Amazing Adventures #18
☆ Be the first to review + Add to your collection — Join freeAmazing Adventures #18 (May 1973) marks the debut of Killraven — Jonathan Raven — Marvel's first fully realized post-apocalyptic freedom fighter and one of the Bronze Age's most ambitious science-fiction concepts. By transplanting H.G. Wells's Martian invasion into a guerrilla-warfare future set in 2018 A.D., the issue launched a series that would push the boundaries of what Marvel's adventure comics could explore thematically, ultimately pioneering what critics have called a groundbreaking examination of colonialism, survival, and human psychology. The issue also replaced the previous Beast feature on the title, signaling Marvel's editorial appetite during this period for darker, literary genre experiments beyond its superhero mainstream. The run that followed — particularly under writer Don McGregor and artist P. Craig Russell — became notable enough to contain what Wikipedia documents as the first dramatic interracial kiss in American color comic books, a distinction whose roots trace directly to the world and cast introduced here.
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The concept gestated for roughly two years before publication: as Roy Thomas recounted in the issue's own letters page, the idea originated around 1971 when Stan Lee — then editor-in-chief — asked Thomas to pitch new series concepts to Lee and publisher Martin Goodman, and Thomas envisioned a vast sequel to Wells's novel pitting humans in guerrilla warfare against returning Martians. The original plot and lead character were developed by Neal Adams, who co-plotted with Thomas; Gerry Conway handled the actual script, while Adams penciled the opening eleven pages before deadline pressures required Howard Chaykin — in what Thomas's text piece described as virtually his Marvel debut — to complete the remaining nine pages, with Frank Chiaramonte inking throughout. John Romita Sr. provided the cover. The split-pencil situation was not planned: a blog post citing a Pencil Ink analysis notes that Adams was late delivering pages and Chaykin was brought in to finish the book, making the issue's production history as turbulent as its post-apocalyptic setting.
Trivia · 8 facts
- First appearance of Killraven (Jonathan Raven), the gladiator-turned-freedom-fighter of Earth-691, cover-dated May 1973.
- First appearance — and death in flashback — of Maureen Raven, Killraven's mother; and first flashback appearance of Joshua Raven, his brother, who would later become the villain Deathraven.
- First appearance — and death in flashback — of Dr. Ann Carver.
- Created by co-plotters Roy Thomas and Neal Adams, with script by Gerry Conway; pencils split between Neal Adams (pages 1–11) and Howard Chaykin (pages 12–20), inked by Frank Chiaramonte, colored by Petra Goldberg, lettered by John Costanza.
- The series concept was explicitly inspired by H.G. Wells's The War of the Worlds, with Thomas citing the Wells chapter 'The Man on Putney Hill' as a direct narrative touchstone; the story opens in medias res in a future New York City (2018 A.D.) at Grand Central Station.
- The issue replaced the previous Beast solo feature on the title, which had ended with Amazing Adventures #16; the Killraven 'War of the Worlds' feature ran through issue #39 (Nov. 1976).
- In 1975, Marvel UK re-purposed the art from this issue and its immediate successors (Amazing Adventures #18–21) into an ersatz strip called 'Apeslayer' for their Planet of the Apes Weekly (#23–30), redrawing Martian opponents as apes and renaming Killraven to suit the franchise — an improvised solution to a reprint shortage that is now recognized as Marvel UK's first quasi-original character.
- The full Killraven run beginning with this issue has been collected in Essential Killraven Vol. 1: War of the Worlds (2005, 504 pages, reprinting Amazing Adventures #18–39 plus Marvel Team-Up #45) and in Marvel Masterworks: Killraven Vol. 1 (hardcover, 2018), both of which include Roy Thomas's original essay about the series' creation.
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Reprints
Reprinted in The Comic Reader #92 (1972), Planet of the Apes #23 (1975), Planet of the Apes #24 (1975), Le Fils de Satan #14 (1979), The Empire Strikes Back Weekly #138 (1980), The Empire Strikes Back Weekly #139 (1980), The Empire Strikes Back Monthly #140 (1980), The Empire Strikes Back Monthly #141 (1980), Essential Killraven #1 (2005), Marvel Firsts: The 1970s #1 (2011), L'ère des Comics Marvel 1961-1978 #[nn] (2017), Marvel Masterworks: Killraven #1 (2018), Killraven Epic Collection: Warrior of the Worlds #1 (2021)
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