All-Star Western #8

All-Star Western #8 (On Sale: August 5, 1971), has an Outlaw cover by Tony DeZuniga.

We begin with Outlaw: Billy the Kid in "The Scavenger" by John Albano and Tony DeZuniga. Billy the Kid gets arrested for gunning down two men and is locked up with a one-eyed scavenger who tries to take her boots. However, when the Sheriff gets mixed up, the one-eyed man stabs the Sheriff and takes his boots instead. Billy and the scavenger then decide to escape jail together.

However, when making their escape, they are stopped by robbers who want to know the location of where the scavenger hid their loot. When they find out that Billy is a girl, the scavenger talks them into drawing against her, Billy, with the scavenger's help, gets the draw on them and shoots them all dead. The scavenger then tells Billy to leave without him as he's going to occupy himself with the pickings of the dead, but in reality, the scavenger was only making an excuse to stay behind and hold the law that is after Billy occupied while she got away. Reprinted in Showcase Presents Jonah Hex Vol. 1 TPB (2006).

Next up is Buffalo Bill in "The Magic Thunderstick" by Dave Wood and Joe Kubert and reprinted from Frontier Fighters #3 (1956).

Our next reprint is Pow-Wow Smith in "The Sheriff's Birthday Party" by Gardner Fox and Carmine Infantino and reprinted from Western Comics #78 (1959). 

Next, we have "Timber Wolf" drawn by Gil Kane and Tony DeZuniga. Ben Armstrong is herding a steer and a cow to his ranch when a timber wolf starts hunting them.

We end this El Diablo-less issue with Davy Crockett in "The Renegade Fur-Traders" drawn by John Prentice and reprinted from Frontier Fighters #6 (1956).

Edited by Joe Orlando.

All-Star Western #7

All-Star Western #7 (On Sale: June 8, 1971), has a beautiful Outlaw, Billy the Kid, cover by Tony DeZuniga.

We begin with Outlaw, Billy the Kid, in "Bullet for a Gambler" by John Albano and Tony DeZuniga. After being saved twice by a man named Ace, from attacking Indians, Billy the Kid agrees to go with Ace to be safe from further attacks. Ace has a case of tuberculosis and is dead set on killing any Indian that happens on his path. However, the two are surrounded soon after Ace indiscriminately kills a hunting party.

However, the Indians let Billy go, as Billy tried to stop Ace from killing the Indian chief's son. Not wishing to be burned alive, Ace demands that Billy pay his debt, and reveals that he was the killer of Billy's father and that he knows that Billy is really a girl. Billy agrees to kill Ace in a draw only, and Ace tricks Billy into shooting him by not drawing when it's time to shoot. Reprinted in Jonah Hex and Other Western Tales #1 (1979) and Showcase Presents Jonah Hex Vol. 1 TPB (2006).

Next up is Davy Crockett in "The Challenge of Black Warrior" drawn by John Prentice and reprinted from Frontier Fighters #1 (1955).

That is followed by Buffalo Bill in "The Tenderfoot Caravan" by Dave Wood and Joe Kubert and reprinted from Frontier Fighters #1 (1955).

We end with El Diablo in "The Gypsy Curse" by Robert Kanigher, Alan Weiss, and Dick Giordano. Santano, a gypsy king, is convicted of crimes and sentenced to death by hanging. He issues a curse on those who persecuted him. 

Princess Nurka, Santano's daughter mourns the loss of her father and El Diablo tries to comfort her, but the other gypsies chase him away. Later Santano's curse unfolds, as the judge and sheriff are murdered. El Diablo is accused of the crime and thrown in jail. Nurka rescues him. That night Hutton, the man who hung Santano is killed. El Diablo catches the killer only to discover it is Nurka. She is arrested. As El Diablo rides out of town Nurka lays a curse on him, but El Diablo knows that he is already cursed.

Edited by Joe Orlando.

All-Star Western #6

All-Star Western #6 (On Sale: April 8, 1971), has a cover featuring the new Outlaw, Billy the Kid, by Tony DeZuniga. Editor Orlando decided to keep the Outlaw name on the covers but replaced the Rick Wilson storyline with one featuring Billy the Kid.

