Nice cover and typical Kane layout. Of note is the unmistakable inking of John Severin.






Well...only it was not. As I've mentioned before, unlike the impact DC had with a classic racially-themed story that same year in the pages of Green Lantern / Green Arrow, Marvel's handling of race matters was shaky, often coming off like a bad PBS special on the subject, instead of giving the impression that some of their writers knew what to do with the material or understood it, which was a surprise. This applies to issue #3, as well.

In the Old West setting, one expects race issues, but I felt it lacked the impact of characters previously not known to be racist, rearing that particular head, as seen with Steve Englehart's take on the 1950's Captain America and Bucky, from issues #153-#156 (September - December, 1972) of Captain America and the Falcon. Set in the then-present day of 1972, with America still embroiled in racial conflict / division (e.g. anti-busing protests & violence, the Black Liberation Army assassinating police officers, fights and lawsuits over fair housing, the Attica prison riots, and so much more), Steve Rogers (already dealing with issues of who he is / what he represents in America that would soon come to a memorable head)and Sam Wilson seeing Cap's mirror image as the very symbol of Right Wing terror struck a stronger chord in-universe and arguably, to Marvel readers in 1972 than this Red Wolf story.

That said, the Red Wolf story ending with the idea of an all-out war between Indians and white people seems like an intriguing concept...only if Marvel would have been brave enough to carry that out over a few issues, with the in-universe story lasting at least a few months. Marvel already had multi-issue arcs in all of the major superhero titles dating back to the 60s, so the format would been right up their alley.

Red Wolf#5, January 1973

“The Man Who Gunned Down Red Wolf!”, 20 pgs
Gardner Fox, writer
Syd Shores, penciler
Chic Stone, inker
Denise (Wohl) Vladimer, letterer



Cover by Gil Kane

Summary:

Things are looking a bit more old-school in the opening splash, with a gunman (in green!) drawing his six-shooter on Red Wolf (who is not going bare-chested, having donned a long-sleeved top over his chaps and loincloth).



It appears that “Fast John” Silver has earned the money he’s been offered by Alvah Bradley to take out the Indian Avenger. In flashback, we see Bradley making the offer to the hired hitman, who initially resists killing an “injun”. But Bradley makes his case: Red Wolf is protecting Cheyenne sacred ground that Bradley needs to water his expanding stock of cattle. Since none of the locals are foolish enough to tangle with Red Wolf, he’s offering $5000 to this fast gun for hire. That kind of money seals the deal!

Silver’s hit was not as successful as he thought: the bullet went through Red Wolf’s buckskin “aya houdla” and hit the medicine bag around his unexposed chest, and the “bits of stone and iron”, to which Red Wolf curiously attributes his “power”, prevented the bullet from penetrating. The now bare-chested Red Wolf heads to Fort Rango, where as Johnny Wakely, he hopes to pick up some leads on why an assassination attempt was made on him.

After paying off Fast John Silver for the supposedly successful hits, Bradley contracts him for $1000 a month to assist his men as they take the Cheyenne sacred ground. Although the ground is too sacred for the Cheyenne to fight upon, the Indians will take the fight elsewhere, attacking settlers until the intruders depart. The first news of the Indians’ war comes from Molly Brennan, who once more rides into Fort Rango with bad news. She begs Johnny to contact Red Wolf, who can find out what has riled the Cheyenne, an idea seconded by Col. Sabre. It’s into the secret lair for Johnny, who dons the mantle of Red Wolf, bemoaning the loneliness imposed by his responsibilities: “My days are filled with fears for the safety of my people. My nights are restless because I’m afraid that war between red world and white will explode across the praries (sic). Alone—always alone! I must find a way to stop these threats to the peace of my world!”

Red Wolf’s first stop is at the cabin under assault by the Cheyenne. They argue that the white man has broken the peace treaty, and two braves tackle Red Wolf, then attack him with spears. Red Wolf artfully dodges and dislodges his opponents. He stops the fighting and sues for a peaceful approach, convincing his brethren. One gifts him his bow, honored that it might play a part in regaining the sacred ground without spilling Cheyenne blood.



The white settlers are impressed that Red Wolf has brought the assault to an end, and muse gratefully: “Our god is also his god, Ed—though the Cheyennes call it the wakan tanka. So I’m going to say a few prayers for him. Maybe that wolf-spirit he calls the Owayodata will hear ‘em!”

Red Wolf summons Lobo and gathers a certain chemical he needs, then advances on the intruders on the Pah Pana, the sacred Cheyenne land, who witness a mysterious set of ghostly apparitions. These are twigs and leaves painted with phosphorus, formed into crude human-like shapes that draw the fire of fearful men who think these are ghosts. Men that are brave enough to draw closer get a wallop from Red Wolf’s coup stick, or an arrow to the forehead, blunted with a leaden, glowing ball at the arrow tip.



