Claw the Unconquered #1

History

Editor Joe Orlando shepherded the concept through an unusually tangled pre-publication road: the series was originally developed under the title Talon, but that name conflicted with a project Jim Steranko had planned, and Steranko agreed to supply a rough logo design on the condition that DC rename the book Claw — lettering artist Gaspar Saladino then finished the logo, famously shaping the letterforms C and L into actual claw silhouettes. Writer David Michelinie and artist Ernie Chan — who was simultaneously contributing to Marvel's own Conan titles and was credited here under the name 'Ernie Chua' — together built the prehistoric realm of Pytharia and its cast of villains from scratch, with assistant editor Paul Levitz also contributing the world map that debuted in issue #5. Chan himself later acknowledged the Conan kinship openly while expressing confidence that a longer run would have let the book find its own voice.

Trivia · 8 facts

• First appearance and full origin of Valcan Scaramax, known as Claw the Unconquered, in the story titled 'The Sword and the Silent Scream'; the issue carries a cover date of May–June 1975 and was published on February 20, 1975.
• Created by writer David Michelinie and artist/co-designer Ernie Chan (credited in the issue as 'Ernie Chua'); editor Joe Orlando oversaw the series with Paul Levitz as assistant editor.
• The series was originally developed under the title Talon; a naming conflict with Jim Steranko led to the rename, with Steranko providing a rough logo design and Gaspar Saladino completing the final lettering, including distinctive claw shapes worked into the 'C' and 'L' of the logo.
• First appearance of the villain King Occulas of the Yellow Eye and the prehistoric realm of Pytharia, establishing the cosmological framework — Pytharia as a world balanced between fifteen light and shadow dimensions — that underpinned the entire run.
• Claw's defining trait — a demonic, clawed right hand inherited through a family curse — is established here; Valcan conceals it beneath a crimson gauntlet made of a metal called oraculum.
• The issue debuted as part of a record-setting DC expansion year in which sixteen new titles launched in 1975; Claw was one of several sword-and-sorcery entries alongside Warlord, Stalker, Starfire, and Beowulf.
• The series ran bimonthly until #9 (October 1976), was revived at #10 (May 1978), then abruptly cancelled at #12 as part of the 'DC Implosion'; two completed but unpublished issues (#13 and #14) appeared in the ultra-limited Cancelled Comic Cavalcade #1 (1978), of which only 35 copies were officially produced.
• The character was later revived in a 2006 crossover limited series with Red Sonja (co-published by DC/Wildstorm and Dynamite Entertainment) and a subsequent six-issue Wildstorm solo series by writer Chuck Dixon and artist Andy Smith; Claw has also appeared in Wonder Woman, Time Masters: Vanishing Point, and Dark Nights: Death Metal.

Full credits