Our first story is Outlaw in "Billy the Kid... Killer" by John Albano and Tony DeZuniga. Billy the Kid's father has been murdered and Billy has been on the killer's trail. Tracking down a Mexican named Poncho, Billy believes him to be the killer, however, Poncho tells Billy that he saw the killers of Billy's father. Agreeing to be taken to the killer, Poncho takes Billy out into the desert.

After camping, the next day Billy wakes up to find that Poncho stole everything including Billy's pocket watch. Tracking Pancho to a house, Billy finds the woman has all his money in her possession but also learns that she is blind. Finally tracking down Poncho, Poncho tells Billy that the watch was stolen. Deciding that they need more money to buy new provisions, Billy takes up a job in a town to stop Blackie Kane, a gunfighter who has been terrorizing the town.

However before Billy can round up Blackie, Billy has to rush a boy to the town doctor when a horse spooked by Kane tramples the boy. While Billy is off saving the boy's life, learning of who caused the trouble, Poncho goes after Blackie on his own. Blackie tricks Poncho and shoots him with a gun hidden in his hat. Billy returns and finds Poncho near death, Poncho hands over Billy's pocket watch. After killing Blackie and after burying Poncho, Billy takes a look at the picture inside. The picture is of Billy and her father, and we learn that Billy is secretly a girl named Billy Jo. Reprinted in Jonah Hex and Other Western Tales #2 (1979) and Showcase Presents Jonah Hex Vol. 1 TPB (2006).

Next up is Wild Bill Hickock in "Town Tamer" written and drawn by Gil Kane. It is 1871 and Wild Bill leaves Abiline, Kansas late one night, having tamed the town and no longer needed there. While contemplating the fate of a wild man in a tamer and tamer world, Bill is attacked by a grizzly bear. Losing his gun, Hickock must kill the bear using only his knife and in doing so, reconnects to his true being. Once the bear is dead, Hickcock mounts his horse and rides off in search of the next town to tame. Reprinted in Jonah Hex and Other Western Tales #3 (1980).

We end with "The Night of the Snake" written by Denny O'Neil and Gil Kane, penciled by Gil Kane, and inked by Tony DeZuniga. Bick Lupson was a trouble-making cattle minder. One night while drinking on the job, Bick leaves his post to find some more fun and ends up finding a cabin owned by a native woman. 

The woman has a pet snake, a servant to the great spirit she worships. Bick promptly kills the snake and attempts to rape the woman. The woman's trapper husband comes home interrupting Bick but Bick shoots them both in cold blood. Before dying, the woman curses Bick with the curse of the snake. 

Haunted by the sound of rattlesnakes, Bick races back to the ranch where his employers tell him to get back to work. The increasingly frightened Bick is dogged by the sound of the rattlesnake until his horse, spooked badly enough, throws him off it and into a ravine. Bick soon finds himself confronted by a giant snake and the ghost of the woman who he killed welcoming him to Hell. Reprinted in Jonah Hex and Other Western Tales #3 (1980) and Showcase Presents Jonah Hex Vol. 1 TPB (2006).

Edited by Joe Orlando.

All-Star Western #5

All-Star Western #5 (On Sale: February 9, 1971), has a classic Outlaw cover by Neal Adams.

We begin with the final tale of Outlaw, "Hangman Never Loses" by Robert Kanigher and Jim Aparo. When Rick Wilson's father Samuel gets the drop on him and arrests him, Rick tries to get away when Samuel's deputy arrives with Stammerin' Sam, one of the Gunpowder Gang. However, the attempt does not work and the two are locked up in the same jail. This is during Founding Day celebrations, where a golden horseshoe is a prize for a shooting contest.

However, they are freed by Gunpowder and his minion Peg-Leg, escaping the law they hide out at Gunpowders hideout, an abandoned train station. When Gunpowder believes that Rick is going to try and take control of the gang, they have him tied up in a train with a bunch of TNT in hopes of using it as a diversion to steal the horseshoe.

Rick frees himself, thanks to his hawk, and stamps out the TNT when the train crashes, Rick and his father team up to stop the gang and kill them all. Samuel reveals Rick to be a Texas Ranger and that the two made up a story that Rick had gone outlaw so that he could infiltrate the gang. Afterward, Rick wins the shooting contest. Reprinted in Showcase Presents Jonah Hex Vol. 1 TPB (2006).

