriff, and eventually the job of sheriff of Elkhorn. Ohiyesa's deputy was Hank Brown. Once sheriff, Pow Wow spent most of his time in town of Elkhorn, only rarely returning to Red Deer Valley. He preferred to be addressed by his given name, Ohiyesa, but the white citizenry took to calling him "Pow Wow" so stubbornly that he eventually gave up and accepted the nickname among them.
Ohiyesa later married to his fellow Sioux tribemate Fleetfoot and his peace-keeping exploits earned him honorary U.S. citizenship. Despite his sterling record in law enforcement, Ohiyesa is still racially shunned by white society. Rather than react to this, Ohiyesa let his deeds speak for him.
We begin with "Gun-Duel at Copper Creek" by Gardner Fox and Carmine Infantino and reprinted from Western Comics #80. Elkhorn town orphan, Duane Jeffrey comes across Pow Wow Smith in a gunfight with two outlaws and by distracting the two for a moment assists Pow Wow in their capture. Duane decides that he wants to become a lawman like Pow Wow and is taken under the lawman's wings for training. One day, Duane disappears and word comes back to tow that he has taken the job of Sheriff in the town of Copper Creek and has been shot on his first day.
Pow Wow heads to Copper Creek and Duane retell show on his first day a man named Fuller pulled into town and complained of being held up by an outlaw, a man Fuller recognized as one of the men who hang out at the local saloon. Duane stood off against the gunman named Davis in the middle of town, but despite being a fast shot, Duane was hit and wounded.
Pow Wow lets the word get around town that he is after Davis and soon they meet in the streets for a shoot out. As Davis goes for his gun, Pow Wow notices that Davis is looking to the side, not at him, so he hits the dirt in a roll and come out shooting Davis, but continues to roll and shoots Davis's accomplice, Fuller, who was never actually held up, but rather was part of a plan to rid the town of its new sheriff. Convincing Duane that he needs to learn more before going out on his own, he returns to Elkhorn to become Pow Wow's deputy.
This was followed by a one-page text story by Gerry Conway, entitled "Dust Under the Whispering Sun..."
We then have our cover-story, "The Return of the Fadeaway Outlaw" also by Gardner Fox and Carmine Infantino and reprinted from Western Comics #73. When Pow Wow Smith once again captures Tony Morley, the Fadeaway Bandit, Morley boasts that he will escape prison and come back to redeem his reputation and tarnish Pow Wow's. Morley escapes prison after only three days and does head back to Elkhorn boasting that he will commit three crimes in three days and Pow Wow will not be able to stop him.
He first robs the assayer's office and manages to slip away using a hidden tunnel in a dry well. He next robs a bank and escapes using a hidden panel in a wall. When he robs the Marshall Mines, Pow Wow is able to trick him out of seclusion by hiding under a blanket covered in pitch and grass. When Pow Wow sends him back to prison, his hands are encased in heavy leather mittens so that he cannot try to escape again.
Before we get to the very end, I have to mention what a revelation Infantino's artwork was here. It is light and sketchy and dynamic and has a richness and a depth that is missing when another artist, like Anderson or Giella or Barry tries to smooth out the rough edges. Wonderful stull indeed.
We end with a full page ad for the next issue, introducing us to the new strips Outlaw and El Diablo and the first of a series of amazing western covers by Neal Adams.
Edited by Dick Giordano.
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