That phosphorus-treat tip is yet another sort of tip—one that tips off Fast John that they are not dealing with ghosts. But his enemies are still invisible, so he flees with the rest of the spooked men.

As they return to Bradley’s “Checkerboard Ranch”, Red Wolf interrupts them with a one-man assault, a seemingly foolhardy surprise attack but one which Red Wolf executes effectively. Now, Fast John might just have to believe in ghosts after all, but he still tries to get a shot into his enemy…a shot that he cannot complete after Lobo’s fangs close around his shootin’ hand!

Silver escapes, but Red Wolf takes prisoners, delivering them, with the explanation, to Col. Sabre. He’s well aware of Bradley’s coveting the Indian land, and intends to speak to him about it, when, conveniently, Bradley himself rides up. Bradley accuses the Cheyenne of damming their Pah Pana watershed, drying up the river and endangering Bradley’s cattle. That doesn’t sound like the Cheyenne way to Red Wolf—he tells us that the red man believes water belongs to all. The three men investigate, and Bradley’s complaints are misguided: the responsible parties are in fact beavers, doing what beavers do! Now Bradley has no choice but to pay the Cheyenne to remove the beavers from the Pah Pana, lest his cattle die.

Only one loose end remains: Red Wolf must confront Fast John Silver. He trails the mercenary killer, without realizing Silver is sniping him from a high rock. But Fast John is given away by the glint of sunlight—“the silver he uses as decorations betrayed him!” (Unfortunately, this is the first that readers have known about Fast John’s affinity for silver adornments, due to the colorist opting to depict him in green and gold tones).

Red Wolf evades Silver’s gunfire and sneaks up on him from above and behind. With superior combat skills, Red Wolf easily defeats him once he’s been disarmed, and Col. Sabre sends both Silver and Bradley off to jail to await charges. Red Wolf rides off into the sunset, under the gigantic looming image of the Owayodata.



Comments:

Despite stories and art jobs that were a notch above the norm for Marvel's Westerns, Red Wolf was evidently struggling to maintain a sufficient readership. This issue's cover suggests we're in for a throwback to cowboy cliches of shootouts on Main Street with fast-drawing gunslingers. We don't quite get that, but Fast John Silver would have been at home in any Marvel Western of the 1960's. 

Gardner Fox had the ingredients for a better installment here. Not that what we got was all that bad, but I think if he'd played up Silver's impression that Red Wolf was in fact a ghost he could have had a more effective story. It seems like whenever these Marvel Westerners try out a spook act, as we've seen way too often, even when Ghost/Night Rider wasn't involved, the head bad guy sees through it almost immediately. I suppose the purpose of this twist, as a story-telling tool, is to separate the superstitious underlings from the head honcho so that he has to face the hero alone, but wouldn't it work just as well if everyone scattered in their own direction, with the presumed vengeful "ghost" of Red Wolf concentrating on a desperately frightened Fast John?

Fox continues to press the "relevant" stuff about peace between the races, and hash over the emotional turmoil of Red Wolf's desire for personal happiness versus his sacred obligation. Even if it's not especially moving, one gets the impression that this series has a little more substance than a typical Western. Shores and/or Fox and or the editor sure seem to like the obligatory shots of the Owayodata giant spirit in the sky. While more inventive and fresh manifestations might have been cool, I suppose it's more mythic for the Owayodata to stick to his routine of looming over the western horizon. 

Although I prefer Syd Shores' own inks, Chic Stone does a more satisfying job than some of the other guys who've been put on top of his pencils in this era. Another well-drawn issue, but between the inks and the layouts, that panel at the bottom of (counting ads!) pg. 14, with the floating Indian heads happily agreeing to Red Wolf's plan looks like something you'd have seen in a comic 20 years earlier. I think part of what bugs me is the Indian who doesn't get to say anything, just popping his head in the frame with a friendly grin!

Fox never gets around to spelling out what Red Wolf's plan was, instead leaving it to the readers to fill in the blank when we get to the somewhat humorous end of Bradley's part in the story. I appreciate that; it was the norm for Marvels of that era to make sure that every plot point was carefully enumerated by the closing panel, so I don't know if this was an intentional thing or an oversight. 

Col. Sabre has been in every installment and has done very little. Once more, my apologies for straying in the tall grasses to the side of the Western Team-Up trail!

Coming Attractions:

The 19th century Red Wolf is about to pass the coup stick forward. One more Old West adventure lies ahead of him. After that, we'll see him sharing pages with another heroic figure from the west... 

