Western Comics Spotlight: GUNHAWKS

 Troy D. Smith


For Marvel Comics' 80th anniversary, the company is doing special one-shots briefly resurrecting some of their lesser known titles from years past with an all-new story. I believe this is going to be a monthly feature, because last month was the 1970s war comic WAR IS HELL, and this month it is the 1970s western title GUNHAWKS. I have heard future months will feature some of their horror, sci fi, and romance titles from previous decades.

GUNHAWKS was a different sort of western which originally ran for only seven issues, in 1972-73. The full title was RENO JONES AND KID CASSIDY: GUNHAWKS. It was written by Gary Friedrich and drawn by Syd Shores. Warning- spoilers ahead for the 1970s series.

Cassidy was the son of a Georgia plantation owner, and Jones was a slave whose mother was the cook in the big house. The same age, they grew up together as friends -and when the Civil War started Reno was conflicted. Cassidy marched away with the Confederate Army, and many of the male slaves joined the Union Army. Reno felt loyalty to the Cassidy family because its patriarch had paid his slaves wages and allowed them to come and go at will. Unwilling to fight against either side, he stayed behind to help the old man look after the plantation.

When the Yankees came they killed all the men defending the plantation except for Reno, whom they left for dead. They abducted his girlfriend and fellow slave Rachel. Filled with a desire for vengeance, he joins the Confederate Army to kill Yankees.

(I could write a whole essay just about the historical problems with this story and its connection to the Lost Cause Ideology... and in the book I am currently writing about the history of race in comic books in the 1970s I do. For our purposes here, I am just laying out the plot.)

At the end of the war Kid Cassidy and Reno Jones are joyfully reunited when they both return to the ruined plantation. They decide to start a new life out West, and head to Kansas to become buffalo hunters. They are constantly confronted with difficulties due to prejudice against Reno. When they are attacked by rival buffalo hunters who want to steal their take and kill one, Reno finds Rachel's locket in the dead man's possession. They hunt down the others, and learn from them that they occasionally work for another transplanted Southerner, a former Confederate colonel who is still using black people as slave labor, abducting them and sometimes selling them. Rachel had been in his possession, but had been abducted in a recent Cheyenne raid on the farm. Reno organizes an uprising among the "slaves," who kill the colonel.

Soon the two heroes are caught in the middle between the Cheyennes and a Custer-like cavalry officer prone to large-scale slaughter of women and children. They are separated, with Cassidy taken captive by the Indians and Reno imprisoned by the army. Cassidy learns that Rachel is among the survivors of the village, but does not want Reno to know she is still alive because she has been taken as wife by the band's leader, Gray Fox, and does not want her beloved to ever learn of her shame. Reno eventually gains his own freedom and arrives at the Cheyenne village to rescue Cassidy, with the cavalry hot on his heels. The Indians retreat, and Reno sees Rachel among them. When he tries to go after her, Cassidy -having sworn to protect Rachel's secret -stops him. He refuses to give an explanation for doing so, and Reno angrily draws his pistol and threatens to kill him -just as the cavalry arrive.

Reno fires but deliberately misses. Simultaneously, however, Gray Fox -who had doubled back, still in possession of Rachel -takes aim at the hated cavalry colonel and fires. Fearing he may accidentally hit Reno, Rachel tries to knock aside his rifle -and he accidentally shoots and kills Kid Cassidy instead. The colonel demands Reno be arrested for murder, even though one of his men had seen the puff of smoke from Gray Fox's rifle in the trees. Reno manages to escape, stricken with grief. Gray Fox finds him and attempts to kill him so as to no longer have a rival for Rachel's affection. During the fight, in which Reno kills the Cheyenne leader, Rachel runs away yet again.

The death of Kid Cassidy and the subsequent events I described take place in issue #6. With issue #7 the series is renamed RENO JONES, GUNHAWK. Reno had really been the primary protagonist anyhow, with Cassidy playing a supporting role, which is not what one might have expected in a 1972 comic. Issue #7 finds Reno trying to track down his beloved, but now a fugitive with bounty hunters tracking him. That issue ends with him captured and in jail awaiting hanging. There was no notification of the book's cancellation, just a message at the end that Reno's fate would soon be revealed in a team-up with the Rawhide Kid.

