Action Comics Weekly #622
☆ Be the first to review + Add to your collection — Join freeAction Comics Weekly #622 holds a modest but real place in late-1980s DC history as one of the few issues during the weekly anthology experiment to spotlight Will Payton's Starman in a standalone short story, giving the freshly launched Copper Age hero additional exposure at the very moment his debut series was finding its footing. The issue also exemplifies what made Action Comics Weekly structurally unusual for its era: a single periodical packaging ongoing serials for Green Lantern, Wild Dog, Blackhawk, and Superman—each by different creative teams and in entirely different genres—under one cover every week. As part of the broader ACW run (#601–642), it contributed to the brief weekly-publication experiment that DC used to road-test characters for their own titles, a production model virtually without precedent for an American mainstream publisher at the time. The concurrent serialization of Hal Jordan's solo adventures here, made possible by DC canceling Green Lantern Corps to funnel the character exclusively into this anthology, also marks one of the more consequential editorial reshufflings of the Copper Age.
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We Buy Collections ▸History
Action Comics converted from a monthly Superman team-up book to a 48-page weekly anthology with issue #601 in May 1988, following the landmark 600th issue, and ran in that format through issue #642 in March 1989. DC deliberately cancelled the ongoing Green Lantern Corps series so that Hal Jordan would anchor the new weekly as its marquee superhero feature, giving the anthology a reliable draw while rotating other characters through serialized backup slots. Issue #622 was edited by a multi-editor team that included Robert Greenberger (overseeing the Starman segment) and Mike Carlin (Superman), reflecting the logistical complexity of producing an anthology with five or six distinct creative teams every single week. The cover for #622 was provided by veteran DC editor and artist Joe Orlando, whose work, as contemporary reviewers noted, made for a striking image even if it did not map directly onto any single interior story.
Trivia · 8 facts
- Cover date: October 1988; published on or around September 1, 1988, with some sources placing the on-sale date as August 30, 1988.
- The issue features a Starman (Will Payton) short story written by Roger Stern and penciled by Tom Lyle—the same creative team behind Starman's ongoing solo series launched the same month.
- Will Payton's Starman first appeared in Starman #1 (October 1988); his appearance in ACW #622 was supplementary promotional exposure, not his debut, running concurrently with the early issues of his own title.
- The Green Lantern segment, titled 'The Edge of Forever,' follows Hal Jordan navigating the edge of his space sector after his power battery's explosion—part of the ongoing James Owsley (Christopher Priest) and Mark Bright serial that was Green Lantern's exclusive home after DC cancelled Green Lantern Corps.
- The Superman two-page strip, 'Seeds of Doubt,' was written by Roger Stern with pencils by Curt Swan and inks by Murphy Anderson—a creative pairing deliberately evoking the visual language of the classic Superman newspaper adventure strip.
- The Wild Dog segment continued the 'Fatal Distraction' arc (Part 8: 'To Help a Child'), written by Max Collins with art by Terry Beatty, one of the longer serialized storylines in the weekly's run.
- The Blackhawk serial and additional features ran alongside the above, with Martin Pasko writing and Rick Burchett on art for Blackhawk—a pairing that would eventually spin off into a Blackhawk ongoing series.
- The cover of #622 was illustrated by Joe Orlando, a longtime DC editor and artist, and was noted by contemporary reviewers as visually arresting but tonally disconnected from the interior anthology stories.
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Reprinted in Justice League [Lega della Giustizia] #4 (1990), Liga da Justiça #24 (1990), Os Novos Titãs #71 (1992), Os Novos Titãs #75 (1992), Superman: The Power Within #[nn] (2015), Blackhawk: Blood and Iron #[nn] (2020)
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