Selling a comic based on straight mythology is a tough go. Wonder Woman is an Amazon but the myths are all in the background. Same with Marvel’s Hercules and Thor. These are superhero comics first, myths second. The few comics to try doing mythological characters without modern influence are rare, such as Charlton’s Adventures of the Man-God Hercules, and none have lasted long. Sindbad, Beowulf, Aladdin, King Arthur, The Trojan War, they’ve all been done, but only for a short time.
And this strikes me as odd because I don’t like my mythology mixed in with capes and kryptonite. I love a good mythological comic. I like superheroes. I like them to be separate. The rest of the world seems to disagree with me. Stan Lee can explain away the glamor of the ancient myths by saying Thor is just a member of a superior race like Superman. The ancient tales become a form of Science Fiction instead of Fantasy.
I suppose it should be no surprise then that the comic book writers should blend mythological heroes with the Science Fiction of the post-apocalyptic kind. The first to make this decision to mediate the magic of the myths with science was Gold Key’s Mighty Samson. Now Samson is not a Greek god but a personality from The Bible. In that book he was a man of gigantic strength who fought the Philistines. He lost his powers when Delilah seduced him and cut his hair. Hollywood made a film of the story in 1949 starring Victor Mature and Hedy LaMarr. It should be noted that this wasn’t the first Samson comic either. Fox had a long-haired Nazi fighter in 1940-41 and Ajax-Farrell did three issues of a modern-day superman in 1955. But The Mighty Samson changes everything and has its hero born into his violent world of post-nuclear N’Yark, where men live like Neanderthals and fight weird new creatures.
The comic was created and written by Otto Binder, the Science Fiction veteran who had written such classics as “The Enslaved Brains” (Wonder Stories, July 1934) and “I, Robot” (Amazing Stories, January 1939), before turning to comics where he wrote for Captain Marvel, then Superman. Who better to create a muscular man of great strength? The first artist was Frank Thorne who would become famous ten years later drawing Marvel’s Red Sonja. The first twenty issues ran from July 1964-November 1969 with Jack Sparling taking over for Thorne with issue #8. The comic was revived in August 1972 to March 1976, reprinting for the issues up to #21 before creating new stories. These were written by Gerry Boudreau, Alan Moniz, Paul Newman, John Warner and Arnold Drake. Art was provided by Jose Delbo and Jack Abel.
Dark Horse did a 4 issue mini-series reviving the title in 2010-2011. Written by Jim Shooter, it was drawn largely by Raymond Swanland, who also did some great covers for the short run.
DC’s Hercules Unbound (October-November 1975-August-September 1977) was DC’s try at the mythological comics. Of the twelve issues the first six were written by Gerry Conway, and drawn by Jose Garcia-Lopez and inked by Wally Wood. The last six were written by David Michelinie and Cary Bates with by Walt Simonson and Bob Layton. Most of the storylines for the first half of the series involved Ares, God of War, launching giants and soldiers at Herc and his friends. Occasionally Conway would throw in a modern issue like Women’s Liberation or warmongering. There was an attempt to tie the comic to the more successful post-apocalypse of Jack Kirby’s Kamandi, with animal soldiers. The artwork for Issues 1-6 were consistent with Garcia being inked by Wood, giving the comic a cartoonier look than most superhero comics but one that worked with the subject matter.
The second half has plot after plot to take out Hercules’ friends so that his team that once included as many as seven allies, pared down to only Hercules, the dog, Basil and the love interest, Jennifer Monroe. Another guest appearance in the second part included the Atomic Knights of Strange Adventures. The storyline took a weird twist towards the end when the Anti-Gods were introduced (too late) and the series ended at #12 to no one’s chagrin. The artwork for the second half was disappointing with Bob Layton’s inking of Walt Simonson looking almost amateurish at time. Things improved when Walt inked his own work, looking like the later issues of The Mighty Thor that Simonson would do.
Had DC done a better job of post-apocalyptic Mythology? It’s a matter of taste, of course. The thing Hercules Unbound reminded me of most, was Marvel’s Skull the Slayer (First issue August 1975, so beating Herc by a couple of months.) Not as heavy on the moralizing as Skull, but formula-wise pretty close. Was Herc meant to be competition for James Scully? Perhaps, though I’ve always thought of it was one of the Sword & Sorcery competitors for Conan the Barbarian. These included Claw the Unconquered, Beowulf Dragonslayer, Wally Wood’s Stalker and Mike Grell’s The Warlord. I think this partly because of timing but also because of the way that Hercules looks like a version of Conan. Ultimately it doesn’t matter as Hercules would be adapted and altered to fit into other versions of the DC Universe.
