{"id":32687,"date":"2025-04-24T08:00:42","date_gmt":"2025-04-24T08:00:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/?p=32687"},"modified":"2025-04-23T17:48:18","modified_gmt":"2025-04-23T17:48:18","slug":"the-mighty-crusaders-origin-of-a-super-team-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/2025\/04\/24\/the-mighty-crusaders-origin-of-a-super-team-2\/","title":{"rendered":"The Mighty Crusaders: Origin of a Super Team"},"content":{"rendered":"

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\nBy Jerry Siegel<\/strong>, Paul Reinman<\/strong>, Frank Giacoia<\/strong>, Joe Giella<\/strong>, Sam Rosen<\/strong> & various (Red Circle Productions\/Archie Comics)
\nISBN: 978-1-87979-414-6 (TPB)<\/p>\n

This book includes Discriminatory Content<\/strong> produced in less enlightened times.<\/em><\/p>\n

If you like your superheroes grim, gritty and ultra-serious you won\u2019t like what follows, but honestly in the final analysis it\u2019s not Chekhov or Shakespeare, just people in tights hitting each other, so why not lighten up and have a little fun?<\/p>\n

In the early days of the US comic book biz, just after Superman <\/strong>& Batman<\/strong> ushered in a new genre of storytelling, a rash of publishers jumped onto the bandwagon and made their own bids for cash and glory. Many thrived and many more didn\u2019t, relished only as trivia by sad old duffers like me. Some few made it to an amorphous middle-ground: not forgotten, but certainly not household names either…<\/p>\n

MLJ<\/strong> were one of the quickest outfits to manufacture a mystery-man pantheon, following the spectacular successes of the Man of Tomorrow and Darknight Detective with their own small but inspirational pantheon of gaudily clad crusaders. Beginning in 1939 (one month after a little game-changer entitled Marvel Comics<\/strong> #1) with Blue Ribbon Comics <\/strong>#1 the MLJ content comprised a standard blend of two-fisted adventure strips, prose pieces and gag panels before, from #2 on, costumed heroes entered the mix. The company rapidly followed up with Top-Notch<\/strong> Pep Comics<\/strong> and many more. However, after only a few years M<\/strong>aurice Coyne, L<\/strong>ouis Silberkleit and J<\/strong>ohn Goldwater (hence MLJ) spotted a gap in the blossoming market and in December 1941 nudged aside their masked mystery men and action aces to make room for a far less imposing hero: an \u201caverage teen\u201d who would have ordinary adventures like the readership, but with triumphs, romance and slapstick emphasised.<\/p>\n

Cover dated December 1941, Pep <\/strong>#22 featured a gap-toothed, freckle-faced, red-headed goof who took his lead from the popular Andy Hardy<\/strong> movies starring Mickey Rooney. Goldwater developed the concept of a youthful everyman protagonist, tasking writer Vic Bloom and artist Bob Montana with the job of making it work. The 6-page tale introduced Archie Andrews<\/strong>, pretty girl-next-door Betty Cooper<\/em> and his unconventional best friend and confidante Jughead Jones<\/em> living in a small-town utopia called Riverdale<\/em>. The feature was an instant hit and by the winter of 1942 had won its own title.<\/p>\n

Archie Comics<\/strong> #1 was the company\u2019s first solo-star magazine and with it began a gradual transformation of their entire output. With the introduction of rich, raven-haired Veronica Lodge<\/em>, all the pieces were in play for the comic book industry\u2019s second Genuine Phenomenon (as influential, if not so all-pervasive, as Superman). By 1946 the kids had taken over, and MLJ renamed itself Archie Comics: retiring its superheroic characters years before the end of the Golden Age to become, to all intents and purposes, a publisher of family comedies. Its success, like Superman\u2019s, changed the content of every other publisher\u2019s titles, spawning a multi-media empire generating TV shows, movies, apparel, and even a chain of restaurants. In the swinging sixties the pop hit Sugar, Sugar<\/em> (a tune from their animated TV show) became a global smash and wholesome garage band The Archies<\/em> has been a fixture of the comics ever since.<\/p>\n

Nonetheless the company had by this stage blazed through a rather impressive legion of costumed champions – such as The Shield<\/strong>: America\u2019s first patriotic superhero, predating Captain America<\/strong> by 13 months. A select core of these lost titans would communally form the backbone of numerous future superhero revivals, most notably during the \u201cHigh-Camp\u201d, \u201cMarvel Explosion\u201d, \u201cBatmania\u201d frenzied swinging Sixties…<\/p>\n