In "The Devil Rides for Vengeance" by Robert Kanigher, Alan Weiss, and Dick Giordano, El Diablo comes into a town where a massacre has happened. One man, Arnie Olsen, clings to life. Before dying, Arnie tells El Diablo that the Carpetbagger was responsible. The man was trying to force ranchers off their land. When they refused, he got impatient and killed them.

After Arnie dies El Diablo tracks down the killers. He kills the Carpetbagger's three henchmen, but he is wounded then by the boss. When El Diablo then attempts to help Olsen's family, the Carpetbagger returns with more hired killers. El Diablo beats them all before killing the Carpetbagger which ends the threat to the ranchers. 

Alan Weiss began his professional comics career at Warren Publishing by writing and drawing the story "Gunsmoke Charly!" in Creepy #35 (1970). The western artwork caught the eye of editor Dick Giordano and resulted in this, Alan's first work for the color comics. Alan would do one more El Diablo story, a few horror tales and some Marvel romance work and an inking assist on Neal Adams' pencils for the classic Avengers #96, before becoming the penciler for the Pellucidar strip in DC's Korak, Son of Tarzan and Weird Worlds.

For Marvel Alan would draw issues here and there of the Avengers, Captain America, Cat, Daredevil, Doctor Strange, Dracula, Inhumans, Iron Man, John Carter, King Kull, Sub-Mariner, Spider-Man, and X-Men, but he would only have one Marvel series: Steelgrip Starkey, of which he drew and/or wrote the first six issues. 

For Atlas, he did an issue of the Brute and for Archie, he did an issue of The Shield.  In the 1990s, for Defiant, he drew and or wrote the first six issues of War Dancer. I also recall seeing some sexual comics by Alan signed as "Vice" instead of Weiss.

At DC he did not only El Diablo and Pellucidar, but also issues of Super-Team Family (Supergirl and The Flash), Richard Dragon, Superman Family (Supergirl), Shazam!, Secret Origins, Captain Atom, and Batman. His most enduring DC title was Tom Strong, for which he did 13 issues.

Edited by Joe Orlando, taking over for the departing Dick Giordano.

All-Star Western #4

All-Star Western #4 (On Sale: December 15, 1970), has a nice Outlaw cover by Neal Adams. 

We begin with Outlaw in "No Coffin for a Killer" by Robert Kanigher and Gil Kane. When the Coffin King and his Coffin Gang capture Paolma, the Coffin King is captured. Set to hang, the Coffin King tells Samuel Wilson that if he hangs, so will Paloma, however Samuel will not shirk his duty as a lawman.

However, Rick has other ideas and rides in and rescues the Coffin King under the pretense that he wishes to join up with the Coffin Gang as they have the best hide out in the area and that he needs a place to lay low. However, when Rick is taken to their hide out, he soon drops his cover as a careless criminal when night falls and with the help of his hawk, Rick manages to rescue Paloma, and kills King Coffin in a one-on-one duel. Rick returns Paloma home, however when his father exits the house with a shotgun, Rick, still the Outlaw, leaves. Reprinted in Showcase Presents Jonah Hex Vol. 1 TPB (2006).

Next is "Jumpity!|" a one-page text story with an illustration by Sal Amendola.

We end with El Diablo in "Satan with Spurs" by Robert Kanigher and Gray Morrow. El Diablo stops a group of masked men who are harassing rancher Noah Johnson and his family. However, when El Diablo is distracted, the men abduct Noah's wife. Noah himself is too cowardly to fight despite El Diablo's encouragement. 

He rides to the ranch of Duke Dorrance, the man behind the attacks to plead for his wife. Dorrance laughs at him. Spurred on by El Diablo, Noah finally stands up for himself and fights back. El Diablo handles the gang while Noah and Duke fight with fists. In the end, Noah's wife is rescued, and Dorrance will no longer threaten Noah or his neighbors.

Edited by Dick Giordano.

All-Star Western #2

All-Star Western #2 (On Sale: August 13, 1970) has a wonderful cover by Neal Adams. Finally this month, something to crow about! I remember the day I bought this book and brought it home. That cover is just a classic: the foreshortened hands ready for action, the billowing shirt, that wonderful back-lighting. I was hooked before I opened the cover.

This is a month of change for DC and nowhere is it more evident than here. DC is back in the western business and this time (unlike with Bat Lash), they mean it.