Red Wolf#6, March 1973

“Night of the Demon Rider!”, 14 pgs
Gardner Fox, writer
Syd Shores, penciler
Jack Abel, inker
Augie Scotto, letterer



Cover by Syd Shores

Summary:

It looks like we’re back in super-villain territory as Red Wolf faces the glowing Demon Rider of the Plains, a.k.a. Devil Mask on the splash. The story itself starts a little earlier with Johnny Wakely tracking a pair of Army deserters for his boss Col. Sabre. The deserters have stolen some Indian ponies intending to sell them up north, but Johnny, in his civilian garb, apprehends one of them. After tying him up, he heads in pursuit of the other AWOL thief on his horse Sundance (unless I missed it, this is the first time Johnny’s horse has been named). He subdues the second man as the sun sets on the horizons, and is struck by the appearance of a glowing figure on a glowing horse, a figure he assumes is K’oumtou Gia, the spirit rider of the plains spoken of by his Cheyenne friends.



Johnny returns the deserters to Fort Rango and reports that the glowing figure absconded with the ponies the men had stolen. The civilians lingering in the fort have also encountered the mysterious Demon Rider and had property stolen. Johnny suspects one man with a “guilty, almost furtive look”, and wonders if he’s the Demon Rider! With his work day over, Johnny heads to his lair to assume the mantle of Red Wolf (the wolf-headdress called the owayo ata’hae), pondering the suspect he plans to follow. The man carries a six gun like a white man, but wears the buckskin jacket of the red man, so which is he?

Time for the first Owayodata to chime in again, once more in the form of a towering apparition visible only to Red Wolf. He reminds Red Wolf of his obligation to be brother and protector to all men, red or white. Since this will be the last time we'll see him for a century or so, let's take one more look:



Red Wolf tracks his suspect to the location of the hidden ponies—he’s not the Demon Rider, because Devil Mask arrives as well! The suspect is not an innocent, though: he’s acting as Devil Mask’s “fence” for selling the ponies in “Blackfoot country” (I do believe the tribe today prefer to be addressed as “Blackfeet”).

Red Wolf fearlessly hurtles to the attack, easily dispatching the crooked trader, Jackson, but finding Devil Mask the Demon Rider to be a tougher cookie. A slip on some wet juniper leaves dazes him, but Devil Mask chooses not to press his luck and takes the opportunity to vamoose. Red Wolf can deliver Jackson to Col. Sabre, but he’s in no shape to press further on capturing the Demon Rider.

As he comforts himself with a bath in a spring-fed pool, Red Wolf suddenly recalls an important clue: Devil Mask mounted his horse from the right, Indian-style! Perhaps the Cheyenne village will be the most productive place to conduct an investigation.

At the village, Fawn brags about being chosen to receive a position of great honor riding the tribe’s fastest horse in an upcoming tribal ceremony, and prompts Red Wolf for his opinion on whether she’s the prettiest girl in the tribe. Red Wolf’s mind is elsewhere; his keen sense of smell detects crushed juniper! The Demon Rider is nearby! He chooses to follow White Bow, but loses the trail. It then occurs to him that Fawn, carrying the sacred warclub on the fastest horse will be tempting to the thieving Devil Mask, so he abandons his tracking efforts to catch up to Fawn instead.

Sure enough, the horned horseman known as the Demon Rider is at that moment attacking the defenseless Fawn. It’s Red Wolf to the rescue! A rugged fist fight ensues, ending with Red Wolf victorious. Devil Mask the Demon Rider is indeed White Bow, who had hoped to discredit and replace the tribe’s chief medicine man, who has sworn to uphold a peace that would have been disturbed by continued attacks on Indian and white alike.

As Fawn’s savior, she tells him her life now belongs to him. She accompanies Red Wolf to the chief, where White Bow is turned over to face tribal justice, but the Wolfhead Warrior must leave her there, riding off alone, as always.



(Although it says "continued after next page", that continuation is a short reprint, "The Harlon Brothers" from Western Outlaws and Sheriffs #70, 1951. Of interest if you like George Tuska's older work, when he was specializing in the kind of static imagery that inspired Pete ("P.A.M.") Morisi.)

Comments:

I’d be unsurprised to learn that the 19th century Red Wolf—or even Col. Brett Sabre--has had other adventures published in the last 20 years or so, but this is the end of the original run, the final Old West adventure of the living Owayodata. With an abbreviated page count, Gardner Fox didn’t attempt to do much of a wrap-up on the saga, but he does leave the few dedicated readers with a final recap of the core character definition, and reminds us that we’re probably not missing out on any resolution to the romantic threads that once teased a potential inter-racial romance. It does however imply that Red Wolf has chosen Fawn over Molly, so that's a small bit of closure, although it's a little disappointing to see Fawn depicted as a clingy, lovesick woman who needs confirmation of her status as the most beautiful in the tribe.  Both Fawn and Molly had the potential to be better-rounded and much more capable characters, potential which had been hinted at in previous issues. 