Archie Comics had tentatively, and with a modicum of success, tried out new characters – Lancelot Strong: The Shield<\/strong>, The Fly<\/strong> and The Jaguar<\/strong> – when DC first began bringing back costumed champions in the late 1950\u2019s and used the titles to cautiously revive some of their own Golden Age stable in the early 1960s. However, it wasn\u2019t until superheroes became a global craze, fuelled as much by Marvel\u2019s unstoppable rise as the Batman<\/strong> TV show, that the company committed to a full return of costumed craziness, albeit by what seemed to be mere slavish imitation…<\/p>\n

The comedy specialists simply couldn\u2019t take the venture seriously though and failed – or perhaps refused – to imbue the revitalised wonder people with drama and integrity to match the superficial zaniness. I suspect they just didn\u2019t want to. As harmless adventures for the younger audience, the efforts of their \u201cRadio Comics\u201d imprint manifested a manic excitement and uniquely explosive charisma all their own, with hyperbolic scripting by Superman<\/strong> co-creator Jerry Siegel touching just the right note at exactly the key moment for a generation of kids…<\/p>\n

It all began when The Fly<\/strong> (originally created by Joe Simon & Jack Kirby) was reborn as Fly-Man<\/strong> to milk the growing camp craze. He began incorporating mini-revivals of forgotten heroes such as The <\/strong>Shield<\/strong>, Comet<\/strong> and Black Hood<\/strong> in his highly imitative pages. With the addition of already-well established sidekick Fly-Girl<\/strong>, an oddly engaging, viable team was formed. Thus – for a couple of truly crazy years – Archie Comics rolled out their entire defunct pantheon for an exotic effusion of multicoloured mayhem before fading back into obscurity…<\/p>\n

Here, then, is a deliciously indulgent slice of sheer backward-looking bluster and bravado from 2003 when the House of Wholesome Fun stuffed a selection of Silver Age appearances into a brace of slim – and still sadly overlooked – compilations. The Mighty Crusaders: Origin of a Super-Team <\/strong>collects the three tenuous team-ups from Fly-Man<\/strong> #31-33 (May – July 1965) plus the first issue of spin-off Mighty Crusaders<\/strong> (November 1965) which finally launched the extremely quarrelsome champions as an official squad of evil eliminators…<\/p>\n

The wacky wonderment begins with a history lesson and loving appreciation in a \u2018Foreword by Michael Uslan and Robert Klein\u2019<\/em> before those first eccentric inklings of a new sensation are re-revealed in Fly-Man<\/strong> #31. As previously stated, Jerry Siegel provided baroquely bizarre, verbally florid scripts, deftly parodying contemporary storytelling memes of both Marvel and National\/DC: plenty of pace, lots of fighting, a whirlwind torrent of characters and increasingly outrageous expository dialogue.<\/p>\n

The artist was veteran illustrator Paul Reinman who had been drawing comics since the dawning moments of the Golden Age. His credits included Green Lantern<\/strong>, Sargon the Sorcerer<\/strong>, The <\/strong>Atom<\/strong>, Starman<\/strong> and Wildcat<\/strong>. He drew The Whizzer<\/strong>, Sub-Mariner<\/strong> and Human Torch<\/strong> at Timely and for MLJ produced strips in Blue Ribbon Comics<\/strong>, Hangman<\/strong>, Jackpot<\/strong>, Shield-Wizard<\/strong>, Top-Notch<\/strong> and Zip Comics<\/strong> involving such early stars as Black Hood, T<\/strong>he Hangman<\/strong> and The <\/strong>Wizard<\/strong>. He even found time to illustrate the prestigious Tarzan<\/strong> syndicated newspaper comic strip. Reinman excelled at short genre tales for Atlas in the 1950s and became a key inker for Jack Kirby on the Hulk<\/strong>, Avengers<\/strong> and X-Men<\/strong> as the King irrevocably reshaped the nature of comics storytelling in the early 1960s…<\/p>\n

Here he uses all that Fights \u2018n\u2019 Tights experience to depict \u2018The Fly-Man\u2019s Partners in Peril\u2019<\/em> as criminal mastermind The Spider<\/em> (nee Spider Spry<\/em>) broke out of jail to attack his old enemy, only to have all his cunning traps spoiled by alien-equipped tech-master The Comet and, in second chapter \u2018Battle of the Super-Heroes\u2019<\/em>, by The Shield and man of mystery Black Hood (whose irrepressible sidekick at this time was a miraculous robotic horse dubbed Nightmare<\/em>)…
\n\"\"
\nCaustically christening his foes The Mighty Crusaders<\/strong>, the villain attempts to ensnare them all in \u2018The Wicked Web of the Wily Spider!\u2019<\/em> but ultimately fails in his plot. The story ends with our heroes hotly debating whether they should formally amalgamate and swearing that whatever occurred they would never call themselves by the name The Spider had coined…<\/p>\n

