FOR YOUR CONSIDERATION: DC’S NIGHTWING: OLD friends and new ENEMIES

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Nightwing: Old friends and new Enemies

by Robert Greenberger

Mike Gold had a bold idea. He wanted DC Comics to produce a weekly comic book, 48-pages thick and imitate the success of Britain’s 2000 AD. executive Editor Dick Giordano was fascinated by the notion of a weekly, having tried without much success to use the Charlton characters to launch a weekly, something I discussed in detail way back in Comic book artist #9. but here was Mike, newly arrived from first Comics and brimming with fascinating ideas, among them Wasteland and this weekly, anthologies to explore new ideas. Somehow, it was chose that action Comics would house this bold new idea, starting with the upcoming issue #601.

Mike announced Barbara Kesel and I were working on features for this book and we hashed out characters to be featured and who would edit which ones. He had figured out that staggering storylines and characters would imply every few weeks we could create an event, goosing sales just as the sellers might begin lowering their orders. He knew the weekly would feature Blackhawk based on his success with the Howard Chaykin-produced prestige format miniseries and because green Lantern’s solo book was being cancelled, he could find a new home here. Superman, of course, had to be a fixture, having not missed an issue because 1938. Mike hit on the notion that it would be done like a weekly Sunday page, keeping Curt Swan, who had lost out on drawing the man of Steel in the John Byrne revamp, connected to the hero. We then drafted a list of other then-popular characters that might not sustain a solo book but could easily deal with a rotating feature.

It fell to me to figure out a rotation based on writers reporting on the length of their serials plus identifying which hero would grace each cover. For me, the best part of working on that book was commissioning the covers, getting people like Alex Toth, John Severin, and Mike Kaluta to contribute. In some ways, the covers were the best part of the series. Anyway, the rotation implied that Black Canary would be the first new feature to be added followed a few weeks later by Nightwing.

Action Comics weekly #613. Cover by Michael Kaluta.

At the time, Nightwing was extremely popular thanks to Marv Wolfman and George Perez’s dealing with of him in the pages of new teen Titans. Barbara, who was working with Marv on the title, got the Nightwing gig and of course that implied she was now editing her boss. Over the 42 issues of the series, there were two Nightwing serials, both involving Speedy, playing off their friendship from the Titans. For the first time ever, the two serials along with Nightwing’s origin are being collected in Nightwing: Old friends and new Enemies. The solicitations sadly are using the weak Gil Kane cover instead of the much more atmospheric Kaluta cover or a choice between the much more content-accurate Jon Bogdanove & Murphy Anderson or Tom Grindberg covers.

Kicking things off will be the Dan Mishkin-penned origin from secret Origins #13, a time when the series was also 48-pages, pairing a golden Age story by Roy Thomas with a much more commercially viable modern age origin edited by yours truly. Dan fit this in between new teen Titans #16-19 as Dick, just turning 20, tells his backstory to Jericho while hanging out on Tamaran. given the acrobatic nature of the character, I turned the art over to newcomer Erik Larsen, who was already working with me on Doom Patrol.

Action Comics weekly #618. Cover by Jon Bogdanove & Murphy Anderson.

From there the book moves into the serial from ACW #613-618 by Wolfman, Chuck Patton and Tom Poston. “The Cheshire Contract” has fast ask Nightwing for help in stopping Cheshire from assassinating an ambassador. given Nightwing’s recent split form Batman, the two former sidekicks take time to talk about what this has implied to the former young boy Wonder. This turns out to a critical fast tale in that he has been chasing Cheshire so he could finally meet Lian, the child they conceived together.

The second serial, “Rocks and hard Places”, was longer — nine parts – and a bit much more ambitious so Marv brought in his animation buddy Cheri Wilkerson to cowrite then take over. While mostly unknown today, from 1984-1992 she was a prolific animation scribe, having dealt with the Batman and Superman animated series among numerous others. Illustrating the tale was new talent showcase alum Tom Mandrake although the schedule required Vince Giarrano to step in and pencil two parts for Tom. The story, running from issues #627-634, picks up with fast in Ireland, taking time off from heroics to bond with Lian. This also picks up on the revelation that he had been fired from the CBI, the government agency he headed for a time and something was certainly rotten. They investigate, getting framed for a crime in the process, and the two have to expose the corruption.

For the record, there was also a solo fast five-parter towards the end of ACW’s existence. Written by mark Verheiden with art by Louis Williams, Frank Springer, and Frank McLaughlin, it was the first story to show fast attempt to raise Lian as a single, super-hero parent. The action also takes place at an aids clinic, one of the earliest comic book references to the insidious disease. A shame it wasn’t included here.

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Nightwing: Old friends and new Enemies

Classic comic covers from the Grand Comics Database.