The Demon Rider's glow-in-the-dark gimmick (his horse glows too!) remains unexplained, but readers who know Ghost Rider, or who read the previous issue, can figure out the likely technique that White Bow used. I guess as a wanna-be medicine man, he'd be familiar with some unusual properties of natural substances like Marvel Universe phosphorus, which unlike phosphorus in our universe, was nontoxic, non-flammable, and readily available as a free element on the Western plains!

This plot reads much more like what I think of as a "Gardner Fox plot", with its weak mystery, oddball motivation (how is this supposed to discredit the tribe's medicine man, exactly? It sounds like the medicine man has the same responsibilities as Red Wolf?) It feels hasty, a little lazy, repetitive, and the detective work is simple-minded and conveniently correct, despite being abandoned mid-effort. And I'd have thought that Fawn's honorary ride would have been a spectator event, not a private night-time exercise, but who am I to define sacred Cheyenne ceremonies? I presume the word had come down about the big change coming to the series, and Gardner Fox wasn't engaged enough to deliver something worthy of capping off what was a pretty decent little series, instead settling for producing the most trivial installment.

Coming Attractions:

The fork in the trail has been reached, and a new direction has been chosen! Follow me, pardners!

Indeed so. It's an effective visual, but it seems like the Owayodata never has anything new to tell Red Wolf, so it's getting a bit tired. I wish Fox had pushed the supernatural angle a little harder in this book. Red Wolf never even seems to have any extraordinary gifts from the spirit, as "unblessed" opponents like Ursa and Devil Mask were able to go toe-to-toe with him. If Owayodata had assigned him specific quests, or granted him some special abilities for specific circumstances, it might have been interesting. As it stands, we could easily interpret this as a normal man attributing his impressive natural capabilities and all successes to the deity of his choice. I don't think we were actually intended to consider the Owayodata as a religious delusion (to put it perhaps too harshly), but the text doesn't seem to prevent us from doing so.

Red Wolf in the 20th Century (again)

According to your trail boss MW's map, this path marked "Red Wolf" heads right to a dead end, but it looks like there are some things of a bit of interest to anyone looking for Western Team-Ups, so what say we keep on this for a mite longer, pardners? Then we'll circle back to the 19th century and check in on some fellas we've heard rumors of before. 

Red Wolf #7, May 1973

“Echo from a Golden Grave!” 20 pgs
by Gardner Fox, writer
Syd Shores, penciler
Jack Abel, inker
Artie Simek, letterer
Petra Goldberg, colorist



Cover by Rich Buckler and Joe Sinnott


Summary:
The opening panel acknowledges the abrupt change in this series, asking “How come our hard-riding avenger of the late 1800’s is prowling about a modern-day setting? This is a Red Wolf of 1973, watching not from a canyon cliff but from a roof-top as a trio of armed men try to steal a purse and camera from a young blonde woman.

With a pet wolf Lobo and a skillfully-wielded coup stick, just like our old West friend Johnny Wakely, this Red Wolf drops down upon the shocked victim, who flees to summon the police. Red Wolf has them subdued by the time the boys in blue arrive, while bystanders recognize our hero; evidently Red Wolf already has a reputation around town.

The young woman, who invites him home for coffee, also knows about Red Wolf, but expected an older man. Her great-grandmother corresponded with a Red Wolf, presumably this modern man’s ancestor. Red Wolf is more than willing to tell the origin of his predecessor, the previous star of this comic:



The lady has a story of her own to share: according to the letter in her possession, her great-grandfather had struck gold when he was attacked by Indians. The original Red Wolf was there to capture the attackers and bury the white prospector. He vows to show the grave to the man’s widow, should she ever visit.



This has established a long-lasting respect of her family for the Indian Avenger of the Plains, who buried her ancestor with his gold. Perhaps the gangsters wanted to use the letter to track down his buriel place and steal the gold? Red Wolf suspects there is another reason…one he does not yet know…perhaps involving the camera? He suggests she develop the film.

Red Wolf departs, agreeing to return tomorrow to see the film. He heads to the rooftop, planning to look out for following gang members. The rooftop reveals many potential hiding places to be alert to, but no obvious observers.

The next night, the pair reunite to look over the pictures. Her automatic camera, taking footage for the anti-pollution board she works for, has captured a drive-by shooting!



Shots suddenly penetrate the apartment door, and in rush five gunmen, insisting on taking the film! Red Wolf and Lobo mount an impressive defense against the armed men: “Attack , furry brother! This is the sort of thing we have sworn to fight here in this city!”