And it was... it just took a quarter of a century.

Reno Jones played a central role in the 1999 miniseries (collected as a graphic novel) BLAZE OF GLORY by John Ostrander and Leonardo Manco. This book was mentioned in my 2013 interview with John Ostrander at this very blog, You can read that interview HERE.

It seems that Reno had escaped execution and roamed the West looking for Rachel, befriending along the way other western heroes such as the Rawhide Kid and the Two-Gun Kid. Many years later, having abandoned his quest for a woman who did not want him, he has married someone else and started a family and is living in the Exoduster town of Wonderment, Montana (with his wife Mary and a son he named Cassidy). A local land baron wants the African American community gone, and hires a group of hooded racist enforcers called the Nightriders to slaughter the town. Reno sends word to his friends for help, and all the major Marvel western heroes show up for a dramatic stand against the Nightriders (with several of the heroes perishing in the process).

In an unexpected twist, the leader of the Nightriders is none other than Kid Cassidy. He had survived the gunshot which he believed came from his disloyal best friend, and as a result was consumed with hatred for not just Reno but black people in general. This time Reno kills him for real.

All right, that catches you up on the legacy of the Gunhawks. There will be no spoilers for the new one, just a description and set-up. You can buy the new one at amazon and other sites, but be forewarned that a single issue of a comic book is now four bucks.

The new iteration has nothing in common with the original except for the genre and the title. It is an all-new story with new characters. It is drawn by Luca Pizzari and written by David and Maria Lapham, who are best known for their classic gritty crime series STRAY BULLETS.

The new "Gunhawk" is Dean Donnelly, recently married sheriff of Clearwater, Arizona in 1914. The town did not know his secret, though- that before coming there to be sheriff he had been a ruthless mercenary in the employ of Mexican usurper Victoriano Huerta against Pancho Villa and other rebels. This single-issue comic is the story of how his past catches up to him.

The book also includes a brief editorial about the important place the western genre has held in the history of Marvel Comics, and how it has been making a comeback in comics the past few years. If you're like me, you are always happy to see a new western from any comics publisher.

Western Comics Focus: Two-Gun Kid

Troy D. Smith

I've always loved superhero comics, and I've always loved western comics. So it should come as no surprise that one of my favorites has always been the Two-Gun Kid, who has a boot firmly planted in each camp.

The Two-Gun Kid debuted at Marvel Comics in 1948. He was Marvel's second continuing western character- the first had been the Masked Raider way back in 1939's Marvel Comics #1 -and the first to have his own ongoing title, which lasted until 1977.

There were two different versions of the Kid. The original, which ran from 1948 to 1962, was a blond cowboy named Clay Harder. Harder was in many ways a generic sort of figure, a wandering gunslinger who righted wrongs- he carried two guns, one of which had belonged to his father and the other to the outlaw who had murdered him.

In 1962, however, in Two-Gun Kid #60, the character was completely rebooted (into the hero Marvel fans are familiar with.) In this new version by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby, Clay Harder (Two-Gun Kid) was a character who appeared in dime novels, and inspired young Matt Hawk to take on the guise in "real life." He wears the same all-black outfit, with two distinctive additions: an orange-and-black-spotted vest, and a mask. (He also, like Clay Harder, rides a horse named Cyclone.) Hawk is a young lawyer from Boston, who -after his arrival in the West -is trained by a famous gunfighter, Ben Dancer. This version of the Kid is similar to the superheroes that Lee and Kirby were then creating: a masked man with a secret identity, using his alter ego to go after the villains who escaped justice in the courtroom where he works by day, with a regular supporting cast (all this making him different from the Lone Ranger, whose "alter ego" John Reid is believed dead by the world, and more like Zorro.)

The Two-Gun Kid was a staple of Marvel's western line in the 1960s and 70s, along with the Rawhide Kid, Kid Colt, the Outlaw Kid (a lot of kids, there), and the Ghost Rider / Night Rider / Phantom Rider, all of whom he interacted with regularly.