We open with the new series Outlaw by Robert Kanigher and Tony DeZuniga. Though some may have missed Tony's American penciling debut in House of Mystery last month, it was hard to miss him here. Little did we know that very shortly we would be inundated with Filipino comic talent, that Tony was only the first of many to come.

In "Draw Death" when Rick Wilson was a young boy he wanted to be a Texas Ranger just like his father, Samuel Wilson. During their time together they rescued and took in a young Mexican girl named Paloma. As Rick grew older, he soon became resentful of his father who would deny his requests to join the Texas Rangers. He befriended an eagle, which he keep as a pet. 

Eventually Rick's resentment of being treated as a boy caused him to run away from his father. He started hanging out with shady characters, like the Fenton Gang. Rick agrees to help the Fentons rob a stagecoach with the understanding that nobody will be hurt. However the Fentons kill some of the coach riders and Rick is recognized. His father has no choice but to hunt down his son.

Sam finally catches up to Rick, but in a showdown Rick shoots his own father, wounding him and making his escape. Rick is conflicted and decides to bring in the Fentons. On the way back to their hideout Rick is confronted by a masked rider, El Diablo, who warns Rick that the Fentons intend to betray him.

Thanks to El Diablo's warning, Rick manages to get the drop on the Fenton Gang and in a massive shootout is the only one to come out alive. Still wanted for the stagecoach robbery Rick is forced to flee, determined to prove himself a man in his own way. The story ends with Sam Wilson putting up wanted poster for his own son, the Outlaw. 

For my money, the real prize in this book is the introduction of El Diablo. Some think of him as DC's answer to Zorro, but El Diablo is a much more layered character than Zorro, though I will admit that there are some striking similarities in the appearance of both characters.

Up till this point, Gray Morrow had been relegated to horror and romance stories at DC, so this was our first opportunity to see Gray strut his stuff in an action story, and "The Devil Has Two Faces!"  by Robert Kanigher and Gray Morrow has a lot of action. It begins in the middle of a stagecoach robbery (apparently Kanigher was very big on stagecoach robberies) and the appearance of "A satanic figure in black on a horse with eyes like blazing coals."

You have to check out Morrow's bandits in panel three, from front to back we have Dick Giordano, Angelo Torres and Al Williamson! Fun if you knew who these guy were.

El Diablo kills one of the men (looks like Al Williamson to me), and the others run off. El Diablo returns to the coach to find a beautiful woman (does Gray know of any other kind?), a woman about to give birth, and a reluctant doctor played by the dashing Gil Kane.

The woman and the doctor are traveling together, running from an unhappy past and looking for a new beginning. The doctor had lost his wife and child in childbirth due, he thinks, to his lack of skill. The woman is a prostitute, looking for a new beginning with a man she could care for, but fate has dealt her a different hand.

El Diablo extols the doctor to redeem himself, "Use those same hands to bring life into this world! You have sworn a sacred oath as a physician! You can do it." But while El Diablo checks on the pregnant woman, the doctor takes one of the bandits horses (most likely Al's) and rides off, unable to face his demons and his doubt.

El Diablo tells the prostitute that she must now step up and do the doctor's job, "Pride and prejudice have no place here! Two lives are at stake!" Hours later the cry of a baby fills the night.

El Diablo takes the reigns of the stagecoach and drives it into town, but on their way the rest of the bandits return for another shot at the stagecoach. El Diablo jumps on his horse and once again becomes a dealer of death.

Once the gang is killed they find the body of the doctor, who had apparently run right into the gang in his break from duty. "Poor Doc! Poor, lonely Doc. Now he won't have to run away."

Later in town the sheriff (played by Phil Seuling) asks the woman who the stranger was, that the mother might want to name her child after him.

"She's grateful, yes, but she wouldn't use his name--the name of El Diablo!"

Man, I was hooked. Really just stunning artwork with some amazingly moody coloring, some inside jokes int he form of character references, and a hint of something supernatural. The story ends with a promise that next issue, we will learn who, or what, this strange masked man really is.

What a great book. Two new series and two artists doing their first action work for DC. I was so waiting for the next issue, and disappointment was not an option.

Edited by the head bandito, Dick Giordano. 

All-Star Western #1

All-Star Western #1 (On Sale: June 16, 1970) has a Pow-Wow Smith cover by Carmine Infantino and Joe Giella.

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.