Before they’re both shot, Red Wolf takes Rhonda in his arms and leaps, to her terror, right out the window…and onto the crane in the construction site next to her building. As he boldly negotiates the bare beams of the skyscraper under construction, following the gangsters below them. Rhonda, as we might expect, is not so comfortable clinging for life on the skeleton of a high-rise construction!

The gangsters take the elevator up, while Red Wolf stalks his human prey “in the steel forest of a thousand girders!” He’s agile and fearless leaping between the members of the steel frame. Plummeting from the higher floors onto the palefaces, he defeats them soundly, leaving them to await the police and further establishing his reputation as a defender against crime in the city.

Red Wolf returns to escort Rhonda off the skyscraper: “She’s probably scared blue. We Indians don’t have any fear of heights like the palefaces.”

Rhonda does have some unfinished business that Red Wolf can now help with, and together, they head west to consult with an old Indian medicine man, son of one who knew the original Red Wolf well. The medicine man has no knowledge of the resting place of the white prospector, but he does know of the cave where the original Red Wolf kept his papers! The current day Red Wolf investigate, and the two Indian heroes communicate across the barrier of a century.

The gold is recovered, and Red Wolf refuses a share, leaving it all to Rhonda to fund her anti-pollution activism. At last, the Owayodata appears again to the modern day Red Wolf, as he did to Johnny Wakely, committing this man of 1973 to a sacred trust to defeat the lawless criminals of the modern world.


Comments:

While the adventures of Red Wolf are “Now! Set in the holocaust of today”, we do get another look at our Old West companion as we make the transition to modern superhero. It’s a Western Team-Up of sorts, with 70’s Red Wolf fulfilling the unfulfilled vow of his 19th century counterpart.

The big change in this series got my attention back in 1973, and I sampled Marvel’s newest superhero of ’73, while I had ignored the Western version. I don’t remember having an especially enthusiastic reaction, and I can’t imagine many readers would. It’s a pretty underwhelming first adventure, against nameless, bland thugs who never appear to provide a credible threat to the hero. We don’t get any demonstration of super-powers, or any kind of origin—instead, we get the origin of the guy who’s no longer headlining this comic book! It’s a weird choice. Maybe they figured the readers would remember the origin from the Red Wolf who appeared in Avengers a few years back, but they’ve got a surprise for those readers coming soon!

Red Wolf’s look has been tweaked a bit for this new incarnation, with his wolf-head headdress now a more traditional superhero mask, and frankly, it looks pretty dopey to me. This is an “improvement” on par with Golden Age Carter Hall’s replacement of his striking hawk’s head helm. The mask doesn’t look like a wolf’s head, just a furry mask with ears. The book also sports a new logo, one that curiously enough has a more “old timey” look than its previous, elegant one. It’s a good logo, though, looking like weathered planks…but I prefer the first logo by quite a bit.

The current incarnations’ concession to 70’s relevancy is no longer a focus on racism, but a nod toward the problem of pollution, one which, as any viewer of 70’s PSAs knows, was a hear-breaker for Native Americans, right? And its primary acknowledgment of Red Wolf’s ethnic heritage is to appeal to the stereotype of Indians being well suited to work on high-rise construction. From what I see, there is no true, instinctive Indian talent that makes them more naturally suited for the task; the stereotype originates in the fact that a Mohawk community in New York took advantage of a need for iron workers that was a risky but high-paying job, and through cultural encouragement took over that niche, the way many ethnic groups have found economic reward from flocking to a job that was hard to fill, developing a tradition and shared expertise and base of inter-community support that allowed them to dominate the field.

Syd Shores continues as artist, abetted fairly well with the inks of Jack Abel, but it appears he’s been coached to consult the work of John Buscema as he moves from the Old West to the Modern East. The result lacks the impressive luster of his previous work in this title. It’s competent but so familiar that it’s difficult to work up any enthusiasm. Of course, it wouldn’t be a Red Wolf comic without an appearance by the Owayodata looming above our hero, and we get two examples here, one in each century.

The letters page attempts to explain the transition: 

"We recognized...that we were straying from the original concept of the Old West/RED WOLF strip. And so, we began to ask ourselves why. The result? We arrived at some pretty startling answers...

"First, what we had was a good premise for the strip, but also a highly limiting one. We could only present so many Red Wolf-averts-the-Indian-war-in-the-nick-of-time stories before readers and writers alike grew tired of them. As a kind of compromise, we opted for a more standard western talke, but, of course, with the Indian as hero, thus maintaining the theme of tension between the races as an integral part of the series. But the two forms never quite seemed to mesh the way we had hoped they would."

