Famous First Fridays: OMAC

Have I ever told you how much I loved, loved, LOVED Jack Kirby's OMAC? His futuristic Captain-America-with-a-Mohawk just blew me away when it hit the spinner racks in June of 1974. All those krazy Kirby koncepts about technology and human nature, koupled with slam-bang, leaping-off-the-page-and-into-your-face art just punched all of the right 11 year-old buttons for Young Groove. A giant, sentient, eye-shaped satellite...a faceless, international peace-keeping organization...rooms where you can vent all of your unsavory desires without shame or harming anyone else...super-rich...cities you can rent...I kould go on and on, but you get the picture. This isn't Kirby kreating a kosmic epic as he did with his Fourth World series'; this is Kirby kutting loose with some of the most imaginative sci-fi koncepts of his kareer! Kirby let it all hang out and laid the skinny on us as to what OMAC was all about in the letters page of ish #1. Dig it:















To kall the first issue of OMAC "wild" would be the understatement of all understatements. You'd have to add weird, wacky, and several more adjectives before you'd come klose to describing this masterpiece of mad-science. I mean, how do you even begin to describe..."Build a Friend"?















Of course, Kirby klobbers you with the weird on page one, then heads straight for the action with a magnificent double-page spread on pages two through three!












If Kirby didn't spell out the premise of OMAC klearly enough for ya in his editorial, OMAC's "dialogue" with Lila hammers it on home...

After grabbing our attention with the prologue, Kirby gives us background into the World That's Koming by introducing us to other key players in OMAC's saga, namely the Global Peace Agency (a nameless, faceless international group of unselfish individuals who are working tirelessly toward world peace), Professor Myron Forest (the main brain behind the OMAC project), Brother Eye (the super-komputer/satellite behind OMAC's power), and Buddy Blank (the nebbish who will become OMAC).















With the stage set and players in place, next komes the good stuff! The origin of OMAC!


Kirby then takes us back to where we started, as Brother Eye kontacts OMAC, putting all of the final pieces into place...















Yeah, Young Groove was hooked, baby. Unfortunately, OMAC came out near the end of Kirby's kontract with DC which meant that the King would abandon his DC projects and move back to Marvel. Only Kamandi (did'ja katch any of the little klues as to OMAC's ties to Kamandi, by the by?) would kontinue without Kirby at the helm. In fact, Jack left without even drawing the kover for the eighth and final issue (August 1975).

OMAC would return in 1978, written and drawn by Jim Starlin, as a back-up in (appropriately enough) Kamandi. Kursed again, due to the DC Implosion, Starlin's OMAC happened to appear in Kamandi's final issue (issue #59, June 1978). OMAC got another shot in 1980, when DC (successfully, this time) went back to the 44 page/fifty cent format, appearing in Warlord (beginning with issue #37, June 1980--exactly two years later--how 'bout that?) kontinuing Starlin's epic from where it had left off through issue #39 (August 1980). OMAC kame back for an encore starting with Warlord #42 (November 1981), but unfortunately, Starlin had moved on to other projects during the two year hiatus between Kamandi #39 and Warlord #37 (evidently, he'd kompleted the whole story before the first one had seen print) and the strip fell into the kapable but less kosmic hands of Dan Mishkin, Gary Cohn, and Greg Laroque for the remainder of the Warlord run (ending with issue 47, April 1981). In DC Comics Presents #61 (June 1983--June was always quite a month for OMAC, wasn't it?), Len Wein and George Perez teamed OMAC (back in his original Kirby kostume) up with Superman. In the 1990s, John Byrne revamped OMAC in a mini-series and used him in his Generations series of mini-series. In 2005, Paul Pope gave his interpretation of OMAC #1 in Solo #3, which was nice, because a month later DC gave OMAC an "extreme makeover" for their OMAC Project/Infinite Crisis/Brand New World mess, the less of which is said, the better.

'Kause, you know...Kirby rules.

Bring on the Back-ups: "A Canterbury Tail"

Here's another keeper from the Groovy Age vaults, Groove-ophiles! In the mid-70s, DC ran a series of back-up stories in Kamandi called "Tales of the Great Disaster". These "Tales" explored the world of Kamandi in ways the regular series couldn't do (i.e. by focusing on characters besides Kamandi). In late 1976, the feature was dropped, but this two parter "A Canterbury Tail/Calamity from the Clyde" by Jack C. Harris (with plotting by Paul Levitz), Marshall Rogers, and Terry Austin was too good to be left languishing in limbo, so they printed it in issues 51-52 of Weird War Tales (December 1976-January 1977). It's daring! It's different! It's doggone good! (Groan!)

Those Groovy Saturday Mornings: Fantastic Voyage

Hey, hey, hey, Groove-ophiles! Here's a trippy trip down memory lane: Filmation's Fantastic Voyage! The ABC-TV cartoon was kinda-sorta based on the movie of the same name, but this time instead of micro-surgery, our heroes were going to use their miniscule might to battle the enemies of freedom! I know that's a fact, 'cause Ted Knight says so in the intro! Check it out...




But we're here for the comics, baby! The short-lived cartoon series had an even shorter-lived comicbook series published by Gold Key. I haven't been able to track down any credits for those comics, so if you have any info, please share it with Ol' Groove! Meantime, just dig on the first story from Gold Key's Fantastic Voyage #1 (May, 1969), "The Seed of Power!"

Holiday Tales Bonus! Steve Ditko "On the Day of His Return"

Merry Christmas and Yuletide Greetings, Groovesters! Ol' Groove has a tiny bit of spare time on his hands, so I thought I'd share this little Steve Ditko illustrated gem I dug up. This tale is from DC Comics' Time Warp #3 (November/December, 1979) and is written by Dan Mishkin and Gary Cohn. Time Warp was DC's attempt to revive the sci-fi anthology, by presenting tons of stories by their best writers and artists in the big 68 page Dollar Comic format. The mag was really far-out, but only lasted five issues (July, 1979-March, 1980). Writers Mishkin and Cohn were just starting out at the time, but went on to be quite a prolific writing team in the late 70s/early 80s. You'll hear more about Time Warp, Mishkin, and Cohn as the Diversions keep on comin'! Meantime, enjoy this little quickie!