ByMartin Powell & various (Dark Horse Comics)
ISBN: 978-1-63008-248-2
Jungle Tales of Tarzan was the sixth prose novel release, published in 1919 after monthly serialisation in prestigious pulp Blue Book Magazine between September 1916 and August 1917.
The content is a series of twelve loosely connected episodes, wherein the young Lord of the Jungle confronts various cognitive and physical stages in his own development. They are all set after the foundling’s ape foster-mother Kala was killed and before that first fateful meeting with Jane Porter and introduction to human civilisation.
The stories have been adapted in whole or in part by most of the American comics publishers who have released Tarzan material – Gold Key, Charlton, Marvel, DC and Malibu Comics – as well as by quintessential Tarzan illustrator Burne Hogarth in one of the industry’s earliest graphic novels.
In 2015 – anticipating this year’s movie release – current license-holder Dark Horse Comics released an all-new adaptation of the complete text, scripted by Martin Powell (Scarlet in Gaslight, Alien Nation), designed by Diana Leto and individually illustrated by a broad swathe of differently-styled artists.
Following author Robin Maxwell’s Introduction ‘Back to the Jungle’, the adaptations begin with ‘Tarzan’s First Love’ (painted by Leto) detailing how the adolescent Ape-Man was increasingly drawn to fetching young She-Ape Teeka. Incomprehensibly, no matter what he did, the young maiden just wasn’t interested in her ardent, hairless admirer…
A brutal and epic clash between the local tribesmen responsible for Kala’s death and the jungle legend highlights the uncanny bond between the seldom-seen but terrifying white ghost and mighty elephant Tantor, who proves valiant and true following ‘The Capture of Tarzan’ (delineated by Pablo Marcos, Diego Rondón & Oscar Gonzalez), whilst Lowell Isaac’s interpretation of ‘The Fight for the Balu’ shows wistful sensitivity and potent fury as childhood friends of Tarzan become incomprehensibly aggressive after the birth of their first baby. They soon change their tune after a leopard attacks…
Will Meugniot deftly details the constantly-questioning outsider’s search for ‘The God of Tarzan’ after overdosing on his dead father’s books and suffering a brain-expanding religious experience, whilst ‘Tarzan and the Native Boy’ – illustrated by Nik Poliwko – sees him experience paternal yearnings. After abducting a small child and learning of both guilt and folly, the Ape-Man earns his first arch-enemy by spoiling greedy fetish-man Bukuwai‘s scam to impoverish little Tibo‘s distraught mother…
Steven E. Gordon explosively renders the return match when ‘The Witch Doctor Seeks Vengeance’; trying – and failing – to feed little Tibo to hungry hyenas before Jamie Chase details ‘The End of Bukuwai’ as the vile witchman finally captures the “tree devil†Tarzan and learns that jungle vengeance is far worse than anything he could conceive of…
‘The Lion’ (Terry Beatty) explores Tarzan’s eccentric sense of humour as the Lord of the Apes acquires an entire skin of Numa the lion and learns from his anthropoid subjects a painful lesson about practical joking, after which Mark Wheatley turns in a lush and spectacularly effective interpretation of much-adapted fantasy ‘The Nightmare’.
Here starving, curious Tarzan steals and gorges on elephant meat from the native village. The resultant food-poisoning takes him on a hallucinogenic journey never to be forgotten and almost costs his life when he can no longer tell phantasm from actual foe…
Crafted by Sergio Cariello, Patrick Gama & Dave Lanphear, ‘The Battle for Teeka’ features an epic clash as the new mother is stolen by a rival ape pack and Tarzan must lead his people into a full-on war to save her…
‘A Jungle Joke’ (Tomás M. Aranda) sees an unrepentant Tarzan revive his hilarious Numa masquerade to bedevil the local natives; taking the place of an actual lion the savages plan to torture, before this legendary lexicon concludes in metaphorical triumph with Carlos Argüello limning an epic struggle after an eclipse blankets the jungle and ‘Tarzan Rescues the Moon’…
With a bonus section highlighting Darren Bader’s cover art and additional illustrations by Bader, Thomas Floyd, Louis Henry Mitchell, Steve Price & Thomas Yeates, Jungle Tales of Tarzan is a delicious treat for both Ape-Man aficionados and devotees of the comics arts in all their multi-various styles.
Edgar Rice Burroughs’ Jungle Tales of Tarzan © 2015 Edgar Rice Burroughs Inc. All rights reserved. Tarzan â„¢ and ® Edgar Rice Burroughs Inc. and used by permission.