I'm not buying it. A limiting premise never stopped a Western comic from running on and on before, and Red Wolf offered a much broader range of possibilities than any of Marvel's other Westerns, I would contend. I think they just decided that superheroes were selling better, Red Wolf wasn't selling, and this was a shot at saving it. They even ask for reader opinions on giving Red Wolf a more contemporary superhero costume, beyond the silly mask they introduced this issue. 

Red Wolf #8, July 1973, 20 pgs
“King Cycle Deals Death!”
Gardner Fox, writer
Syd Shores, penciler
Chick Stone, inker
Shelly Leferman, letterer



Cover by Ron Wilson and Joe Sinnott

Summary:

The caption on the splash fills in readers who might have missed the transition: “This is Red Wolf…and he is a descendant of his namesake, the original Red Wolf…and much like his ancestor…he is a man who lives dangerously! And danger threatens him now, Tiger…and it just keeps on trucking—all the way through!”

The specific danger we find Red Wolf facing is “King Cycle” and his gang of motorcyclists, roaring toward him like a herd of stampeding buffalo might have threatened his ancestor. (King Cycle is a bit of a comical-looking stereotype of a biker gang leader, with handlebar mustache, fur vest, and horned Viking helmet!)

Red Wolf responds with a handful of slippery elm powder from his medicine pouch, which causes the bikes to slip out of control, infuriating King Cycle. The gang whips out chains to take out our hero, who then slips on the powder himself, whumping his head against a fire hydrant and giving the gang a chance to split—they’ve seen enough to not risk taking on even a temporarily unconscious Red Wolf! Red Wolf recovers, embarrassed that the gang he’s been hunting for weeks is getting away.

He heads home in need of “an herb poultice” for his aching head. King Cycle’s gang has been stealing “too many rare and precious art treasures to be allowed to run free!” He blames the absence of his wolf Lobo—recovering from an injured paw--for his defeat.

The full-time do-gooder spots a woman collapsed on the steps of the museum who proves to be a policewoman, victimized by the bikers. Red Wolf replies “So you ran into them, too. So did I. That makes us partners, in a way.” (Which is as close to a justification for including this in our reviews of Western Team-Ups as we’re going to get this time around, pardners.) This is Jill Tomahawk, a Mohawk, and she’s not buying Red Wolf’s claim to be a Cheyenne wolf spirit. Their conversation is contentious: “All I need right now is a Mohawk woman libber to make my night complete!”

Jill is something of a lone wolf crimefighter herself, prepared to take on the gang while off duty, in order to prevent her colleagues from stealing her thunder—she wants “to show the world a girl is as good as any man!” As they discuss the threat—the gang was only casing the museum when they knocked her out, not robbing it—Red Wolf wonders who they are fencing their loot to. They agree to communicate by smoke signal as they continue to investigate! Lobo gets Red Wolf’s confession: “For all her women’s lib-ism, I like her.” He’s already looking forward to working with her again tomorrow.

And when he does hit the rooftops as the full moon rises, watching for smoke signals, it’s with his lupine companion, healed and ready to fight crime! The signal comes, although Jill Tomahawk has other duties that will prevent her from anything but passing along the info that the gang is going to rob the museum tonight for sure.

When the cyclists arrive, they’re shocked to see a wolf running loose beside them and cruelly beat him down with a chain! Then it’s into the museum to loot $5,000,000 worth of jewelry in a single smash and grab before looking for even more!
But Red Wolf is on the job, smashing through the overhead skylight and showing the united biker gang how dangerous an artfully-wielded coup stick can be.



King Cycle has brought some unique weapons of his own invention: guns that fire off flying buzz-saws!



Of all the museum artifacts to defend himself with, Red Wolf chooses a totem pole and a teepee, which do protect him from the saws and the gang members, but suffer some unfortunate damage. Lobo has bounced back and joins in the fight, but Jill has shirked her other duties and arrives in time to be captured as a hostage to cover their escape. “If anything happens to that cute little mohawk, I’ll never forgive myself! She trusted me to do a job and—I didn’t!” But what he can’t do, perhaps Lobo can: tracking the bikers by scent rather than tire tracks that Red Wolf can’t find!

Lobo leads the way to a dark and silent mansion, which Red Wolf enters stealthily. In the cellar, he finds Jill strapped to a large metal disc that begins to spin rapidly at his approach! When he backs off, the disc stops—he can’t risk attempting a rescue until he can discover how to shut off the power to the motor.

Searching, he finds a vast chamber filled with the stolen artifacts, King Cycle dressed as a Chinese emperor on a throne before a huge jade buddha!



The gang members intend to kill Red Wolf, but he’s more than capable of taking them all out, but when he gets to the head honcho, the very inventive King Cycle warns him that he can start the “death disc” again, and that he has built the mansion “in such a way that no man may ever trap me in it!” The first demonstration: a trap door that drops him into the cellar, where King Cycle smashes the mechanism that can stop the death disc! Looks like Jill is about to be spun to death, but Red Wolf can still take out King Cycle with a fist to the face, and smash the fuse box cutting off all power, allowing him to free the still-living policewoman.

