I think I’ve mentioned before that my Megaton book was going to feature a new generation of super heroes. Back in 1981, time didn’t really pass in comic books. Dick Grayson was still Robin, having only aged from the Boy Wonder into the Teen Wonder in 30 years. Only on DC’s Earth 2 were sidekicks allowed to grow up, but even there Dick Grayson was still Robin, albeit in some very ugly new uniforms. In DC’s imaginary stories, readers were treated to the adventures of Superman and Batman’s Super-Sons during the 1970’s.
In creating a second generation of heroes, it stands to reason that there had to be a first generation and they were represented in Megaton #1 by Ultraman and the Crusader. Each of them appeared in costume for only a single panel that issue. Crusader showed up once again in his civilian guise in a second panel and only reappeared a few years later in the Megaton Explosion, our who’s who promo book. (You can download the Explosion here on my Megaton website: http://megatoncomics.com/Megaton/Megaton_Explosion.html)
Ultraman was all over the first three pages of his story (art by Butch Guice and James Cassara)in his real identity of astronaut turned hero Christopher Kelly before he blew up. Neither were the stars of their first appearances. Crusader showed up in flashback in the Sentinel story, which featured his two grown-up sidekicks (Sentinel and Headhunter) battling each other. Ultraman was there to pass on his powers to his daughter Christie, aka Ultragirl, in her origin story. Unfortunately for Christie, her story didn’t resume until Megaton #’s 7 and 8 a few years later (and Megaton X-Mas a few years after that). Her dad did guest star in #7 and showed up in the Explosion too.
And that was it for those two old-timers, until Chris Ecker, Ed DeGeorge and I resurrected them as the stars of Big Bang Comics. Ultraman underwent a slight name change to Ultiman and the Crusader was transformed into the Knight Watchman. (The Watchman’s metamorphosis was already told in an earlier blog). At Big Bang they were the stars. At Megaton, they were the back story. I don’t recall any plans to tell any Ultiman retro adventures in Megaton, although the Crusader would have reappeared to fight Headhunter and may have stuck around for a while.
I have a number of my own sad, swiped drawings of the Crusader from the late 70’s and early 80’s. To the right is Frank Fosco’s take on one of them from 1982. Chris Ecker, who drew that first story, must have designed the Sentinel but I have a few of my own designs for the character that became Headhunter.
Very few early Ultraman sketches exist, at least in my hoarding piles (and I never throw anything out) but I’ll show you a few of them next time
