A 100th BIRTHDAY CELEBRATION of the late, great comics creator… By PETER BOSCH Today is a special, celebratory day: the 100th anniversary of Gil Kane’s birth. Kane — born Eli Katz in Riga, Latvia, on April 6, 1926 — is a big-time 13th Dimension favorite and we are finally taking a look at one of his greatest works — His Name Is… Savage. In the 1960s, the spy obsession was everywhere, thanks to James Bond. Movies, TV and comic books, too. And, in return, movies, TV, and comic books got more violent. Blame it on Bond, if you will, but it had been building in other genres. Certainly, war and Western. Anyway, by 1968 we had already seen major comics talents applying themselves to the spy phenomenon: Jack Kirby and Jim Steranko on Nick Fury, Agent of S.H.I.E.L.D. Wally Wood on Total War M.A.R.S. Patrol and T.H.U.N.D.E.R. Agents. Steranko creating Spyman (but drawn by other hands). Plus, there were comic-book adaptations of The Man from U.N.C.L.E., Get Smart, Danger Man/Secret Agent, Mission: Impossible, and Dr. No. But none were like Gil Kane’s magazine, His Name Is… Savage. Though Savage (no first name revealed) was designated a secret agent, nothing done in the single issue of his adventure was done in secret. Savage was a killing machine. You didn’t send him out clandestinely; what you did was — to quote an old expression — “you turned him loose.” The same might be said about Gil Kane. Kane had a career that was known for his incredible artwork no matter the genre: science-fiction, war, Western, adventure, or just plain old romance comics. And let’s never forget his dynamic superhero work (which included co-creating the Silver Age Green Lantern and the Atom). But he was dissatisfied. “When I first started Green Lantern and the Atom, they (DC) wouldn’t allow me to do more than one panel of action, of fighting action in a fight,” he told Gary Groth and Mike Catron in a 1981 interview (printed in Gil Kane’s Savage #1, March 1982, Fantagraphics). However, when he started doing material he had total control over, such as His Name Is… Savage (where he was creator, artist, co-writer, and co-publisher), “I just let loose, I indulged myself in every way.” And he did let himself loose of all restrictions. His Name Is… Savage...
PART 1 of BATMAN FAMILY ALBUM: An interview series with Bob Rozakis — who turns 75! — UPDATED 4/4/26: Bob Rozakis turns 75! Perfect time to reprint our four-part interview series with the Bronze Age stalwart — BATMAN FAMILY ALBUM — from 2015. Dig it. — Dan — The two best Batman runs of the ’70s were by Denny O’Neil and Neal Adams at the beginning of the decade, and Steve Englehart and Marshall Rogers at the end of it. Their stories, simply put, set the foundation of the modern Dark Knight. There were also mighty contributions from the likes of Bob Haney and Jim Aparo in Brave and the Bold, as well as Irv Novick and Len Wein, to name just a few. But over the course of the decade, all three titles starring Batman — JLA and World’s Finest are separate animals — had their ups and downs. There were dozens of memorably unmemorable stories tucked between the masterpieces. Enter Batman Family, the most consistently entertaining Batbook of the 1970s. Of course, we’re only talking 20 issues, many of which were stocked with heavy doses of reprints, but no comic was more fun, issue in and issue out. A lot of that was down to the sensibilities of Bob Rozakis, who crafted much of the book’s content and sense of whimsy. Batman Family was also highly influential: While a number of features and reprints centered on the various supporting characters and villains of Gotham, the focus was on the Batgirl and Robin team — the so-called Dynamite Duo — and their will-they-or-won’t-they relationship. Before Batman Family, there was no sexual spark between the two — at the time the book debuted, Barbara Gordon was a congresswoman and Dick Grayson was a college student. Today, through retcons borne from the seeds sown in the title, Babs and Dick have become DC’s great, star-crossed lovers, youthful contemporaries who learned at Batman’s side in roughly parallel fashion. But that’s something we’ll explore down the road. In this, our first installment of BATMAN FAMILY ALBUM, Bob Rozakis talks about how he ended up with the gig … — Dan Greenfield: It’ll probably be dating both of us by putting it this way, but I grew up reading Batman Family. (Bob laughs) It’s one of those books that I absolutely loved and...
Columnist Christy Blanch pauses before digging in this Thanksgiving.
Your favorite creators remember their favorite holidays!
Come take a journey back to the go-go ’60s!