Red Wolf tries to give the credit to Jill when he phones the cops, but she refuses to accept credit: “I’m honest enough to admit you captured them all and saved me from a frightful death. I don’t need any of your male chauvinism—like throwing me a bone to keep me quiet!”

Red Wolf departs with a patronizing grin and receives the blessing of the Owayodata as he heads home:



Comments:

Gardner Fox is struggling in his final outing with Red Wolf, presenting an incongruous pair of ideas. Red Wolf vs. a biker gang has some potential: motorcyclists are a modern-day echo of Western horsemen or stampeding herds. But bikers as museum thieves? Well, sure, it contradicts some stereotypes, which can be good, but it’s hard to think of a less-effective approach to stealing gigantic ancient statues and other massive works of art than on a Harley Davidson. And then we have the mansion of an ingenious inventor rigged up with deathtraps and secret escapes; if King Cycle is decorating his place with stolen treasures, how is he financing his gang’s crime sprees, and what’s in it for them? Dressing up as an emperor suggests that he’s not just warehousing the loot until he can fence it, he’s really into this stuff, which I doubt would interest the gang as much as the black market sales value would.

Fox has apparently been instructed to “Indian it up” to emphasize the cultural background of this new superhero, and he goes all out, with smoke signals, Native American artifacts, love interest from another tribe, and some Native reliance on natural materials like “slippery elm powder” from his “medicine pouch”. It’s not quite clear what information Jill came up with to warrant the smoke signal, since the gang is just very predictably hitting the museum they just cased the night before. It’s obvious that Fox just wanted an excuse to incorporate smoke signals between them.

He’s also trying to find more “relevant” themes to replace the racism emphasis of the Western version of the strip: last issue it was pollution, and now it’s Women’s Lib, undermined by Red Wolf’s chauvinistic responses. Red Wolf remains a cypher, with no evident civilian identity or role in life other than to go on patrol and fight crime wherever he sees it.

This was Syd Shores’ last issue as artist, and, sadly, one of his final art jobs before his untimely death. Chic Stone serves him better than some of his immediately previous inkers, and I find this job a more authentic representation of his style than last issue’s Buscema impersonation. Marvel wasn’t taking good advantage of his considerable talents, but at least they weren’t wasting him on inks only here at the end of his trail. I assume he’d rather have stayed in the Old West, but he gave the updated version a good effort.

Coming Attractions:

The origin of the modern day Red Wolf revealed at last! (Wait...didn't we already see that in Avengers? The answer may surprise you!) And the Western Team-Ups--or what passes for such on this stretch of the trail--don't quite stop with the end of Red Wolf's solo series! After that, we'll head back to the 1800's to check out Gunhawks in more detail. 

Red Wolf #9, September 1973

“A Legend Reborn!” 19 pgs
Gary Friedrich, writer
Dick Ayers, penciler
Vince Colletta, inker
Charlotte Jetter, letterer
Janice Cohen, colorist


Cover by Ron Wilson and Mike Esposito

Commentary:

We start this final issue with the familiar visual of Owayodata looming over the current Red Wolf, who is tied before a trio of wolves. The wolf spirit shouts: “Your people hunger, Thomas Thunderhead—and you let them starve! Why?! No true blood relative of Red Wolf would turn his back on his people! They thirst—and you allow them to go without water! Now you must face your responsibilities as a leader of red men—or be banished from this earth!” Harsh words for a man who assumes he is dreaming in his Phoenix pad, but Red Wolf has to assume it’s all real and escape his bonds or feel the fangs of the wolves!

Owayodata’s thoughts are ours to read, and he finds this man has the courage of his great-great-grandfather, but to be certain, he orders the wolves: “Attack! This pitiful excuse for a Sioux brave chooses to ignore me—and for that, he must die!”

Turns out is is all a dream, and though he knows his great-great grandfather was supposedly Red Wolf, Thomas doesn’t believe…until he sees a wolf in his apartment! He instinctively recognizes him as “Lobo”, and he recalls the origin of his predecessor:



Having found the wolf headdress, the coup stick, the medicine pouch, and the garb of Red Wolf materialized on his bed, Thomas Thunderhead concludes the story he has been telling to Jill Tomahawk. Since this, he has studied his ancestor and has come to follow in his footsteps.

At this point a package arrives as Jill’s place. Jill’s initial ideas of what it might be don’t jibe with Red Wolf’s:



When Red Wolf saves her, it turns out not to be an overreaction:



I guess Red Wolf does have some super powers after all!