In the late 1970s he was one of the western heroes who teamed up with the time-traveling Avengers, striking up a close friendship with Hawkeye (see our interview with writer Steve Englehart)... but unlike the other western heroes, the Two-Gun Kid joins the Avengers when they return to the 20th century, where he becomes a man out of time. After a few adventures with the superhero group, he returns to his own time (taking a cashe of modern weapons with him, as revealed in the miniseries Sunset Riders -in which it is revealed he married after his return, but his wife died in childbirth.)

He later shows up in the great miniseries Blaze of Glory (see our interview with John Ostrander)... he has dyed his hair blond and now goes by the name Clay Harder, having abandoned his mask and working exclusively as a lawyer. However, he joins his old partner the Rawhide Kid (along with a slew of other Marvel western heroes) for one last grand adventure.

Sometime later, Matt Hawk is plucked from the timestream and returned to the modern world, where he becomes a frequent ally of She-Hulk (for those unfamiliar with the character, Jennifer Walters/She-Hulk received a blood transfusion after an accident... from her cousin Bruce Banner, the Incredible Hulk. Superhero-ness ensues, as the young lawyer gains the power to transform into a green Amazonian powerhouse, while retaining her normal intelligence and her law practice.) The Two-Gun Kid -who has traded Cyclone in for a flying motorcycle donated by his pal Hawkeye -at first serves as a private detective for She-Hulk's law firm, and later becomes an independent bounty hunter. Thanks to the time travel angle, then, the character occasionally pops up in stories set in the modern-day Marvel universe as well as flash-back stories set in the Old West.

One of my favorite such stories involved that other masked lawyer, Daredevil, who alter ego attorney Matt Murdock was attempting to solve an old case from the 1870s that had been begun by Matt Hawk.

In 1996 I had a chance to meet Stan Lee, and had him autograph my copy of Two-Gun Kid #60, the first appearance of the Matt Hawk version of Two-Gun Kid. The book triggered a nostalgic response -"I remember when Jack drew this very picture on the cover! I haven't seen one of these in ages!" A few weeks later I interviewed Lee over the telephone (for this article), and after introducing myself said "You probably don't remember me, but-" "Of course I remember you," he said. "You're Two-Gun! How's it goin', Two-Gun?"

Needless to say, that particular autographed item is one of my most treasured possessions.

Western Comics Focus: Timothy Truman

This month we turn our spotlight on writer/artist Timothy Truman, whose name has popped up more than once on this blog the last few months (he has worked often with Joe R. Lansdale and John Ostrander, both of whom we have also recently interviewed.)

Truman burst onto the comics scene in the early 1980s, when he and Ostrander co-created GRIMJACK for First Comics -a very influential title, which ushered in the "grim and gritty" movement that would dominate comics for the next decade. He has since worked on various comics, from TARZAN and CONAN to STAR WARS, as well as revamping the DC superhero Hawkman in HAWKWORLD. He has also created artwork for album covers and posters, doing several pieces for the Grateful Dead.

He has also been prolific in creating western and western-related comics, approaching the genre from several different angles. With Lansdale he produced several Jonah Hex "weird western" miniseries in the '90s, as well as a Lone Ranger miniseries. With Ostrander he created THE KENTS, a long miniseries following the western adventures of Superman/Clark Kent's adopted father's ancestors.

His 1985 series SCOUT was a dystopian, futuristic sci fi comic whose hero was an Apache. His two-part graphic novel about Revolutionary Era renegade Simon Girty won much critical acclaim; he also did a graphic novel adaptation of Allen Eckert's outdoor play TECUMSEH!

More recently, with his son Benjamin Truman, he has introduced HAWKEN- an aging Wild West hired killer who is haunted by the ghosts of everyone he has killed. Literally.

Timothy Truman has agreed to answer some questions for us today.

1. Simon Girty: Renegade was a very powerful work, and an unusual subject choice. What can you tell us about it, and why you chose Girty?

 

TIMOTHY TRUMAN: Growing up in West Virginia, along the Kanawha River and Ohio River country, Simon Girty was a historical figure that we used to read about in our state history classes. he was always described as a deplorable traitor, cutthroat, and lawless renegade. However, in the 1990's I started reading a lot of historical fiction and happened upon a book called the Frontiersman by the late, great Allan W. Eckert. Girty figures into the story as a secondary characater-- a friend of the great Ohio Valley scout, Simon Kenton. Allan's painted Girty as far more sympathetic and likeable person than the version of him I'd grown up hearing about. I became fascinated with Girty and decided to research his story. The more research I did, the more I saw how unfairly he'd been treated by American history. So I became determined to tell a more truthful history about the man. As a result of the work I did, many other people began reexamining his reputation and his place in history.  His relatives in Canada and the U.S.A. even made me an honorary "cousin." So I'm very proud of the Wilderness graphic novels, to say the least. 