Two months later they were back in Fly-Man<\/strong> #32, battling an incredible psionic dictator from long-sunken Atlantis. With Fly-Girl \u201cadding glamour\u201d but unable to quell the boys\u2019 fractious natures, the still un-designated team clash with many monstrous manifestations of \u2018Eterno the Tyrant\u2019<\/em> before confronting the time-lost terror and banishing him to trans-dimensional doom…<\/p>\n

One final try-out appeared in Fly-Man<\/strong> #33 (September 1965) as boisterous bickering boils over into outright internecine warfare between \u2018Fly-Man\u2019s Treacherous Team-Mates\u2019<\/em>, all ably assisted by the evil efforts of vile villain The Destructor<\/em>. The sort-of team had been recently joined by two more veterans climbing back into the superhero saddle, but both The Hangman<\/em> and The Wizard<\/em> subsequently succumbed to rapacious greed as the Fly Guys gathered billions in confiscated loot and tried to steal the ill-gotten gains for themselves…<\/p>\n

Finally in November 1965 Mighty Crusaders<\/strong> #1 premiered (by Siegel & Reinman with a little inking assistance from Frank Giacoia & Joe Giella). \u2018The Mighty Crusaders vs. the Brain Emperor\u2019<\/em> sees the heroes bowing to the inevitable after incredible aliens attack at the bilious bidding of an extraterrestrial megamind who could enslave the most determined of individuals with the slightest wrinkling of his see-through brow. However, the mental myrmidon proves no match for the teamwork of Earth\u2019s most experienced crime-crushers…<\/p>\n

Also included in this captivating chronicle is a splendidly strange cover gallery by Reinman.
\n\"\"
\nThe heroes all but vanished in 1967, before impressively resurfacing in the 1980s (albeit as a straight dramatic iteration) under the company\u2019s Red Circle imprint, but again failed to catch a big enough share of the reading public\u2019s attention. Archie let them lie fallow – except for occasional revivals and intermittent guest-shots in regular Archie comedy titles – until 1991, when they licensed its entire cape-&-cowl cohort to superhero specialists DC Comics for a magically fun, all-ages iteration (and where are those star-studded curated collections, huh?!).<\/p>\n

Impact Comics<\/em> was a vibrant, engaging and fun all-ages rethink that really should have been a huge hit but was again incomprehensibly unsuccessful. When the line folded in 1993 the characters returned to limbo until called for one more collaborative crack at the big time in 2008, briefly incorporating Mighty Crusaders & Co into DC\u2019s own maturely angst-ridden and stridently dark continuity – with the usual overwhelming lack of success.<\/p>\n

In 2012 Archie began reinventing their superhero credentials with a series of online adventures under the aegis of a revived Red Circle subdivision, beginning with a second generation of The Mighty Crusaders<\/strong> (reinforced by traditional monthly print versions six months later) and latterly The Fox<\/strong>: new costumed capers emphasising fun and action which were equally welcoming to inveterate fanboys and eager newcomers alike, so there\u2019s still hope for the crazy gang to make good…<\/p>\n

Jerry Siegel\u2019s irreverent, anarchic pastiche of Marvel Comics\u2019 house-style utilising Archie\u2019s aged pantheon of superheroes is one of the daftest yet most entertaining moments of superhero history, and the sentiment and style of these tales has become the basis of so much modern kids animation, everything from Powerpuff Girls<\/strong> to Batman: Brave and the Bold<\/strong> to Despicable Me. <\/strong>That tells me these yarns urgently need to be reissued because at last the world is finally ready for them…<\/p>\n

Weird, wild and utterly over the top! This is the perfect book for jaded veterans or wide-eyed neophytes in love with the very concept of costumed heroes. C\u2019mon, prove me wrong…
\n\u00a9 1965, 2003 Archie Comics Publications, Inc. All Rights Reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Jerry Siegel, Paul Reinman, Frank Giacoia, Joe Giella, Sam Rosen & various (Red Circle Productions\/Archie Comics) ISBN: 978-1-87979-414-6 (TPB) This book includes Discriminatory Content produced in less enlightened times. If you like your superheroes grim, gritty and ultra-serious you won\u2019t like what follows, but honestly in the final analysis it\u2019s not Chekhov or Shakespeare, … <\/p>\n

Continue reading “The Mighty Crusaders: Origin of a Super Team”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[191,141,113,75,125,108,127,111,107],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-32687","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-adventure","category-archie-comics","category-comedy","category-crime-comics","category-humour","category-miscellaneous-superhero","category-nostalgia","category-satirepolitics","category-science-fiction"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p4AFj-8vd","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32687","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=32687"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32687\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":32691,"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32687\/revisions\/32691"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=32687"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=32687"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=32687"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}