Into what’s left of the apartment stride some gun-toting white men. They planned on bringing Jill back to the “boss” dead, but Red Wolf tries to talk them into bringing them both in one piece—they don’t realize they’ve got a superhero on their hands, I guess—but it comes down, as always, to a fight, one that Red Wolf wins, of course.
Until Western film star Clayton Bickford arrives on the scene. He’s the “boss” and Jill’s been investigating him. He’s discovered oil on land near his ranch, land owned by “Injuns”. He plans on buying it cheap before the owners find out about the oil, but that’s going to require him keeping Jill Tomahawk quiet.

As the beloved cowboy celebrity takes Red Wolf and Jill to his ranch in the back of his limo, the sound-proof partition allows them to speak openly: Bickford is bankrupt, but considers himself the last of the Great Americans, and has no qualms about cheating the Indians to get rich. Red Wolf is confident, and he sees Lobo following on fleet paws.
At the ranch, Bickford feels free to spew his racist bile, and Red Wolf responds appropriately:



Even though he got some blows in, Red Wolf and Jill are still prisoners. Jill has doubts about the Red Wolf mumbo-jumbo, but our hero calls upon his spirit guide’s powers, whistling to summon Lobo, who appears magically in the room:



When the men come to investigate the prisoners in the basement, they are attacked by the wolf, and their shots go right through the lupine terror! Red Wolf shrugs off Jill’s incredulous wonder at Lobo’s survival, before Lobo mystically disappears! Red Wolf and Jill Tomahawk head up the stairs and come face to face with Bickford, wielding a double barrel rifle.
But Lobo has materialized behind Bickford, and knocks him down the stairs! Red Wolf takes care of Bickford’s pistol-packing assistant while Bickford recovers and takes Jill at gunpoint. With his coup stick, Red Wolf quickly turns the tables:



Rather than the customary neat ending, the tale ends with the implication that the beloved cowboy star will be able to beat the charges, and a disgusted Red Wolf rides into the sunset:



Comments:

Gary Friedrich takes over for this final issue, to give us something of an origin story and establish some background, giving the 20th century Red Wolf a name and a locale. Sharp-eyed readers will notice that this is Thomas Thunderhead, not Will Talltrees—a different Red Wolf than we met in the pages of Avengers a few years earlier! This guy is also a direct ancestor of Red Wolf, implying that he was not doomed to a lonely, loveless life after all. He took a wife, presumably Fawn, and passed on the legacy to 1973. Have these last three issues been taking place in Phoenix, Arizona? Beats me.

Friedrich does make some efforts to establish some kind of supernatural abilities for Red Wolf, with heightened senses and a magical wolf friend, and we get one final look at the original Red Wolf, for one last taste of Western Team-Up across the centuries. I suppose the depiction of Bickford was suggested by the reputation of icon John Wayne as a less-than-racially-sensitive type, which is an interesting angle, but this is not much of a threat by superhero comic standards. For a final showing, it’s easy sailing for Red Wolf.

Dick Ayers fills in for the recently-deceased Syd Shores, and I’m going to give him and Vince Colletta the benefit of assuming this was a rush job, because this art is pretty terrible stuff. It’s crude, sloppy work, with some Gil Kane swipes and lazy renditions, and reminds me very much here  of the work of Tony Tallarico. I couldn’t figure out whether the apartment building was blown up or not, but apparently that vague image of destruction was meant to be a single room, not the entire complex.

Over at the letters page, they’re not explicitly saying that this is the last issue, although they imply it: “So, while you’re waiting with bated breath for the final answers to these earth-shattering questions (which, incidentally, may never come, so you may as well unbate your poor breath…!”)”. Of the final correspondents, one asks if this is the same guy from Avengers, and is not answered, one begs for a return to the Old West, and one suggests that Red Wolf have a new girlfriend every issue !?

And thus do we come to the end of the series, with a 3-issue coda in the 1970’s that just didn’t stick. I bought two of these issues off the stands, the 70’s debut and the final issue. I remembered nothing of either except the covers when I re-read them for this review. I suppose it’s symbolic of the waning of the Western comic, at Marvel, anyway, with this attempt to save a Western series by shifting it to modern day, and that take might have been a winner had it been better executed…but probably not. Marvel’s attempts to establish a more inclusive base of characters, with female-centric series like The Cat and Night Nurse, black heroes like Brother Voodoo, Jewish characters like The Golem, and Indian Red Wolf didn’t take off as hoped. I’m glad they tried, and I think they bailed on the Western Red Wolf too soon, but I wasn’t paying for the publication of the series.

Coming Attractions:

While Red Wolf has reached the end of his own series, Marvel heroes didn’t linger long in limbo in those days. There’s another Team-Up to follow, maybe not a particularly Western one, but we’ll cover it shortly.