Friday, January 14, 2011

Groove's Faves: The Green Hornet and "The Threat of the Red Dragons" by Newman and Spiegle


Are ya hyped up to see the new Green Hornet flick, Groove-ophiles? Ol' Groove has mixed feelings about what he's seen preview-wise, but is willing to give it a shot. Something I KNOW I dig is the old Green Hornet TV show with Van Williams and the immortal Bruce Lee. As a Bat-fan, Li'l Groove had to watch Batman's darker (!) and more serious (!!) counterpart. Besides, Green Hornet was one of those cool old-time radio heroes Dear Ol' Dad was always telling me about. T'was only natural, then, that Li'l Groove would get his sticky fingers on the Green Hornet comicbooks produced by Gold Key Comics. All three issues (December 1966-May 1967) are pretty cool, but it's ish #2 (February 1967) that's my personal fave. It reads a whole lot like an episode of the 1966-67 TV series, but with a better budget. Author Paul S. Newman could always be counted on for turning out fun stories, and Dan Spiegle never, ever disappointed on the art. Here's hoping that Seth Rogan and Jay Chou read Green Hornet #2's "The Threat of the Red Dragons" if they wanna know how the Green Hornet and Kato really get down!



I just have'ta toss in this special inside-back cover feature from ish #3 spotlighting all of the Green Hornet's groovy gadgets. How many of 'em will pop up in the movie?

2 comments:

  1. Hey Groovy Hornet one!
    I was hoping you were going to post one of these GH books. Hey before I forget, for anyone who can get the ME channel out of Chicago. Sat their going to be airing a Green Hornet marathon! I know it starts 10 central time, but they don't have it listed how long it's on for.

    I'm assuming for 6 or 7 hours. When they aire mini-marathons they usually run till 7pm central time. That's 9 hours & 18 episodes. I think that's the entire series. Thank god I have a spare tv with a old vhs hooked up. Because it's NFL playoff day! I'm pretty disappointed in the new movie from what I've seen of it. Just a campy spoof of some great characters.

    I know in the mid 90's I read George Clooney was offered the role of the Green Hornet. With Jason Scott Lee? Or Jason Lee of the Bruce Lee bio movie Dragon to play Kato once again. He did a excellent job in Dragon. That they were even going to use the original Black Beauty's. Because the studio was looking for the original's owners to restore them free.

    To beable to use them in the new movie. We'll sadly for various reasons it never came to be. Clooney instead ended up playing Batman with batnipples! OY!! He would have been a much better Britt Reid/GH. What might have ben a great movie in the tradition of the Darknight. If the studio execs would have taken these characters seriously like the last two Batman movies. Thanks for posting this great comic. I can't believe they only did three of these!

    Anyone remember those cool GH & Kato bumper stickers? This car is protected by the GH & Kato! Remember the updated theme Flight 76 in the disco era? The guy who did he 5th of beethoven disco hit did it. It's on youtube, dated badly. But was pretty cool in the 70's.

    ReplyDelete
  2. The Green Hornet's gadgets = ¡Cool!

    ReplyDelete

LinkWithin

Blog Widget by LinkWithin
Special thanks to Mike's Amazing World of Comics and Grand Comics Database for being such fantastic resources for covers, dates, creator info, etc. Thou art treasures true!


Note to "The Man": All images are presumed copyright by the respective copyright holders and are presented here as fair use under applicable laws, man! If you hold the copyright to a work I've posted and would like me to remove it, just drop me an e-mail and it's gone, baby, gone.


All other commentary and insanity copyright GroovyAge, Ltd.

As for the rest of ya, the purpose of this blog is to (re)introduce you to the great comics of the 1970s. If you like what you see, do what I do--go to a comics shop, bookstore, e-Bay or whatever and BUY YOUR OWN!