ROGER’S COMIC RAMBLINGS: CANTON street PRESS’ original GHOST RIDER

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by Roger Ash

The original Ghost Rider Vol. 1

When you hear the name “Ghost Rider” it wouldn’t surprise me if the very first picture that came to your mind is a guy with a blazing skull for a head sitting atop a motorcycle with flaming tires. however there’s one more Ghost Rider; one from earlier in comics history. This Ghost Rider is a cowboy dressed all in white astride a white stallion. It’s this Ghost Rider who is the subject of The original Ghost Rider Vol. 1 from Canton street Press.

The original Ghost Rider Vol. 1 collects Ghost Rider #1-5 as well as four stories from Tim Holt #11-14 published between 1949-1951 by magazine Enterprises. The stories are mainly written by Gardner Fox with some by Raymond Krank as well as the art is by Dick Ayers with Frank Frazetta providing some outstanding covers. Tony Isabella composes a nice introduction that puts the series into historical point of view as well as provides some background information.

Ghost Rider is Rex Fury. He as well as his companion, Sing-Song, are thrown into the Devil’s Sink by the renegade Bart Lasher as well as delegated drown. They miraculously make it through as well as Fury dons a white attire as well as cape and, riding the white stallion Spectre, becomes The Ghost Rider, righting the wrongs of the wild west.

These stories are products of their time as well as native Americans aren’t frequently depicted well. Sing-Song is Chinese as well as his look is extremely stereotypical as well as he speaks in damaged English. However, he has more depth to his character than any type of other character in the collection as well as is frequently shown as being smarter than Ghost Rider.

If you’re looking for complex characters as well as stories with deep, twisting plots, this isn’t the book for you. However, if you want fast-paced, fun adventures, these stories will be right up your alley. The stories are all short (ten pages or less), the dispute is provided at the begin of the story in a half sprinkle page, as well as is resolved at the end of the story. The villains in the stories are relatively typical western poor guys; corrupt ranchers, rustlers, train robbers, as well as such. Ghost Rider defeats them with different techniques (he frequently startles people by making his head appear to float), his guns, as well as his fists. While he wants the villains to believe of him as some supernatural being, aside from his origin, the supernatural never plays a part in the tales.

Gardner Fox composes fun, enjoyable stories. They are frequently packed to overflowing with action. Dick Ayers art doesn’t do much for me, however it works fine as well as he tells a story well. The reproduction of the stories is nice with the comics appearing like they did at the time – coloring errors as well as all – rather than redone with computer colors. If you’re a fan of traditional comics or comic book westerns, you should definitely get your hands on a copy of The original Ghost Rider Vol. 1.

Moon woman #5

Also from Canton street press is Moon woman #5, a reproduction of the comic from 1948. It features three Moon woman stories drawn by Sheldon Moldoff, a zombie tale drawn by Johnny Craig (which is a genuine treat), as well as a 2-page prose science fiction story. A huge part of the appeal of this reprint for me is the inclusion of all the original ads. It’s always fun to see what was being hawked in comics in the past.

Moon woman is Claire Lune (great name) who gets her powers from a wonderful moonstone. The Moon woman stories surprised me. I was expecting superhero stories typical of that era, as well as I definitely got that in the very first story which features Moon woman as well as her partner, The Prince, fighting a group of women whose leader has harnessed the sun’s power into weapons. However, the other two stores break out of that mold. In the second story she assists a group of ranchers irrigate their land as well as defeat a land swindler. In the final story, she’s basically a supporting character in a story of a like triangle gone horribly wrong. I appreciated that she might be utilized in extremely different methods in three different stories. The art by Moldoff is rather nice. On the stamina of this issue, I’d extremely suggest inspecting out the Moon woman #1 reprint which is offered for preorder now.

Moon woman #1

Canton street press does a fantastic task of preserving our comics history. The original Ghost Rider Vol. 1 as well as Moon woman #5 are perfect examples of what they do so well. If you’re a fan of traditional comics, you’ll definitely want to inspect these out.

Now, go checked out a comic!