2. How did you come to adapt the outdoor play Tecumseh! as a graphic novel?

 

TT: Through the relationship that I established with Allan W. Eckert, mainly. I got to know Allan through my Wilderness work. He was very kind in suggesting some reference materials I might want to check out. We became friends. Allan was the writer of the Tecumseh! outdoor drama in Chilicothe, Ohio. Anyway, we thought that doing a graphic story adaptation would be a really cool thing to do. The promoters of the play were all for it. We made a deal with Cat Yronwode and Dean Mullaney at Eclipse Comics, and the graphic novel happened. As a result of the graphic novel and the research on frontier and Eastern American attire that I had to do for it, I was asked to redesign a lot of the costuming for the drama a few years after the graphic novel was published.  All in all it was a really rewarding experience. I just wish I could go back and redraw all that stuff! I'm such a better artist these days! My style has changed a lot.

3. Native American Indians figure prominently in your work, as do frontiers -even in some of your science fiction. Do you have a particular attraction to those themes, or did it just work out that way?

 

TT: I'd always been interested in Native American history and culture, even as a kid. I suppose it sprang out of stories I'd heard growing up about my great grandmother, Belle Truman, who was a Cherokee full blood who was raised in Kentucky. I've since learned that the stories were true. Anyway, the older I got, the more interested I became in Native culture, especially the Southwestern and Ohio Valley people.

4. You've been credited with helping launch the "grim and gritty" trend in comics in the early 80s. Why do you think so many other writers and artists followed your lead in this regard?

TT: I think it was a genre whose time had come. Remember that I was there in the beginning of the 1980's "independent" comics scene. The Indy movement was itself largely inspired by the '60's Underground and '70's-'80's European comics movements-- a fact that is unfortunately overlooked in most histories and documentaries about American comics. When we started doing creator owned stories and characters with the independent publishers, we gravitated towards creating material that was akin to the stuff people were doing in "respectable"  mediums such as novels and film. Still, for the material to be successful, it had to retain the action and more colorful, fantastical elements of comics, at least early-on. So it was a marriage of mediums, of sorts. Guys like me who enjoyed action films, science fiction and the like in the films and fiction we liked started doing our "movies on paper".  We proved it was possible and viable to own or co-own our own characters and get a fair share of royalties for the books and any merchandising or film that resulted from them. A few years later other folks got interested and started doing the same thing. Major publishers like DC and Marvel had to start offering creators better contracts. And "mainstream" folks like Frank Miller and the Image guys started jumping ship and getting better deals for the work they were doing.  

5. Your series Scout blended westerns with post-apocalyptic sci fi, and Hawken and Jonah Hex blended western with horror. Why do you think the western genre can be stretched into such diverse shapes, and yet still feel "western"?

TT: It's a question of environment and atmosphere,  I guess. Westerns speak to all of us. It involves certain character types and arch-types that are exciting to explore, whether you're a creator or a reader. There's an old adage that westerns are the American mythology, and I think that's true to a great extent. Myths are a reflection of history and culture. Westerns tell us a lot about America and Americans and are fertile ground for seeding stories of all types. In many ways, just giving a story a Western flavor or ambiance does about a quarter of the work for a writer or artist. It kind of "places" what it is you want to do. Of course, the most interesting stories take the tropes and expectations of the Western genre and play with them-- turn them on their heads, open them up, re-examine them. So mixing Westerns with other genres is probably an offshoot of that impulse. That was certainly the case with Scout, Hex and Hawken. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't. I and the people I've worked with have been pretty lucky in that regard, I suppose.

6. We've recently interviewed John Ostrander and Joe R. Lansdale, both of whom you have worked closely with. Can you tell us about your professional relationships with them?

