February 1961: Wonder on the Wing

I must admit, in December 1960, the house ad copy for The Brave and the Bold 34 had my 6-year-old self hooked.

So this guy flies? He uses cool ancient weapons like maces and flails? He talks to birds the way Aquaman talks to fish? He fights gigantic dinosaur-things that try to steal interstate highway tunnels?

I’m in.

I was particularly intrigued by Hawkman’s weird, unique look — that startling raptor mask over his bare, winged torso. I’d never heard of the 1940s Hawkman, the Flash’s co-star in Flash Comics, so this guy came flying out of left field at me.

And what really sealed the deal was the moody art by Joe Kubert, DC’s war comics artist.

“I felt that the challenge that was involved in the character was one that really pulled me in,” Kubert said in an interview for TwoMorrows’ Hawkman Companion. “(T)aking a guy who has wings and making him seem as if that could really happen, it could really be. And I tried in the scenes of him flying around and having slight physical contortions that he puts himself in, puts himself through, I tried to get that feeling across.”

Rarely was a dime better spent.

DC Comics on the newsstand in December 1960