Nobody ever said the history of superhero comics wasn’t convoluted.
Americomics 3 (Aug. 1983) gave us a fresh look at some then-idled characters, the first, second, and third Blue Beetles.
The first had been a ubiquitous 1940s character, police officer Dan Garret, a vitamin-powered masked vigilante who appeared in comics and on radio. The second was an archeologist named Dan Garrett (two Ts now) who gained vast powers from a sacred scarab in Charlton Comics’ Blue Beetle 1 (June 1964). When Garrett disappeared, he was replaced by Ted Kord as a Steve Ditko-drawn, non-super-powered, high-tech Blue Beetle (Captain Atom 83, Nov. 1966).
“It was probably the second time an established superhero’s death resulted in the creation of a new one,” observed Christopher Irving in TwoMorrows’ Blue Beetle Companion. “The Hangman came into being to avenge his brother, the Come,t in 1941’s Pep Comics 17 by MLJ (now Archie Comics).” Kord initially appeared without explanation, so readers had to wait a while to learn that Garrett had apparently been fatally injured in a battle on Pago Island. “Enter Bill Black, a cartoonist and prospective publisher who’d produced several high-quality fanzines,” noted Tom Brevoort. “He brokered a deal to print some of the stories that had been intended for Charlton Bullseye in his own new color comics line — mainly material worked on by himself and his circle of friends. Charlton agreed to this, though they thereafter sold the rights to all of the Action Heroes characters to DC Comics, which put an end to Black’s outfit AC continuing to use of them. Still, Black got a few issues out of the material he’d taken control over, including this issue – Americomics 3.”
“The … story, written and drawn by Rik Levins with inks by Bill Black, featured the Blue Beetle fighting for his life against … the Dan Garrett Blue Beetle?” recalled Irving.
“The solution ties into the Ditko run pretty loyally, but not slavishly. The result is a fun superhero story that is a step up from the average Charlton comic, one that would be mirrored years later in a DC comic.”
The super-powered, vengeful Beetle gives the newer Beetle quite a time, physically and emotionally, before Kord realizes that his enemy is actually a robot, not a resurrected Dan Garrett. An offensive beam from Kord’s Bug destroys the automaton.
The same issue contained a Jack Kirby-style revamp of the original 1940s Blue Beetle.
Irving wrote, “The Blue Beetle also appeared in Americomics Special No. 1: Sentinels of Justice, a team book featuring Captain Atom, the Question, and Nightshade, before the character rights reverted to Charlton to then be purchased by DC Comics.”
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