TT: They are like brothers to me. We're very, very close. John, Joe and my son Ben are my writers of choice if I'm not going to write a story myself. We operate on the same wavelength in many reagrds, yet we're also very different from each other. We each can bring new colors to the final mix. As far as John and Joe go, they're both very different from each other. We get into these gabfest story conferences to figure things out. Ideas fly like mad-- hot and heavy. Then we do our work and bring our differences into play. Since there's a lot of mutual admiration and respect there, we each trust what the other is going to do. The funniest thing about working with Joe and John is the fact that I handle their stories quite differently. For one thing, John and I work "Marvel" method-- plot first, then art, then John scripts what I've drawn. We've tried it a few times full script, but have found that the so-called Marvel method is the way we work best. It makes for a better mix. With Joe and me, it's the opposite. Full script all the way-- mainly because that's the way that Joe insists on working. Also, Joe is a really wild writer. Given the material I've done over the years, you might be surprised to know that I'm a tad more mild-mannered in the kinds of material I like and the types of things I like to portray. So I usually end up turning things down a notch for Joe, just to stay comfortable with my own sensibilities. With John, it's the opposite: John is more mild-mannered than me. So as a result I find myself turning up the wildness and violence factor about 20% in the stories we do. As far as Ben goes, we're pretty much on the same wavelength. The only difference is that I prefer to do characters who have some sort of nobility or redemptive qualities about them-- damaged angels, if you will. So we've learned to meet in the middle in that regard.  

7. Of all the western characters you've worked with, have you had a favorite?

TT: Kit Hawken, without a doubt. So far he's my favorite character I've ever drawn. He's the only character whom I've drawn six entire issues of and still wanted to go on and do more, more, more. I've loved them all, but Hawken is the best, and I'd love to continue his adventures someday. There's so much more to tell! Ben and I are putting together a new Scout project though, Scout: Marauder, and it seems like it will have just as much energy to it.

If you could choose one fictional or historical character you haven't done that you'd like to do, who would it be?

TT: Fictional? Hard to say. I'd really like to do a real crime drama one of these days-- some sort of hard-boiled thing. It might be via prose: A few years back I started writing a detective novel set in West Virginia in the 1920's-- constructing my own genre of "Appalachian Noir", as I call it...  and I'd like to get back to that. But it would be great to draw some crime stuff, too. I got a big taste of it when I was drawing plates for the box set by late Irish guitarist Rory Gallagher which just came out this month, Kickback City, where I got to do pulp crime style illustrations for a short story written by best-selling author Ian Rankin.  As far as historical charcaters go, I've always wanted to do the story of turn-of-the-century labor activist Mother Jones. She is a fascinating woman-- a real hell-raiser, way ahead of her time. I love her so much. That woulod probably be better done as a screenplay than a comic, though. Anyway, it's a dream project I'd love to be able to take some time off and get into. 

8. Not a western question- but I never thought an artist could approach John Buscema as the definitive Conan artist, and in my mind you have done so. You have said that the (very western-like) Robert E. Howard Conan story "Beyond the Black River" sums up the theme of the character: that "the powers of civilization will always end up praying for a man with a sword." Do you think this helps explain the enduring (though vacillating) popularity of the western, as well?

TT: To a degree, sure. Sounds good, for certain types of Westerns. Call it the High Noon syndrome, I suppose? Of course, there are some great tales that explore what happens when you pray for that guy and he finally comes: I'm thinking of The Unforgiven here, and a few others. Just goes to prove what I was talking abuot earlier: take the genre, turn it's conventions inside out, and fish through the guts awhile with your bare hands. You'll find a story that's worth writing about or drawing. 

9. Do you have any recent or upcoming projects you'd like to make us aware of?

TT: The two that I mentioned above: The Rory Gallagher box set that just came out. That was a really cool project to be involved with, since I'm such a Rory Gallagher fan, and also because of the fact that there's never, ever been anything like it ever done.; And the Scout: Marauder project that one of my publishers has asked Ben and me to work up a pitch for. That's really exciting. I've wanted to return to the Scout saga for a long time, and people are always asking me when I'm going to get back to it. So it seems the time has come. Stay tuned!

Visit Timothy Truman's website and order some of these great books! www.timothytruman.com

Many thanks to Tim for visiting us today!

-Troy D. Smith