The Road To Wakanda

The Black Panther, like T'Challa, is King these days - ruling the box-office world. While he made his debut in 1966, it wasn't until 1977 that he finally got his own title. That slow start is fairly indicative of the rough ride getting here to mass market star. If we had over 8000 folks so intimidated by the idea of a black hero that they were voting against the film before they could even have seen it, just imagine what it was like a half century back. It was a struggle to even get the idea of a black hero out there, in any form.

There were other attempts to do a black hero in comics - some savage social parody, some straight-up heroes, and some a mix of both. But - damn. It's been a bumpy road...

With the way of underground comics of the time, one often could expect to find conventions subverted and cultural norms toppled. It wasn't too surprising to find the "hero" of a story (or comic) to be more villain in perception, and so our hero in the second issue of Captain Guts appears as the villain -

Their main confrontation occurs in chapter two -

It was his comic, however, so he eventually drank more beer, got over it, and came back to screw her white. (seriously)

On very rare occasion, a black hero even got his own book. Back in 1972, the same year Luke Cage became the first black hero to headline his own book at Marvel, strange things were afoot over at Kitchen Sink -

This one was quite the odd mix. It's parody, sort of, with an underpining of dark social commentary - but not all outwardly directed. Richard "Grass" Green had a unique blend here that's tightly bound to the time of its creation.

Despite any proclamations above, nobody on this page was ever seen again to my knowledge.

Next post, we'll look at a few heroes more serious in tone.

Ace Of Spades from Up Your Nose #1, Afro Boy from Pervert Comix #1, other strips from the comics indicated in the provided covers (1969-1972)