Sadly, I never got to find out if the mag ever delivered on that promise, as I never got my hands on an issue.
Or so I thought.
But yet again the internet has surprised and bamboozled me - by revealing that I did indeed have an issue of Stalker.
It was issue #2 and, until I blundered across its cover online, I'd totally forgotten I'd ever owned it.
Sadly, I remember nothing of the contents, although the cover tells me there might have been a four armed monster in it. Clearly this is a good thing for the monster in question. For, as we all know, to be four armed is to be forewarned.
The Grand Comics Database tells me this issue too was drawn by Steve Ditko and Wally Wood and so I suspect it all looked rather splendid inside.
Sadly, it seems readers may not have been as taken with the mag as that art team might suggest, as it managed to fold after just four issues.
Yet again the 1970s seem to have decreed that Conan was the only Sword and Sorcery hero who was allowed to prosper in that decade.
I understand your sense of bamboozlement. I as well, when I have occasion to visit my brother's place, where my magnificent collection of comics are stored, in his basement, (hey, man, I live in an apartment)have found things in there I had no idea I had. Including two issues of Stalker.
ReplyDeleteIt is often a journey of discovery, finding something weird and obscure and wondering, "what the hell was I thinking when I bought this?"
But I liked Wally Wood. Maybe that's why.
To be fair, DC in the mid- to late '70s was cancelling pretty much anything and everything left, right, and center regardless of whether it was selling okay. It's like they were deliberately committing suicide. I never bought this despite loving both Ditko and Wood simply because fantasy/sword&sorcery comics aren't my bag. I'd rather have Ditko on Creeper or Shag or even Static or Crackling Blazer.
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I got a couple issues of Stalker a bit back, along with Beowulf and Starfire: DC wanted a fantasy book like Conan, in the worst way, which mostly they got. Still, Warlord did pretty well for itself!
ReplyDeleteGoogum, I actually got this issue in a grab bag in Lewis's department store in Argyle Street, Glasgow, circa 1978/79. The other contents were the aforemetioned Beowulf; Kong (Anthro without the charm),a late Kirby Kamandi and an early Claw, which was basically Conan but with added Moorcock.
ReplyDeleteI still think Stalker was the most interesting feature but the Ditko art and the anti-heroic lead didn't find a market among DC's vanilla superheroes.